We wish you a Berry Christmas and a fruity new year
The Messiah is at The Other Palace (theotherpalace. co.uk), London, until January 5.
THERE’S a sparkling new Christmas double act doing the rounds. Not Morecambe & Wise, alas, nor The Two Ronnies, not even Cannon and Ball. Of course these shows are still available – thank you, Christmas Gold! – but they have nothing on the new, touching pairing of Berry and Edwards.
Not to be confused with a local wine merchant, this first-time cookery coupling of Mary Berry and Huw Edwards was brought together on
(BBC One, Monday). Party? It’s the only Christmas do on television where the celebrity guests never meet each other, arriving one after the other to join in the fun in the kitchen.
That said, it was clear that Berry and Edwards wanted to spend quality time in front of the camera, firming up their feelings for each other in public.
It was a coming out, if you like, a message to commissioning editors at the BBC that they have arrived as a TV couple. Huw, who has met Barack Obama and other big political leaders, was overwhelmed by the experience of meeting a true TV icon: “I’m a little knotted,” he confessed.
In preparation for his nouvelle cuisine session of stuffing tiny cocktail sausages with cheesy mash, Huw had spent a year losing weight. It showed, if you squinted a bit, and got very close to your HD screen. Anyway, who cares if a newsreader looks like Mr Blobby?
Huw has apparently shed 2st but lost nothing of his gravitas. Phew. As Mary pointed out, this owed much to his “standing with his feet apart” at the start of each bulletin. I wouldn’t have been surprised to hear Huw say, “Ooh, you are awful but I like you”. But the hunky newsreader, clinging to his new Christmas sweater as he offered his toned biceps to Mary, said: “I’m here because I want to eat something. I’m starving.”
Rather than whip up some emergency Welsh cakes to please him, she expressed surprise at his height. Taking it like a man, he joked that she was wearing shoes with a heel. To prove otherwise, Mary impressively thrust her leg into air like a Strictly professional, almost taking his eye out.
He could hardly collect himself, making out
Mary Berry’s Christmas Party
he couldn’t find the oven. “You’re just like my husband!” gushed Mary. Where was this going?
The host then gave the game away. “I make sure I’m always in bed by 10 to watch Huw...” The newsreader left the house, swelling with sausage canapés but delighted that he’d managed to put a baking tray into the oven successfully. We look forward to BBC One’s Berry & Edwards Go Large in Llandudno.
Have the children recovered from
(BBC One, last night) yet? I imagine the BBC complaints hotline was working overtime as bosses insisted that no bunnies were injured in the process of making an animation film and that it was, after all, fiction.
There is an argument that broadcasting this at 7pm was a little early even though the story is now spread over longer episodes and the nasty bits don’t dominate proceedings. The tone, however, was threatening, a bit like Theresa May walking into a summit of EU leaders.
The second, feature-length episode of this star-studded, two-part adaptation of Richard
Down Watership
Adams’s bestseller will be shown tonight. But impressionable children do need to be reminded that housing needs to be built, occasionally on the “green belt”, that farmers have guns, and they do occasionally shoot rabbits for Mary Berry’s little-known Bunny Stew.
Did the fault lie with the intrepid brothers Hazel (James McAvoy) and Fiver (Nicholas Hoult) who set off just before the bulldozers arrived? They should have simply called Greenpeace or brought Swampy out of retirement to sit in a tree for a few days. My pick of the actors was Peter Capaldi’s injured birdy Kehaar who was the cynic of the bunch. I guess that’s what happens when you soar above the chaos below.
(BBC One, Monday) was a promising and sprawling romantic saga set on a Jamaican sugar plantation in the 19th century. With a cast led by Sir Lenny Henry and Hayley Atwell, the story thrust its characters into the tumultuous period just before slavery was abolished and gives a glimpse of the historical upheaval unfolding around them.
Into this came Tamara Lawrence’s mischievous “July” (later to be known as Marguerite, Hayley Atwell’s lady’s maid) who was actually the daughter of the brutal Scottish overseer. Not surprisingly, he took little interest in her but she caught the eye of many others, sometimes to her cost.
Andrea Levy’s evocative story doesn’t hold back on the brutality of the colonialists, with a telling reminder of the summary justice that was meted out to slaves but also the dignity they showed in the face of it.
Finally, as we prepare to consume as many mince pies as Christmas specials in 10 days, can I advise celebrities to stay away from the bear trap that is the quiz show? Or maybe not, since
(ITV, Sunday) was an entertaining showcase of household names scratching their heads in confusion over simple questions.
The least surprising fact was that Americans eat 100 acres of pizza each day but the best line went to veteran actor Bernard Cribbins. He applauded the appearance of Anne Hegerty’s Governess who turned out in a Ginger Spice Union Jack dress. He declared boldly: “You’ll never get her up the flag pole!”
The Long Song Celebrity Chase Christmas Special