LISTINGS TELEVISION
TELEVISION
A selection or television highlights, listed by day, in chronological order. Television listings compiled by Eddie Gibb.
FRIDAY 10
I Ellen (Channel 4) 9-9.30pm. Platonic friend Adam is moving out of the flat and Ellen is gutted.
I Doctor Finlay (Scottish) 9—l0pm. Last visit to Tannochbrae this series. as all three doctors in the practice face personal struggles which affect their work.
I Rising Damp (Channel 4) 9.30—l0pm. Rigsby starts working out after Miss Jones mentions that she prefers her men with muscles.
I Billy Connolly’s Return to Rose and Beak (BBCl ) 9.30—l0.25pm. Warm up for next week's Comic Relief fundraiser. with the Big Yin travelling to Mozambique (his daughter thought it was called ‘nose and beak' — thus the show‘s title) to find out how the funny money is being spent.
I Roseanne (Channel 4) l0—l().30pm. Bev is picked up for drink~driving; Roseanne and Jackie post bail.
I The Jack Dee Show (Channel 4) l0.30—l 1.05pm. Deadpan stand-up from happy Jack. plus a singalong with Marcella Detroit.
I Night Moves (Scottish) 10.30pm—1225am. Complex psychological thriller with Gene Hackman as a private eye hired to track down a wealthy women whose evil mother wants to lay claim to her money.
I The Word (Channel 4) ll.05pm—l2.05am. Usual mix of bands. American gossip and embarrassed interviewees introduced by Terry Christian and Dani Behr.
I The Mrs Merton Show (BBC2)
ll.15—l l.45pm. Mancunian OAP (Caroline Hook in make-up) tries to humiliate her low-grade celebrity guests. I Buckman (BBCZ) l 1.45prn—12.10ant. A duck detective with orange hair and a pig for a sidekick is the hero of this cult American cartoon.
I Beavls and Butt-Read (Channel 4) 12.05—12.40am. MTV videos intercut with pearls of wisdom from this pair of cartoon airheads.
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I Just a Gigolo (Channel 4) 12.35—2.35am. David Bowie stars in this bizarre film set in pre-Hitler Germany about a World War I veteran who finds work as a gigolo. Marlene Dietrich‘s final film. but not much of a swansong.
SATURDAY 11
I The Island or the Aye-Aye (Channel 4) 8—9pm. Shown as a tribute to animal author Gerald Durrell. who died recently. this wildlife film is about the search for a rare Madagascan lemur called the aye- aye.
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I In the 60s, Lew Grade’s ATV was the source or a seemingly endless stream of low- budget paranoid thriller series that looked more like American television. The Prisoner, The Saint, The Persuaders — they were all from the ATV stable, and so was The Champions which has just been revived by BBC2. The scene is set in the extended first episode, in which three research scientists are so seriously injured when their plane crashes in the Tibetan mountains, death seems inevitable. But, miraculously, they regain consciousness, unhurt and with special powers of survival. The Champions starts on Friday 17 March on BBC2 at 6.25pm.
I Casualty (BBCl) 8.05—8.55pm. A light aircraft crashes when a women loses control during latrding.
I Bookmark (BBCZ) 8.05—9.05pm. Film about Rumer Godden. author of Black Narcissus and The River. who makes an emotional journey back to India where she lived during the war.
I Caught on Camera (Scottish) 8.15—8.45pm. Just what we needed. another candid camera show! The gimmick is it mixes Beadle with the real- life emergency rescue format. as Michael Aspel introduces footage including an eleven-year-old trapped under ice. Did the cameraman actually think of rescuing the lad?
I Aut Wiedersehen, Pet (Channel 4) 9—lOpm. First ever episode of the ' excellent drama about a bunch of builders who head to Germany itr search of work. See preview.
I Down Among the Big Boys (BBC l)
9. 15-10.45pm. Repeat of Peter McDougall's entertaining underworld drama. with Billy Connolly as ganster JoJo Donnelly.
I The White Room (Channel 4)
10—1 1.05pm. First in the new music seri.'s fronted by Mark Radcliffe. See preview. I Born on the Fourth of July (BBC2)
IO. lOprn—12.30am. Oliver Stone's overblown (is there any other kind of Stone movie) but worthwhile film about Vietnam vet Ron Kovic who returns from the war in a wheelchair and becomes embroiled in the anti-Vietnam movement. Tom Cruise gives an excellent performance as Kovic.
I The Red Light Zone (Channel 4) ll.05pm—2.50am. Starting tonight for the next eight weeks, Channel 4 is devoting Saturday nights to sex. sex. sex and more sex. It goes without saying that this will be handled in the spirit of truthful social documentary. and should not be interpreted as an attempt to titillate the viewer in any way. With that clearly understood. we can reveal the first night's schedule looks like this: NYPD llude
(l 1.05pm). The story of the New York cop who stripped for Playboy and just about lost herjob in the process. The Peanut Club (11.40pm). Film about a strip club in Los Angeles favoured mainly by women. White Jazz ( 1 1.50pm). Dramatised documentary about crime writer James Ellroy. Blue (12.55am). Cult director David Cronenberg plays a man obsessed by pornography. Chicken Shack (1.20am). Nick Broomfield‘s documentary about an
'I Party of Five (Channel 4) 6.05—7pm.
up-market brothel iii the Nevada desert.
I Chet Baker - The last Bays (BBCZ) 1.30-2.35am. Documentary about the last days of the jazz trumpeter who took a dive out of a hotel roorrr in Arrrsterdam.
I Comedy Rules (Scottish) 1.45-2.15am. More clips from the Fringe last year. with Scott Capurro and the Tokyo Shock Boys.
The live Salinger's struggle to keep the family together after the death of their parents.
I Dr nuinn, Medicine Woman (Scottish) 6. l0—7pm. New series of the drama about a stong-willed woman doctor on the American frontier in the l860s.
I The Big Picture (BBC2) 7.15—7.55pm. A Public [Eye special about criminal justice. or lack of it. in which Thames Valley chiefconstable Charles Pollard argues that court rules designed to protect the innocent are being exploited by sharp defence lawyers to get guilty clients off the hook. The film is followed by a debate on the issues raised (7.55—8.25pm).
I Moving Pictures (BBCZ) 8.20—9.10pm. Howard Schuman reports on Nell and the ‘wild child’ movies that preceded it.
I When Harry Met Sally . . . (BBCl) 9.05—1 lpm. Nora Ephron's classy romantic comedy with Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan as college males who don't hit it off the first time they meet. or the second. but eventually they get it together. several years later.
I little Man Tate (Channel 4)
lO—l 1.55pm. List cover star Jodie Foster's first film as director in this moving story about a working class mother struggling to give her seven-year-old prodigy son an education that will challenge him.
I The South Bank Show (Scottish)
10. 15—1 1.15pm. More Jodie Foster with an in-depth interview with the actress promoting her new film Nell. See feature. I light Sleeper (BBC2) llpm— l 2.45am. Willem Dafoe atrd Susan Sarandon star in Paul Schrader's complex thriller about a drug dealer and his varnpislt boss. who are increasingly concerned about the direction of their sleazy lives.
I Don’t look Down (Scottish)
ll. lSpm—midnight. Tonight‘s arts programme presented by Janice Forsyth takes a look at Glasgow School of Art’s 150th anniversary. plus a film about the Scottish jazz scene featuring our own jazzman Kenny Mathiesorr.
MONDAY 13
I Cutting Edge (Channel 4) 9— 10pm. First time a documentary crew has been allowed to film in a British casino.
I She’s Out (Scottish) 9—10pm. Lynda La Plante's series about Dolly Rawlins‘ life after doing time in lVlt/()ll'.\' continues. Dolly tries to cut a deal with her former jail males who want a share of her diamond haul.
I Panorama (BBC 1 ) 9.30—10. 10pm. Investigation into privatised water companies who seem to have ‘profits on
tap . I Game On (BBCZ) 9.30-10pm. Mandy‘s dreaming of Bermuda, while Matt attd Martin dream of ‘hot babes'. as ever. in Andrew Davies‘ llatshare sitcorrr.
I NYPD Blue (Channel 4) lO—l().55pm. The charred remains of a pregnant woman are discovered in a field.
I Ruling Passions (BBCZ) l0—lo.30pm. The series about sex and empire continues with an examination of the ‘black peril‘ which was regarded as such a threat to white women’s moral well-beirrg.
I Face to Face (BBC2) 11.15—1 1.55pm. Jeremy lsaacs meets Kerr Dodd in the rtrinimalist studio interview format.
I Crush (Channel 4) l l.3()pnr—l.25am. New Zealand filmmaker Alison Maclean‘s feature about a woman who takes the place of her'jonrnalist friend who is injured in a car crash. She shows up for an interview with a famous writer and quickly seduces him. before moving on to his daughter. Noirish plot which explores sexual identity.
I Without Walls (Channel 4) ‘J—lOpm. The second part of the Arm) [front-u series looks at the family car. Followed at 9.30pm by Dead Wes! — The War all the American Desert. a look at the impact of nuclear tests on the Nevada Desert through the lens of photographer Richard Misraclr.
I Murder Most Horrid ( BBCZ) 9-9.30pm. A yuppie couple have granny (Dawn French) to stay but when the husband loses hisjob he starts eyeing up his mother-in-law‘s legacy.
I Cardiac Arrest (B BC2) 9.3()—l()pm. Dr Collin confirms an elderly patient has cancer. but then she stops breathing.
I Closing Numbers (Channel 4) 10—1 1.55pm. Jane Asher is a woman who has known for some tinre that her husband. is having an affair. but she is shocked to discover that it's with a rrratr.
I Ex-S(BBC1) l().25—l().55pm. ln-depth profile of Scottish Writer of the Year Janice Galloway whose story The Trick is to Keep Breathing is being adapted for the Tron stage later this year.
I Network First (Scottish)
10.40-l l.40pm. Documentary about the photojournalists with a Belfast press agency who have documented the rnonumentous changes over the last year as the peace process rolls on.
The List lO-23 Mar 1995 77