Wednesday's TV tips
As we all know, England’s performance in the World Cup was nothing to write home about.
Given the result, Blighty’s players could probably have done a better job if they’d been blindfolded and guided by fans using megaphones.
However, following the summer of discontent, hopefully England’s lions will manage to claw back some respect having spent the past few months licking their wounds with this friendly on home turf.
Joining them at Wembley Stadium are Norway, so it’ll be intriguing to see how Roy Hodgson’s men get on here.
A word of advice lads: if you see a net on the opponents’ side, the idea is to put that ball in the back of it.
Given the critical reception to Adrian Chiles’ World Cup presenting skills, England aren’t the only ones looking to up their game.
Here he hosts with Clive Tyldesley and Andy Townsend commentating, and Lee Dixon and Glenn Hoddle providing analysis.
You can’t come up with a perfect recipe for mid-week, primetime entertainment. If you did, the small screen would be bursting with quality shows.
Occasionally all the right ingredients are applied in just the right measure to form a thing of beauty, and The Great British Bake Off is one of those rarities.
Moulded by Mel and Sue, it proves to be a gripping affair, and this week’s portion is no exception as our brave bakers see their pastry skills tested in the latest tasks.
First up is a sweet custard tart, with rhubarb and custard and tropical Manchester tart just two of the offers created.
But how will Team GBBO get on with the technical round when they have to recreate Paul Hollywood’s recipe for mini pear pies?
Later, with a mere four hours to play with, they have to impress Paul and Mary Berry with their showpiece bake – a towering collection of three-tiered pies.
The Homeless Shelter is a brand new TV3 documentary about homelessness in Ireland, and those working to combat it.
Since 1844, the Society of St. Vincent de Paul has worked with a diverse range of people who experience extreme poverty and social exclusion throughout Ireland.
TV3 will document the staff that work in 24 hour shelters and follow those who are in real need of their services.
In this two-part series, we witness the strong commitment that the SVP staff has towards helping all residents that walk through their doors.
We see the daily struggles they encounter while trying to assist those who need help the most. And, we get a true insight into life from inside a shelter from those who know it best, the homeless.
There’s a good chance that without this series, More4 and 4seven would have very little to show. But given the calibre of Kevin McCloud’s series, there’s little wonder it’s repeated so often.
Okay, very few of us have the kind of cash sunk into some of these money pits, or the force of will to alienate dozens of neighbours in the process of making our domestic dream a reality, but that’s often the key elements that make the show so watchable.
The first of a new series centres on Rob Hodgson and Kay Ralph. Inspired by the villas of California, they plan to build a sleek glass-fronted house on a crumbling clifftop in Gwynedd.
To make matters worse, one of the heaviest storms in recent history batters the coast, and erosion experts predict the property could fall into the sea within 60 years.
As ever, our urbane host sows the seeds of doubt at the halfway mark and delivers another fabulous sign off.
Frank Sinatra wanted to wake up in a city that never sleeps. He obviously didn’t spend part of his honeymoon in a New York hotel room with a strange electronic knocking noise at 2am, and a compact bathroom so small The Borrowers would have a tough time using it.
But that’s the thing about the Big Apple: it’s a noisy, beautiful mix of glorious highs and heartbreaking lows.
It was the same in 1951, one of the most exciting times in the city’s history.
American art was shaken up by the work of Jackson Pollock; jazz was given a shot in the arm with bebop, and on the literature front, Jack Kerouac defined the ’beat generation’ with his book On the Road.
And who could forget Marlon Brando taking the cinema by storm?
Certainly not James Fox, who sings all of the above’s praises in the last of the current series.
It’s based on the true story of Erin Gruwell, an idealistic teacher who takes a job at a gang-ridden high school in Los Angeles.
At first, her enthusiasm does little to inspire her pupils or her jaded fellow staff, but she makes a breakthrough when she introduces her class to The Diary of Anne Frank.
By encouraging the teens to write about their own life experiences, it seems she may have succeeded in broadening their horizons.
There’s no shortage of movies about inspirational teachers, but this is one of the better examples of the genre.
Admittedly, if it wasn’t inspired by a true story, some viewers might be a little cynical about just how quickly Gruwell manages to turn her troubled class around, but good performances, especially from leading lady Hilary Swank, keep it very watchable.
Hilary Swank, Patrick Dempsey, Scott Glenn, Imelda Staunton, April L Hernandez,
Joanna Eberhart – a hugely successful president of a TV network, suffers a nervous breakdown after being fired.
She decides to relocate, along with her mild-mannered husband Walter and children, Pete and Kimberly to enjoy an upper-class lifestyle in Stepford.
However, the modern, planned community in Connecticut hides a terrible secret. All of the wives are too perfect, and all of their husbands are way too happy.
Frank Oz’s comedy remake of the classic 1970s chiller was beset by production problems and doesn’t quite work, but it’s worth at least one look.
Nicole Kidman, Matthew Broderick, Bette Midler, Glenn Close, Christopher
Walken
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