Not having a laugh

The annual British Comedy Awards proved to be a bit of a damp squib, with the so-called cream of our comedic talent failing to raise many laughs in a ceremony that lasted under two hours but felt more like four and bizarrely began on ITV1 and ended on ITV2.

The only real moment of note came on ITV2 when a seemingly intoxicated Oliver Stone stumbled out and started burbling on about Jack the Ripper, which is hardly the cleverest thing to do given the current mood of the nation. He might have got away with such terrible taste and timing if his remarks were actually in any way funny but they weren’t and Liza Tarbuck very wisely chose not to bandy words with him when it became obvious that he was less than coherent.

Jonathan Ross was given a Writer’s Guild award though presumably not on the strength of material he used during the show. He gave credit to Danny Baker and fair play because he seems to have been recycling much of his material for over a decade now. Ross and Gervais insulting each other on this show is becoming as much a part of our pre-Christmas ritual as stuffing a turkey and is about as much fun.

Catherine Tate finally managed to bag an award but wasn’t there to receive it while Harry Hill took two but it seems ages since he was on the box. Indeed, so many of the nominations seemed to for things that came out eons ago, like Wallace and Gromit winning best movie when I’m fairly sure it was in cinemas before last year’s awards.

The event felt dated, boring and lacking in the sort of dangerous tension that used to make the thing unmissable. It was crying out for a Kathy Burke or Johnny Vegas to perk things up. Madonna did threaten to give the host a black eye but sadly failed to deliver a moment that may well have got a standing ovation.

The spice of life

Variety may not be dead but if this year’s Royal Variety Performance was anything to go by, it could well be on its last legs.

The show was topped and tailed by John Barrowman who the BBC just can’t seem to get enough of these days. As well as Captain Jack, he has also popped in Maria and anywhere where a bit of West End showmanship is called for. Don’t be too surprised if the All Singing All Dancing Six O’Clock News with John Barrowman turns up next year.

Wood get serious

After tickling our funny bones since the early eighties, Victoria Wood got all serious and dramatic on us.

Yes, Housewife, 49 turned out not to be a documentary about Madonna after all but a tale of the war years of Nella Last, a woman whose drab life became greatly enhanced by her work with the WVS during the second world war.

There was nothing particularly extraordinary about Mrs. Last’s story but thanks to Wood’s marvellous script, this story of someone’s journey from the mundane to the slightly less mundane managed to hold the interest for two hours. Things were helped along greatly by marvellous turns from David Threlfall and Stephanie Cole.

Something Kinda Oooh

Seasoned actress, I mean ghost hunter Yvette Fielding, has been making the slightest creak of the floorboards seem like a massive psychic event for several years now. She’s got so good at it that the mere prospect of heading off to a “haunted house” with her freaked Nadine Coyle out so much that she didn’t take part in Ghost Hunting with Girls Aloud.

What took this beyond being just a celebrity episode of Most Haunted was the presence of psychologist Geoffrey Beattie to deconstruct some of the behaviours of the girls as Yvette managed to give them the heebie-jeebies in no small measure.

It has to be said though that the level of swearing from the group would have made Gordon Ramsay blush.

While the show was entertaining enough at first, at two hours it was really dragging on for me by the end. They’d have done better to have split it into two episodes. It was appropriate that the show was sponsored by Sekonda because I certainly kept looking at my watch towards the end.

What’s wrong with being desk bound

With a serial killer still on the loose in Suffolk, our news broadcasters flooded the area with reporters (which is understandable) but also presenters. I’m sceptical as to how much it adds to our understanding of a story to have the news bulletins anchored from the area of the story. At one point it really looked as though the various channels were jockeying for position outside Suffolk Constabulary.

Prostitution is regarded as the world’s oldest profession but apparently the word ‘prostitute’ isn’t politically correct enough for our current crop of journalists so ‘sex worker’ became the buzzword of the week, which was odd.

Terrible as events were, there were times when both the BBC and ITV seemed to be dwelling on the story rather than giving us the pertinent information then moving on. As you’d expect, Newsnight offered the most intelligent, incisive and waffle-free coverage of what is a very frightening event.

Dancing with tears in my eyes

You evil people! You finally voted Baby Spice out of Strictly Come Dancing this week. What took you so long?

I’m no dance expert and it’s the personalities rather than the actual steps that interest me and from that perspective, it’ll be a fairly dull finale. Frankly, I lost a lot of interest when Claire King was knocked out. I wish she’d go back to Emmerdale.

May your days be merry and bright

I really like Doctor May in EastEnders though the sight of her injecting herself in he belly is not what I want to see while I’m eating my dinner thanks very much. It was almost as disturbing as Bert without his beard.

While May is desperate to conceive, Dopey Dawn is up the duff by the doc’s errant hubby Rob and the inevitable upcoming storyline should be a bit of an emotional rollercoaster.

Rob suffered the ultimate humiliation of being talked down to by Keith, a man who looks so scruffy that I’m tempted to spat Oust at the telly everytime he appears on screen.

Certainly it’s more watchable than watching the Fowler clan go through its death throes. The sooner the twin black clouds of Pauline and Sonia are removed from Walford, the happier I’ll be.

I’ll miss Ray Brooks though.

Goosy Goosy

Nigella’s Christmas recipes look so pricey to me that it occurred to me that the only section of society that afford to do them would be that which probably hires outside caterers anyway.

What would actually be useful would be a cookery show helping us to have cracking festive fayre on a limited budget.