The Hurley’s Guadeloupe experience looked like my kind of holiday – 16- hour flight delay, two punctures and “Wanda overcome by sulphur fumes”.Up at the top end of the travel market, two Clives were fearlessly exposing bald spots in hot spots. Intestinal warfare doesn’t get much of a press on escapist strands, so it was a relief to turn to The Real Holiday Show (C4). “For those who doubt the story,” said Judith brightly, “they have tried to take cuttings and grow it elsewhere but failed.” So God moves in mysterious ways, but sensibly draws the line at pruning.Judith was ecstatic about the “choices” available. On my Egyptian vacation, the choices basically came down to one: sitting on the lavatory or kneeling in front of it. Here, we got introduced to the Burning Bush from which Jehovah addressed Moses. The show offered its regular pleasures: desperate links (“they’re very much a nation of tea-drinkers here in Egypt”) and a Home Counties take on other cultures (“Even the bedouins wrap up!”) My favourite bit comes when Judith tries to raise the tone.
No-nonsense headmistress of the old school of travel reporting, Judith was making the very best of the Sinai – “So far unaffected by terrorist troubles!” – in Wish You Were Here? (ITV). How perverse not to set Carol and Lamin’s story in a wider context. They could have started by quoting the Gambian minister who recently chastised tourists for using his countrymen as “shag bunnies”.At least you can rely on Judith Chalmers not to do anything to foreigners that involves removing her Jaeger safari two-piece and character kerchief. Much was made of the parallel with the Deirdre- Samir relationship in Coronation Street, as if to approach the condition of soap were now the highest aim of documentary. No doubt, editor Stephen Lambert will have got brownie points in the new populist BBC for a titillating bit of scheduling: certainly, there are plenty of people eager to watch a freak show starring a young black buck and an old bird. I wonder if producer Helena Appio would ask white middle-class subjects if they had “done it”.
What were we meant to gather from this costly 50 minutes? That Carol was painfully deluded? That Lamin was little better than an exotic pet in a crude transaction? If the intention was to expose racism, it backfired. The first film in the new Modern Times slot, it followed the fortunes of Carol, a 52-year-old Londoner, and Lamin, the 27-year-old beach boy she fell for in the Gambia and was now bringing over to Britain for marriage. If the Maxwell brothers can obtain an injunction against a musical about their rotten father, why has Des Squire no means of restraining those who would kill his daughter a second time?No need to dismount from your high horse before Mad About the Boy (BBC2). An uncanny analysis of Carlton’s strategy: true crimes, unbelievable ethics. Des Squire, Penny’s father, said on Monday that he had been informed about the project as filming was about to begin He believed it was “profiting from tragedy”.
Skewing all emotions to establish Christie as the real victim, it buried what remained of Duncan McAllister’s reputation. “No endorsement has been sought or received from anyone depicted,” said a notice at the end It read like a boast, not an apology. Mysteriously, the camera which has repeatedly cut back to the bloody mess on Susan’s hands during her miscarriage is overcome with reticence when it’s time to show the slaughtered Penny.As its title suggests, Beyond Reason washed its hands of rational process. Murdering Penny starts to seem understandable – positively sensible in the light of all Susan’s suffering and snot Just think of the money she could save on tissues The killing itself is a tasteful affair. With those big stricken eyes and the full mouth always ready to ripen into a sob, she can rival Juliet Stevenson for scalding honesty and gloopy grief.
Penny remained a remote figure – a cool Sloane smile in a frame by the marital bed. You figured this was intentional: hard to care about her death when she never really came alive.The casting was shameless: the blonde Ehle looks nothing like the warm brunette she played, and Hardie is much cuter than the real Christie. Our loyalty was skilfully fastened on to Susan (Kate Hardie). We got to know the plucky wee girl, her nice mum and dad, the layout of her bedroom, the contours of her dreams. We were privy to Susan’s feverish capitulation to Duncan (“I want to be special”) and her dependence on the man who took her virginity as if it were just another dive.
