49
Daily Mail, Wednesday, August 7, 2019How many Gregg Wallaces does
it take to bore viewers to tears?
ANCIENT CURSE OF THE NIGHT:
The hugely entertaining World
War Weird (Yesterday channel)
returned with the tale of how
Stalin might have triggered
Hitler’s 1941 invasion of the USSR
by angering a 14th-century
warlord’s ghost. Bizarre!W
AH HeY HeY!
oi oi! Woah!
Gregg Wallace is
back and, boy,
has he got some
statistics for us!
Gregg loves numbers. Better still,
he loves telling us how the numbers
compare to other numbers.
Confronted with a lorry delivering
rolls of cotton on Inside The Factory
(BBC2), he demanded to know
how much each one weighed.
The answer: 160kg. Woah! ‘That’s
about two Gregg Wallaces,’ he
bellowed, his shiny head already
reeling. And there was more incred-
ible information to come. Unrolled,
the bale would stretch 500 metres.
‘That’s a phenomenal amount of
cloth,’ gasped Gregg, so staggered
that for a moment he was unable
to conceive of a suitable analogy.
There’s the problem with these low-
budget shows packed with numbers:
your brain becomes overloaded.
Gregg was in South Shields to
see waxed jackets being made, the
type worn by country types of all
classes — equally practical for
standing in the pouring rain at a
point-to-point or stuffing snaffled
pheasants into the capacious
inside pockets.
Some of his stats seemed dodgier
than the village poacher, mind you.
The presenter watched the rolls of
cotton being run under a jet of
orange flame to sear off any stray
threads. ‘The singeing machine isshooting out gas-fuelled flames at
2,000 degrees Celsius,’ he told us.
Are you sure, Gregg? i ask only
because i seem to remember from
long-ago chemistry lessons that
flame burns orange at around
2,000 Fahrenheit, not Celsius.
At 1,500c flames turn white and
cut through metal. To create heat
of 2,000c would require experimen-
tal lasers, and even then it might
cause the surrounding air molecules
to dissolve into plasma.
They’re only making waterproof
jackets at this factory, not splitting
the atom.
Poor old Gregg dashed away to the
next spectacle, getting ever more
confused. Told that the jacket
pockets were lined with moleskin (a
heavy felt-like cotton), he wondered
how a mole’s skin would feel.
kerry, the lady on the sewing
machine, regarded him with pity.
‘i’ve held a hamster. They’re
furrier,’ she said helpfully.
Alan Titchmarsh’s jaunt around
the stately home of the Marquess
of Anglesey in Secrets Of The
National Trust (C5) was both more
reliable and more entertaining
because it gave us stories insteadInside The Factory HHIII
Secrets Of The National Trust HHHHI
CHRISTOPHER
STEVENS
LAST NIGHT’S TV
of numbers. This pile belonged
200 years ago to Henry William
Paget, the suicidally brave officer
at Waterloo who lost a limb to a
cannonball, riding at Welling-
ton’s side. All he said was: ‘By
God, sir, i’ve lost my leg’ — to
which the Duke replied calmly:
‘By God, sir, so you have.’
Alan was delighted to see theMarquess’s wooden leg, hinged
at the knee to help him when
dancing. He was more delighted
still to see an immense mural
created by his favourite artist,
the dashing Rex Whistler.
Rex was besotted with the
Pagets’ eldest daughter when he
painted it. (And here’s a fact
Alan didn’t mention: Rex wasthe inspiration for Charles Ryder,
the Jeremy irons character in
Brideshead Revisited.)
We learned too of the black
sheep, the fifth Marquess, who
blew the family fortune on parties
and theatrical extravaganzas. ‘if
there was an edwardian equiva-
lent of a rock ’n’ roll lifestyle, he
lived it,’ remarked one historian.
Marquess no 5 married his
cousin and loved to shower her
naked body with jewels before
gazing at her curves fervently.
Three years later, his lovemaking
had gone no further than that.
The marriage was never consum-
mated, and they separated.
That’s the sort of stuff that
makes for memorable telly — not
botched statistics.TELEVISION
FILM CHOICES
I Didn’t Kill My Sister, 2.15pm, Ch5
LIVING in the shadow of your more
successful sister, who works as a local
news anchor, is a motive for murder in
this comfortingly predictable murder
mystery. Luckily for accused sibling
Heather (Nicholle Tom), other suspects
line up as she fights to clear her name.The League Of Gentlemen,
11pm, Talking Pictures TV
CLASSY British
crime caper,
with Bryan
Forbes on both
writing and
acting duties.
Jack Hawkins
(pictured) tops
a fine cast as
the gentleman
thief who sets
out to commit
the perfect crime — with a little help from
a misfit band of ex-Army rogues, including
Roger Livesey and Richard Attenborough.me withalittlehelpfromCHANNEL 5
6.00 Milkshake! Peppa Pig (R,HD) 6.15 Ben
and Holly’s Little Kingdom (R) 6.30 Olly the
Little White Van (R,HD) 6.35 Noddy: Toyland
Detective (R,HD) 6.45 Fireman Sam (R,HD)
6.55 Thomas & Friends: Big World! Big
Adventures! (R,HD) 7.05 Shane the Chef (R,HD)
7.20 Peppa Pig (R) 7.30 Peppa Pig (R,HD)
7.40 Top Wing (R,HD) 7. 5 5 Paw Patrol (R,HD)
8.05 Digby Dragon (R,HD) 8.20 Little Princess
(R,HD) 8.40 Shimmer and Shine (R,HD) 8.55
Floogals (R,HD) 9.10 Sunny Bunnies (HD)
9.15 Jeremy Vine (HD)
11.15 GPs: Behind Closed Doors (AD,R,HD)
A woman is experiencing dizzy spells.
12.10 5 News Lunchtime (R,HD)
12.15 GP’s Behind Closed Doors (AD,R,HD)
Patients dealing with persistent pain.
1.10 Access (HD)
1.15 Home and Away (AD,HD)
1.45 Neighbours (AD,HD)
2.15 I Didn’t Kill My Sister (2015) (PG) ●
(HD) Thriller, starring Nicholle
Tom and Chris William Martin.
See Critics’ Choice.
4.00 Friends (R,HD)
4.30 Friends (R,HD)
5.00 5 News (HD)
5.30 Neighbours (AD,R,HD) Amy
suggests to Gary that they bring
their wedding day forward.
6.00 Home and Away (AD,R,HD) Tommy
continues to manipulate Bella.
6.30 5 News Tonight (HD)7.00 Chris Tarrant: Extreme Railway
Journeys (R,HD) Chris sets out on
a mission to cross Estonia, Latvia
and Lithuania entirely by rail in
just one week, uncovering stories
from the Baltic states’ Soviet-era
past. (Followed by 5 News Update)8.00 GPs: Behind Closed Doors
(AD,HD) Dr Amir Khan is
concerned about a diabetes
sufferer’s weight, while a girl is
brought in with a swollen belly
and skin rashes. Last in series.
(Followed by 5 News Update)9.00 Casualty 24/7 (HD) Patients
include an elderly man due
to fly to Cyprus in two days,
an ex-miner with breathing
difficulties, a youngster with
a footballing injury and a case
of suspected meningitis.10.00 Vanished: The Murder of
Charlene Downes (HD) On
November 1, 2003, 14-year-old
Charlene Downes left her home
in Blackpool and was never
seen again. This documentary
examines the events that
followed. A wall of lies and
misinformation hindered the
subsequent investigation into
Charlene’s disappearance,
until one man stepped forward.
The information this witness
gave led to the discovery of
a grooming-gang scandal.12.55 Britain’s Greatest Bridges (R,HD)
1.10 The 21.co.uk Live Casino Show
(HD) 3.10 Gotham: Wrath of the
Villains (R,HD) 4.00 Gotham: Wrath
of the Villains (R,HD) 4.45 House
Doctor (BSL,R) 5.10 Great Artists
(BSL,R) 5.35 Wildlife SOS (BSL,R)(^) ▲ Particularly liable to offend
WELSH TV VARIATIONS
BBC1: 11.45am Weatherman Walking: The Welsh
Coast. 1.30pm BBC Wales Today; Weather. 6.30
BBC Wales Today; Weather. 7.30 Eisteddfod 2019
with Jason Mohammad. 10.25 BBC Wales Today;
Weather. 10.35 Hell On Wheels. 11.15 Can You Beat
the Bookies? 12.15am Serengeti. 1.20 BBC News.
ITV: 8.00pm Eisteddfod 2019. Highlights of this year’s
National Eisteddfod. 10.45 Ainsley’s Caribbean
Kitchen. 11.10 Ross Kemp: Living with Young Carers.
11.40 Killer Women with Piers Morgan.
S4C: 6.00am Cyw. 10.00 Eisteddfod Genedlaethol
Cymru 2019. 12noon Newyddion S4C a’r Tywydd.
12.05 Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru 2019. 2.00
Newyddion S4C a’r Tywydd. 2.05 Eisteddfod
Genedlaethol Cymru 2019. 4.15 Eisteddfod
Genedlaethol Cymru 2019. 6.25 Newyddion S4C
a’r Tywydd. 6.30 Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru
- 9.00 Newyddion 9 a’r Tywydd. 9.30 Eisteddfod
Genedlaethol Cymru 2019. 10.30 Y Babell Len 2019.
11.30 Un Swig Arall: Llanrwst 89. 12midnight
Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Cymru 2019.
FILM
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