36 saturday review 1GR Saturday November 14 2020 | the times
Yes, Prime Minister
BBC Four, 8pm/8.30pmIn a rerun of the classic 1980s
comedy Jim Hacker
(Paul Eddington) settles in to
10 Downing Street only to
make a horrifying discovery:
there’s nobody to cook him
lunch. And while he has the
power to press the nuclear
button, he’s not sure whether
it will even work. His solution,
characteristically, is to cancel
Trident, prompting one of
those wonderfully daft
speeches from cabinet
secretary Sir Humphrey
(Nigel Hawthorne). In the
second episode Hacker
prepares to make his first
public broadcast as PM with,
you won’t be surprised to hear,
much difficulty. BDThe Great Plague:
Outbreak
Channel 5, 9pmJust what we need for
lockdown — an immersive
three-part series about the
Great Plague of 1665. Filming
started just as Covid-19 was
taking hold and the parallels
are not lost on Dr Xand van
Tulleken, the archaeologist
Raksha Dave and the journalist
John Sergeant as they trace its
origins from infected linen,
probably brought over by
French weavers. In a chilling
sequence Sergeant recreates
life as a plague victim, with
gangrenous nose. With just 24
hours to live, Sergeant is most
struck by the sheer loneliness
people would have felt. BDIndustry
BBC Two, 9.15pmIn the second visit to the
trading floor saga the Pierpoint
company is reeling from that
classic drama device — the
death of a lead character in
the first episode. Spoiler alert
if you didn’t see it, but those
all-nighters, uppers and energy
drinks took their toll on poor
Hari and his ticker gave out in
the company lavs. Tonight he
is only remembered as a
potential PR embarrassment
or as a cautionary tale for
the money-hungry graduates
who continue to set about
furthering their careers,
sucking up to power and
getting their ends away. It’s
as mesmerising and addictive
as it is deeply unpleasant. BD● S4C 6.00am Cyw: Timpo (r) 6 .10
Jamborî (r) 6. 20 Tomos a’i Ffrindiau (r)
6 .30 Sigldigwt (r) 6 .45 Stiw (r) 7 .00
Olobobs (r) 7 .05Deian a Loli (r) 7 .20
Anifeiliad Bach Y Byd 7 .30 Sion y Chef (r)
7. 45 Cacamwnci (r) 8. 00 Peppa (r) 8. 05
Bach a Mawr (r) 8 .15 Dwylo’r Enfys (r)
8. 30 Nico Nôg (r) 8 .4 0 Meic y Marchog (r)
8 .55 Wibli Sochyn y Mochyn (r) 9. 05 Yr
Ysgol (r) 9. 20 Digbi Draig (r) 9. 30 Loti
Borloti (r) 9 .4 5 Cei Bach (r) 10. 00 Timpo
(r) 1 0.10Jamborî (r) 1 0.20Tomos a’i
Ffrindiau (r) 10. 30 Sigldigwt (r) 10 .45Stiw
(r) 1 1. 00 Olobobs (r) 1 1. 05 Deian a Loli (r)
1 1.20Anifeiliad Bach Y Byd (r) 1 1.30Sion y
Chef (r) 11. 45 Cacamwnci (r) 12. 00 News
12. 0 5pmTân (r) 12. 30 Heno (r) 1. 00 Y Sioe
Fwyd (r)1.30Ffermio (r) 2 .00 News 2.05
Prynhawn Da 3. 00 News 3. 05 Agor y Clo
(r) 4 .00Awr Fawr: Anifeiliad Bach Y Byd
(r) 4 .1 0 Timpo (r) 4. 20 Jamborî (r) 4. 30
Sion y Chef (r) 4. 45 Cacamwnci (r) 5. 00
Stwnsh: Cath-Od (r) 5 .1 0 Un Cwestiwn (r)
5. 30 Dreigiau: Marchogion Berc (r) 5 .5 0
Ffeil 6. 00 Rhaglen Deledu Gareth (r) 6. 30
Rownd a Rownd (r) 6 .57News S 4 C 7. 00
Heno 7. 30 News 8. 00 Pobol y Cwm 8. 25
Rownd a Rownd 8. 55 News 9. 00 Cymru
Wyllt Gudd 10. 00 Y Teithiwr 1 1. 00 -11. 35
Dim Byd i’w Wisgo (r)
(r) repeat (SL) In-vision signing● BBC One Wales As BBC One except:
11.45am-12.15pm X-Ray (r) 8. 30 - 9. 00
Children’s Ward. New series. Three
critically ill babies arrive within 2 4 hours
● BBC Two Wales As BBC Two except:
4 .30pm First Minister’s Questions 5 .20
Coast (r) 5 .30-6.00 Garden Rescue (r)
● BBC One N Ireland As BBC One except:
10 .45pmSpotlight. Social and political
issues 11. 15 Ovie: Life After Reality TV
1 2.00 My Family, the Holocaust & Me with
Robert Rinder (r) 1 .00am-6.00BBC News
● BBC Two N Ireland As BBC Two except:
1 1. 30 pm-1 2. 30 amHawks and Doves (r)
● BBC One Scotland As BBC One except:
7 .5 0 pm River City. Lenny finds out the
truth about Paul (r)8.20-9.00 Holby City.
Jac rushes in a mystery patient, which
results in a deepening medical crisis
1 1.30-12.30amGetting Hitched Asian
Style. The wedding planners arrange an
Indian Sangeet for a Sikh family (r)
● STV As ITV except: 1 0 .5 0 pmSTV News
10 .55 Scotland Tonight 1 1. 25 Great Art
12. 2 5am All Elite Wrestling: Dynamite (r)
1 .15-5. 05 ITV Nightscreen
● BBC Scotland 7.00pmDoddie Weir: One
More Try (r) 8. 00 The Generation Frame
(r) 9. 00 The Nine 10. 00 This Is Our Story:
Inside Hearts (r) 11. 00 -1 2. 00 The Big
Scottish Book Club (r)I Wish (PG, 2011)
Film4, 12.45am
I Wish is the slow-burning, charming tale of two Japanese brothers
living in different cities after their parents’ separation. Directed by
Hirokazu Koreeda, it takes a child’s eye view of the world. The
younger brother Ryu (Oshiro Maeda) plays an adult role living with
his childlike indie rocker father, while 12-year-old Koichi (Koki
Maeda) stays with his grandparents and mother in the shadow of
an ash-spewing volcano. The boys are trainspotters and discover
that two of the new bullet trains, speeding at 150mph, will cross
at a junction near by, releasing a miraculous energy, which, they
believe, will allow them to wish for reunion. After six months apart
they meet up secretly, along with a rag-tag group of schoolmates,
and the result is delightfully uplifting. (128min) Kate MuirFilms of the day
Happy as Lazzaro (12, 2018)
Channel 4, 2.05am
There’s a risky dramatic strategy at the centre of this Italian-
language fable that won many admirers at the 2018 Cannes film
festival. It’s the eponymous hero, a twentysomething man-child
with doe eyes, a scratchy woollen T-shirt and a penchant for
acquiescing to the abuse meted out by everyone he encounters.
Lazzaro (Adriano Tardiolo, above) is also seemingly immortal. He
falls off a cliff edge in central Italy and is revived by a wolf. He
moves from the failing countryside to a nameless grey poverty-
stricken city with an urge to reconnect with the farmers he knew
before “the fall” (it is possibly metaphorical). Lazzaro, without any
discernible personality, is, at best, a symbol of Italian innocence in
the face of political and economic corruption. (127min) Kevin MaherThe Black Stuff:
Play for Today
BBC Four, 10pmA forerunner to his classic
1982 series Boys From the
Blackstuff, Alan Bleasdale’s
1980 Play for Today introduces
us to his cast of labourers
tarmacking roads, the black
stuff of the title. They are
Yosser (Bernard Hill), Loggo
(Alan Igbon), Chrissie (Michael
Angelis), George (Peter
Kerrigan) and Dixie (Tom
Georgeson) who encounter
a group of gypsies who offer
them a side job, with disastrous
results. Often seen as one of
the great anti-Thatcher dramas,
this original was written in
1978, a year before the Iron
Lady came to power. BDRegional programmes
Catch
up
Being Frank:
The Frank Gardner Story
BBC iPlayer
“I see my life in two halves,”
Frank Gardner says
with characteristic
crispness at the
start of this
revealing
documentary. “The
Frank that travelled
the world
unhindered and
the Frank that
came after.”
The Frank that
came after is the
Frank that was
shot six times in asuburb of Riyadh in June 2004
while doing his job as BBC
security correspondent. One of
the bullets hit his spinal nerves,
leaving him partially paralysed
in his legs. He has, however,
carried on with the job. He
takes us through, with
self-deprecating wit and
beguiling candour, some of
the physical challenges. He
shows off pictures of
young Frank
backpacking around
the world and
finds out from
his specialist
that his
condition is
likely to
deteriorate as
he gets
older.
Dominic
MaxwellTuesday 17 | Viewing guide
Critic’s choice
Offended by Irvine Welsh
Sky Arts/Now TV, 10pm
Who better to step into the
heated debate over wokeness
and cancel culture than Irvine
Welsh, the 62-year-old
Scottish novelist and fearless
chronicler of society’s
scabrous underbelly. Welsh
doesn’t like censorship,
believes it stifles creativity
and thinks people should
accept that being human
sometimes means becoming
occasionally offended. Ideas
(and people), he says, should
be challenged not cancelled. It
sounds like a reasonable point
of view, which he supports by
editing his 1998 novel Filth to
make his racist, misogynist
central character’s words
politically correct. Inevitably
he fails. Welsh is a skilled
interviewer whose subjects
include the artist Jake
Chapman, whose artwork
features sexualised children
and murderous Ronald
McDonalds. Other witnesses
include the comedian Geoff
Norcott (considered cutting-
edge for being a Tory) and the
singer MIA (a Londoner with
Tamil heritage) who felt social
media’s wrath when she
questioned Black Lives Matter
orthodoxy. As Welsh sets out
his case that cultural
prohibitions are about class,
with bourgeois progressive
views the dominant voice in
British society, he is
challenged by the Oxford-
educated Somali-British writer
(and liberal media darling)
Nadifa Mohamed, right with
Welsh. Her call for nuance and
sensitivity in public discourse
leads to a suggestion that
today’s woke activists are
clawing back power to
“dictate the terms” of debate.
Welsh has a problem with her
use of the word dictate. “To
speak truth to power people
really need to express
themselves freely and to say
what they want,” he
concludes. Ben Dowell