Television
The Best of the Week
SATURDAY AUGUST 5
Athletics (Sky Sport Pop-up 2, Sky 056, 8.50pm). Among the Kiwi athletes attending the IAAF World Championships in London are runner Nick Willis, pole vaulter Eliza McCartney, shot putters
Jacko Gill and Tom Walsh, New Zealand 10,000m record holder Zane Robertson, and New Zealand’s fastest man, Joseph Millar. The competition begins on August 4 and continues throughout the week (morning and evening). In other sports news, the Super Rugby final is tonight (Sky Sport 1, Sky 051, from 6.30pm), and the Women’s Rugby World Cup begins on Thursday morning (Sky Sport 1 and 2, Sky 051-052, from 12.50am). The tournament is in Ireland and the first game is England v Spain; the Black Ferns, four-time winners, play Wales at 1.35am. See our schedule for further games.
SUNDAY AUGUST 6
Maigret: Night at the Crossroads (TVNZ 1, 8.30pm).
Rowan Atkinson’s first two Maigrets were not entirely well received: it seemed that Atkinson was so at pains to keep from busting out any comedy moves that he became almost catatonic.
But perhaps three times are a charm. There were better reviews for his performance in this new two-hour mystery, based on the 1931 story by Georges Simenon. Atkinson is still rather dour, however (“gnomic” said one critic), as he investigates the death of a diamond dealer, found in the car of a Danish national (Tom Wlaschiha, Game of Thrones’ Jaqen H’ghar). Coronation Street’s Wanda Opalinska also stars.
Midsomer Murders (UKTV,
Sky 007, 8.30pm). Midsomer Murders, the gift that keeps on giving, although one of the episodes in season 17 shockingly contains just two murders. Are they going soft? Doubtful: a boobytrapped roulette wheel, a drowning in a bowl of live eels, a slug-pellet poisoning, a parasol impalement and a magic show gone wrong are just some of the jolly ways characters are offed.
Snowfall (SoHo, Sky 010, 8.30pm). In 30 years’ time, it will be dramas about the opioid epidemic in the US; now, it’s time to look back to 1983 and the crack explosion in Los Angeles. Snowfall is
co-created by Boyz n the Hood director John Singleton and follows three separate characters whose lives will eventually intersect (although, reportedly, this doesn’t happen for quite some time). One of the leads is another brilliant British find – Damson Idris, who plays a 19-year-old crack dealer from South Central LA. To make sure Idris could be authentic, during the audition process Singleton took him into South Central to “hang out with some folks”, he told TV Guide. “Nobody knew he was a Brit.”
MONDAY AUGUST 7
Moose Meat & Marmalade (Maori TV, 7.30pm). Best name for a cooking series ever. The “moose” in this scenario is Art Napoleon, a First Nation Canadian bush cook and hunter who is well versed in traditional indigenous food and practices. The “marmalade” could only be an Englishman – classically trained Dan Hayes, known as the London Chef. There are bush adventures in Canada and urban adventures in the UK; naturally, Napoleon’s cooking style appals Hayes, whereas Napoleon describes Hayes as “anal”. In other cooking-show news, a new series of Whanau Bake-off begins on Wednesday (Maori TV, 7.30pm) and the top six on MasterChef Australia enter finals week (TVNZ 1, Saturday and Tuesday-Friday). The Art of Japanese Life (Choice TV, 8.30pm). Young and debonair art historian James Fox explores the complex and beautiful culture of Japan, particularly the way in which aesthetics are part of everyday life. “Japan is a society in which so much is informed by aesthetics. Not just painting and sculpture, not just homes and gardens, but the way you look at cherry blossom, the way you drink tea, even the way you arrange your lunch box … in Japan, almost everything has the capacity to become art.” The three-part series starts with Nature, then goes on to Cities and Home.
An accompanying series, Handmade in Japan, follows at 9.55pm. It looks at traditional crafts and the people making them: there’s a family of samurai sword-makers, the production of a kimono on the island of Amami Oshima and the work of master potter Tomoo Hamada.
TUESDAY AUGUST 8
Ray Donovan (SoHo, Sky 010, 8.30pm). Our patience was tested by season four, but now that Ray (Liev Schreiber) has vanquished the Russian mob, he’s going back to his Hollywood “fixing” roots for season five, which is potentially more interesting. Another reason to watch: Susan Sarandon plays a studio boss who is as ruthless as Ray.
Bobby & Harriet Get Married (Viceland, Sky 013, 8.30pm). With more women in standup, it’s not surprising that the UK circuit has started to resemble a matchmaking service. Among the comedy couples are Sarah Millican and Gary Delaney and Nina Conti and Stan Stanley. This, naturally, has led to on-stage confessions, but none of them have taken it as far as Harriet Kemsley and Bobby Mair, who allow the filming of their tortuous journey to the altar over the course of five weeks. “A lot of hair, quite angry,” says Kemsley about her Canadian fiancé, who is rather issue-laden. But although she seems the sane one in the relationship, she also struggles with anxiety. “Our baggage just fits together so it’s easy to carry,” Mair told the Guardian.
THURSDAY AUGUST 10
Jono and Ben (Three, 7.30pm). The bad boys of NZ television – well, the mildly naughty boys – are back for another season. Guy Williams and Laura Daniel provide backup. In other comedy news,
7 Days (Three, Friday, 9.00pm) is celebrating its 250th episode by apologising to Hamilton in Hamilton. The panellists are Rhys Mathewson, Cal Wilson, Josh Thomson and Cori Gonzalez-Macuer and there will be a showreel of some of the best Hamilton-related gags from 7 Days’ eight-year history. “I am very grateful to Hamilton for all the good content they have provided us with over the years,” says host Jeremy Corbett. “This is our way of saying sorry.” Let’s hope Hamiltonians are the forgiving type.