Royal Russian romps steam up our screens!
DESPITE reports to the contrary, there is no national shortage of quality TV drama. Hours and hours of the stuff is now gushing from our televisions, held back by canny TV executives who must have found something lurking in a bottom drawer.
There’s been eight hours of Bonkerton – sorry Bridgerton – eight hours of The Serpent ( BBC One, Sunday) and now 10 hours of The Great. Oh, and 80 hours of Boris Johnson: My TV Movie, which pops into the schedule with worrying regularity.
But escapism, we have plenty. The new pretender is The Great ( Channel 4, Sunday), which is another retelling of the Catherine The Great story because not enough of us watched Dame Helen Mirren’s version on Sky, “Catherine, The Great Old Cougar”. What the new version does have in common is the inclination of our Russian friends to spend an inordinate amount of time in the bedchamber. And I don’t mean sharing the Sunday Express Crossword while waiting for The Shipping Forecast.
Since few of us can stretch our memories back to 1761, it’s been decided by TV writers that all anyone wanted to do back then was indulge their unbridled passions. And they unbridled mostly everything. For starters, there were at least three people in Peter The Great’s marriage, according to this “occasionally true story”. Lords (and ladies) were leaping in and out of beds without a care for the required eight hours slumber, or even checking their Fitbit sleep score.
We must congratulate Channel 4 too for probably the longest content warning since Clockwork Orange. It read: “Strong language/ sex/graphic violence/drugs and self-harm”. Oh, and the shooting of a large animatronic brown bear, which I personally found very upsetting. We so rarely get a chance to see the Russian bear in its natural habitat – a large stately home, watching aristocrats behave like there’s no lockdown and smashing glasses.
There was a strong cast, in case you didn’t notice among all the general fraternisation surrounding petulant Peter. He was played by Nicholas Hoult, while Elle Fanning took on ambitious Catherine. The production had its roots in Australia with funding from the NSW Government. This could explain why Peter was so badly behaved and walked around nearby forests like a bushranger shouting, “Let us drink! Let us fight!”
The Great is very rude and won’t please all, but its virtue is that it’s far from predictable. Did you know that Catherine once tried to escape Peter secreted in a large wooden chest which Peter then had thrown in a lake? No? No one did. And you thought The Crown took liberties.
Bridgerton ( Netflix) was another highly sexed drama. Has someone put something in the water? Again, they couldn’t leave each other alone in this colourful frolic. Maybe the cause lies in a
chronic lack of decent central heating in Regency times. Even so, they were apt to leave their clothes all over the place – in mazes, on staircases (at least twice), and obviously in bedrooms. The maids and valets must have had a terrible time tracking down all those breeches. It’s not often written about.
Two mysteries remained for me after eight hours: quite how I stayed awake, and
whatever happened to that expensive necklace given to Daphne Bridgerton by that minor European royal before she lost herself altogether to a wilful Duke in the garden? A ladies’ maid is having the time of her life with that.
Adil Ray’s new quiz show, Lingo ( ITV, Monday-friday), was a triumph of social distancing, soon no doubt to be a Bafta category. In the quiz, you create four-letter words. Be my guest.
We now face a blizzard of game shows with contestants and presenters shouting nonsense at each other across vacant studios. It’s what ITV calls entertainment. We can make very little else other than these shows, although reality TV – now a meaningless term – still has a foothold.
The Cabins ( ITV, Monday) is a damp and drab Love Island, filmed by the banks of a river. It’s terribly modern. If you don’t like the other person, you evict yourself in the morning, but even the most dedicated Love Island fan would have found this show a struggle.
For one, the contestants were allowed to take in their phones. Or was this a canny idea by a producer, “Let’s film them texting, no one’s tried that before,”?
But by far the greatest contribution to the evening’s exhausting entertainment was from chirpy, muscle-bound Tom when he completed his tour of the log cabin. “This is 10 times better than Nando...” I didn’t know accommodation was offered by them. In order to understand this comment, his earlier analysis of his personality and appearance may help: “I’m not just a piece of meat.” Tom can look forward to a year’s free supply from Nando’s. Far from a paltry offering in these times.