the times | Saturday November 14 2020 1GR saturday review 23
The best films
t v & ra di o
Best of the rest
Full seven-day listings & previews
Podcast choice
The Lock In with
Jeremy Paxman
Apple Podcasts
The idea is that the fearsome
old journo gets to interview
people he likes. He’s not all
sweetness and smiles, but his
grumpy charm makes chats
with Richard Dawkins, Michael
Palin and more really fly.
James Marriott
Critic’s choice
The Crown
Sun, Netflix
Series four of the impeccably
evoked royal soap begins in
1979 with the fate of Lord
Mountbatten, but really this
series is all about the 1980s.
Increasingly, the biggest
challenge for the performers
is not falling into caricature.
Joining the cast as Diana is
the newcomer Emma Corrin,
whose initial flirtations with
Charles are imagined in
puckish fashion — over a
shared love of A Midsummer
Night’s Dream. Then there is
Gillian Anderson as Margaret
Thatcher, offering her
deepest, slowest drawl while
seething with resentment at
the entitled classes.
The second episode has the
Thatchers in the Scottish royal
residence failing “the Balmoral
tests” — various undefined
protocols and parlour games
— which is amusing and
ridiculous in equal measure.
During moments such as
these the Windsors are
presented as ultra-aristocratic,
slightly absurd creatures
entirely removed from
normality. Few come out in
a flattering light here, but
it remains an irresistibly
entertaining palatial fantasy.
James Jackson
Radio choice
Archive on Four
Sat, Radio 4, 8pm
Here’s a programme for
political losers, and there’s a
lesson in it somewhere. The
historian Steven Fielding
explores how political parties
recover from big election
defeats. It’s certainly one for
the Labour Party, which
suffered one of its biggest
general election defeats in
December 2019. What lessons
does history have to offer the
politicians as they try to claw
their way back?
Fielding looks at five famous
cases of defeat and rebirth,
starting with Winston Churchill
in 1945 — a shattering defeat
for the Tories, yet they were
back in power six years later.
In 1959 Labour lost its third
election in a row; by 1964
Harold Wilson had turned it
around for them. In 1979 the
Conservatives needed all the
help they could get — having
won only once in a decade.
Then along came Margaret
Thatcher. Michael Foot
couldn’t steer a Labour victory
in her wake, neither could Neil
Kinnock. But in 1997 Labour’s
shining knight Tony Blair put
the Tories on the back burner
after 18 years in office.
Among those Fielding talks
to is the Times columnist (and
Conservative peer) Daniel
Finkelstein, along with
pollsters and former advisers.
And, Fielding asks, what do
these stories of changes in
party leadership, organisation
and image have to offer Keir
Starmer as he tries to bring
Labour back from the brink?
Debra Craine
Josh O’Connor as the Prince
of Wales and Emma Corrin
as Princess Diana
The best films
Best of the rest
Small Axe
Sun, BBC One, 9pm
The first in Steve McQueen’s
anthology is Mangrove,
starring Shaun Parkes, below,
an account of a Notting Hill
restaurant at war with
racist Britain. It’s not
subtle, but it’s done
with class, the era
superbly captured.
I’m a Celebrity...
Get Me Out of Here!
Sun, ITV, 9pm
No tropical bugs, jungle
shorts or gratuitous waterfall-
bikini shots — this time we’re
in lockdown and this comes
from a chilly castle in Wales.
Offended by Irvine Welsh
Tues, Sky Arts, 10pm
In which the Trainspotting
author tries rewriting a page
of his savage prose to meet
today’s politically correct
standards — which turns it
into complete bilge. All
part of a thoughtful
exploration of how
the increasingly
offended nature of
our society is killing
artistic expression.
The Good Lord Bird
Wed, Sky Atlantic, 9pm
A wild new drama about
slavery in pre-Civil War
America in which Ethan
Hawke knowingly dials it up
to the max as the militant
abolitionist John Brown. This
is not a boring prestige
American history drama, but
an unhinged romp that can at
times feel, as one character
calls Brown, “as nutty as a
squirrel’s turd”.
The Blackadder Collection
BBC iPlayer
Back today on iPlayer are
all four series of the classic
comedy and, not counting
the first one, it’s hard to
know which series is the
best. Perhaps the more
cynical Rowan Atkinson
got the better. JJ
Journey’s End (12)
Sat, BBC Two, 9pm
Sam Claflin is Captain
Stanhope in a respectable film
of RC Sherriff’s play about life
in the trenches; Toby Jones
steals his scenes as the cook.
The Man Who Would
Be King (PG)
Sun, Film4, 6.10pm
The Rudyard
Kipling yarn can’t
be bettered as
tribute-viewing
to Sean
Connery
goes, with
Connery and Michael Caine,
below, a peerless double act.
Jojo Rabbit (12)
Sky Cinema
Risky comedy about a Hitler
Youth boy forced to realise
the vileness of his imaginary
friend: the Führer.
The Lighthouse (15)
Sky Cinema
Willem Dafoe
and Robert
Pattinson
go mad in
isolation —
a mystery
like no
other. JJ