Captain Poldark's heaving bosom reigns supreme
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Version 0 of 1. Never wear a tightly laced corset for a posh dinner, especially when you’re pregnant “I have chores.” “Suppose I have other plans for you ...?” Heavens to Betsy. Bring on the storm of pilchards before everyone gets too excited. It’s the Rick Stein Special! Poldark was followed by a live chat with the captain himself (Aidan Turner) on Sunday night. Favourite questions of the #AskPoldark hashtag? “Will there be a Poldark calendar?” “Have you just made pilchards the new aphrodisiac?” “You are fit. How did you get fit?” (Sunday, BBC1) The episode was all about married life with “one day Miss Skivelly-Scuvverly kitchen maid the next she Miss High and Mighty.” “Any number of girls from rising families and who does he choose? His serving wench.” “Doors which were open will be slammed in his face.” Zoe Ball was pushing her own hashtag – #heavingbosoms – ahead of tonight’s outing and who could blame her? Although the only bosom most viewers seem interested in, Captain Poldark’s, is indeed rarely and chastely glimpsed. Is the captain “reckless in the extreme” or a loveable maverick? He’s a copper-bottomed survivor, of course. Among Aidan Turner’s best answers for #AskPoldark were: his horse is called Seamus. He sometimes forgets to remove the Scar after filming. He describes himself as “pretty chilled out.” Most importantly, will there be another series? “It’s too early to say.” A lie, surely? He didn’t answer the question about the pilchards. Or the calendar. A Rick Stein pilchard calendar does seem more likely at this stage. Away from Poldark himself, it was lovely to see the blossoming of Demelza. But the greatest respect is due to the late Warren Clarke, playing Uncle Charles Poldark, whose on-screen death must have been painful for the rest of the cast to watch. The actor knew at the time that he was seriously ill, and died several weeks later. Clarke has been the spirit of Poldark, the Downtonesque Dame Maggie of the piece: full of wonderful thespian bluster, sinister majesty and generous, playful humour. RIP, great man. Opera should be saved for the opera Judge extraordinaire will.i.am had chosen to dress as a sort of jailbreak Fat Controller on The Voice (BBC1, Saturday) And it was full steam ahead as he “brought opera to the masses for the first time” (yawn) or as he would put it, let us “watch Cinderella cast her spell”. Well done to the lavish-of-lung Lucy for her place in the final. But, really, someone needs to tell will.i.am that not only has opera been represented in talent shows before but – from Il Divo to Paul Potts – it has been represented in several gazillion talent shows and sold many, many millions of CDs. In short, it is not new, it is not big and it is not clever. It’s Most Basic Trick No 1 in Simon Cowell’s weaponry. The Voice should be trying to do something different, surely? If this were about styling alone, then The Voice would be worthy of a place in the X Factor/Britain’s Got Talent Hall of TV Fame. This season they’ve really pulled out all the stops (and many jumpsuits and much demented hairstyling). But despite the gloss and the expenditure of a lot of hope and effort, there is still something odd about this show. Where is the real contest? We love a winner but most of all we love to watch defeat Thanks to Johnny Vegas, I have suddenly become obsessed with quiz show The Chase. (ITV, Sunday) As a guest quizzer, Vegas was both wobbly-lipped and quick on the draw as he struggled to beat the almighty “Sinnerman”, Paul Sinha, stand-up comedian and one of The Chase’s resident “chasers”, aka The Sort of Person You Would Really Want On Your Pub Quiz Team. Vegas was almost derailed by his assertion that the artist Pisarro was a woman. Despite possessing the unfortunate Christian name Camille, Pisarro, sadly, wasn’t a woman. But Vegas’ eventual undoing was Nancy Sinatra: he reached for the right button in answer to the question, “Who sang You Only Live Twice?” but somehow hit the wrong one. Sinnerman struggled to hide his triumphalism and Vegas looked utterly crushed.This is a weirdly compelling and satisfying show which combines the best elements of Eggheads and Pointless. I’m fascinated by the new trend for quiz shows where winning hinges not on what you know – but on what other people don’t know. On Pointless you win by giving the answers no one else has given. Likewise on The Chase, it’s not enough to get it right. The Chaser has to get it wrong. Is this the new British Schadenfreude? Achtung Quizenfreude. |