It’s sporting, butnota relief
SPORT RELIEF 2018 BBC1/2, TODAY, 7PM
WELL, here we go again.
The annual bunfight and exercise in celebrity self congratulation Sport Relief
2018 (BBC, from 7pm) is once more upon us and if you aren’t really excited about that prospect then you obviously hate poor people.
Not to be confused with
Red Nose Day (which alternates every year with
Sport Relief ) this is the biannual occasion when the best athletes and the kindest celebrities gather together to raise for money for all sorts of worthy causes.
They do this in a variety of different ways, most of them stultifyingly dull, safe in the knowledge that anyone who is less than enthused by the prospect or, even worse, maintains a certain critical standard, can be dismissed as a big old meanie.
The offerings tonight are of the usual standard. In other words, it’s all very clubby and jolly and features the kind of items which would, under normal circumstances, get a commissioning editor the sack.
Chris Kamara in a mini version of ‘Celebrity Come Dancing’? My God! Why hasn’t this been before?
Robbie Savage taking part in a football marathon? Genius!
Celebrity boxing with Helen Skelton? Give that producer a promotion!
Youth hostelling with Chris Eubank? Oh wait, Alan Partridge already came up with that idea.
Through the process of statistical inevitability there are a couple of things which don’t look entirely hideous, but that’s mostly down the presence of the great Kyle Minogue, who is willing to selflessly devote her time to plugging her new album...sorry, supporting the good causes.
Oh well, it’s all for charidee, I suppose...
Best TV comedy option for the weekend is undoubtedly Tommy
Tiernan: Out Of The
Whirlwind (tomorrow, 3e, 11pm) which sees Ireland’s best stand up perform at the 2016 Edinburgh festival.
As ever with a Tiernan show, it’s a frequently bewildering but always compelling collection of dark thoughts and great gags from the one Irish comedian who remains ferociously committed to stretching himself artistically whenever and wherever possible.
The nature of the beast means that some of it remains hit and miss, but it’s rare to see someone as brilliant as Tiernan being so prepared to walk the tight rope and risk failure rather than simply giving the audience what they want.
Tiernan is the only stand-up comic we have produced who can be reasonably spoken of in the same terms as some of the American greats, and it remains a testament to is restless imagination that he is still so willing to push the boundaries of his own craft.