Old haunts get a lease of life
CORRIE’S villains special missed one of the worst – the soap’s former executive producer Brian Park, the mad axe man who sacked Percy Sugden and Derek Wilton...
PROPER Cockney accents on Real Eastenders. Diane Parish. Ghosts. Crissy Rock saying her MasterChef sea bream looked like “a CSI crime scene”. 30 Rock repeats (SkyCom).
THE funniest part of Trump In Tweets? When The Donald sued comedian Bill Maher for joking that he was the love-child of “a human woman and an orang-utan from Brooklyn Zoo”. Daft. It had to be an Oompa Loompa.
WAS I too hard on Ghosts? When the sitcom first aired I dubbed it Rentaghost with the jokes exorcised.
Now it feels like an oasis of daft joy in the mainstream comedy desert.
Cash-strapped Alison Cooper inherits a crumbling country pile from a distant aunt.
Unfortunately, Button Hall is more haunted than Scrooge and the spirits aren’t happy when she and husband Mike plan to turn it into a hotel.
So trouserless MP ghost Julian shoves her out of a first-floor window.
When Alison comes round she can see dead people.
And older viewers see the spectres of The Ghosts Of Motley Hall, Beetlejuice and Hubert from Sir Henry At Rawlinson’s End.
The spooks – played by the Horrible Histories team – are the real draw.
There’s Lady Fanny Button, who plummets from a window every night screaming loudly enough to wake the dead, love-struck poet
Email me at: garry.bushell@ dailystar.co.uk or write c/o Daily Star Sunday, One Canada Square, London E14 5AP
Thomas, and Scoutmaster Pat with an arrow through his neck.
Others include a World War Two captain, a stake-burnt witch, a headless man, naive Kitty and grunting caveman Robin, who still makes more sense than Alan Carr. Oh, and plague victims pollute the cellar.
The BBC One show could play on CBBC if it wasn’t for the odd risque line. Fanny was murdered by her husband after she caught him enjoying a “mandwich” with two of the staff. “It’s known as a Moroccan tea party,”
sleazy Julian explains.
Alison played
Charlotte
Ritchie, who died herself on
Call The Midwife.
Although the phantoms are shocked by her appearance – “She’s exposing her knees! She’s got a tattoo!” – they quickly fall for her.
Ghosts isn’t packed with one-liners but it’s a welcome a break from the fad for joyless middle-class sad-coms.
Added bonus? Kitty’s smile. Worth losing your head over. is by
FEAR City: New York Vs The Mafia (Netflix)... Once Upon A Time In Iraq... Matthew Rhys, Perry Mason, right (SkyAt).
CURSED, left (Netflix) – worst King Arthur spin-off since Avalon High... Strasbourg 1518... The Old Guard (Netflix) – the new dull.
THE too-camp Trump mimic (Trump In Tweets). Unnecessary and unwelcome footage of Miriam Margolyes squeezing into a campervan khazi. Piers Morgan’s six-week holiday.