The very best of the week ahead
Today Olympics 2020 BBC ONE/RED BUTTON, 6AM
The intense 16-day period of sporting achievement ends with the closing ceremony, starting at 11.55am and ending around 3pm with the passing of the Olympic torch to Paris. If the opening ceremony is anything to go by, it’ll be a restrained affair taking in the global situation, but our Japanese hosts are entitled to some joyous letting loose after pulling off a successful pandemic-era Games. There are still medals to be won and Team GB’s chances lie with Lauren Price, world champion in women’s middleweight kickboxing. Podium spots are also up for grabs in the men’s marathon, women’s handball, women’s volleyball and men’s water polo. Despite the BBC’s coverage being cut down from 3,000 hours to just 350, Gabby Logan, Clare Balding and the team have put in sterling work in whipping up excitement in these crowd-free Games. Vicki Power
Pose BBC TWO, 10PM & 10.50PM; NI, 10.30PM & 11.20PM
The fabulous drama about New York’s drag ball culture kicks off its final season with a double bill. It’s 1994 and the visceral reality of Aids haunts the characters. Blanca (MJ Rodriguez) finds romance with a doctor, before developments lure her back to the House of Evangelista. VP
Monday The Riots 2011: One Week in August BBC TWO, 9PM
A decade on, the riots of August 2011 look no less shocking now than they did then. The largest wave of social disorder in Britain since the e 1980s, they were triggered d in London by the Met Police’s ce’s shooting g dead of Tottenham am local Mark Duggan. uggan. But within hours ours the disturbances nces spread to o other boroughs, s, sparking a chain reaction eaction of rioting, looting ooting and arson in other UK cities, and nd the deaths of
three men trying to defend businesses from mobs in Birmingham. Packed with archive footage, this film tells the story from all sides. Convicted rioters, policemen, community activists and Craig Oliver, Number 10’s spokesman who found himself alone at the wheel while Prime Minister David Cameron was off on holiday, all look back from differing viewpoints at the events of a shameful week. By far the most memorable voice – as it was so decisively at the time – is that of Tariq Jahan, who recounts re the events that led to his hi son Haroon’s death in Birmingham, B and how his quest for f justice continues conti to this day. Gerard O’Donovan O’Do
Ghosts Ghos BBC ONE, 8.30PM
More spectral silliness silline as the haunted haun house comedy come makes a welcome welc return with a third series. serie Headless Sir Humphrey Hu (Laurence Rickard) Ric is forced to stick his neck
out when Alison (Charlotte Ritchie) and Mike (Kiell Smith-Bynoe) host a TV crew investigating a deadly plot hatched at Button House. GO
Tuesday Jonnie’s Blade Camp CHANNEL 4, 10PM
If you’re in the mood for some uplift, treat yourself to this two-parter in which, ahead of the Tokyo Paralympics, double gold-winning sprinter and former Strictly star Jonnie Peacock sets out to help five young amputees to realise their sporting potential at a ground-breaking exercise camp. Rallying a group of experts whose skills in biomechanics, prosthetics and performance assessment are normally only available to top-flight athletes, his aim is to develop tailored training programmes to bring out the untapped sporting prowess of each of the five. They range from charmingly hyperactive Harvey, a 10-year-old double-amputee, to quietly determined 15-year-old Liv, who lost her leg after a drunk driver crashed into her family’s car. All except meningitis-amputee Mitchell have
experience of using prosthetic sports blades, but it becomes obvious that emotions have just as much a role to play in getting them to change their
behaviours and imbue them with the confidence to perform. In this respect Peacock is inspirational and it’s not long before they see the benefits. GO
Write Around the World with Richard E Grant BBC FOUR, 9PM
Richard E Grant takes in the wildness of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Cévennes, the glamour of F Scott Fitzgerald’s Riviera, and the aromas of Patrick Süskind’s Grasse, as he celebrates the literary legacy of southern France. GO
Wednesday American Oz PBS AMERICA, 8.45PM
In The Wizard of Oz, Dorothy endures a bizarre odyssey in a magical land. As this two-part documentary explains, the man who wrote the novel had undergone his own journey before he created the wildly successful children’s book in 1900 at the age of 44. L Frank Baum had sampled many careers before writing the novel that would make his name. This excellent biopic sets up the premise that Baum’s search for his own Yellow Brick Road mirrors that of the American Dream, of a restless entrepreneur eager to join in the capitalist boom. A passel of writers and historians point out where Baum’s experiences find their way into his Oz novels – he had a spell on the cycloneprone western prairie, just as Dorothy eventually would. Their observations are accompanied by clips from the 1939 movie, old photos, and readings of Baum’s newspaper writings to paint a picture of turn-of-the century America and look behind the curtain at the creator of Oz. Concludes tomorrow. VP
Fake or Fortune? BBC ONE, 9PM
In 1987, Kathy and Barry Romeril purchased a print of Landseer’s Time of War. The original disappeared after The Tate flooded in 1928, and science offers hope that the Romerils’ purchase could be the real deal. VP
Thursday The Watch BBC TWO, 9PM & 9.45PM
Terry Pratchett’s complex worldbuilding would pose a challenge even with a Peter Jackson-size budget. Creator and writer Simon Allen knew this – so he didn’t try. Instead, he has teleported characters from Pratchett’s Discworld series into a universe of his own making. Arriving on BBC Two after launching on iPlayer last month, this double-bill introduces us to the mercantile city of Ankh-Morpork and its ineffectual City Watch, led by drunk Beckettian vagrant Sam Vimes (Richard Dormer). Flashbacks reveal a time when Vimes washed his hair and the Watch kept order, before a dispute with a friend precipitated its collapse. The series deals with the reappearance of that friend, assumed dead, in the form of the villainous Carcer Dun (Sam Adewunmi). Vimes rallies his crew, including a werewolf, a troll and a transgender forensic officer, to investigate his motives and restore dignity to the Watch. It’s steampunk fun and rather amusing. Jack Taylor
Exploring Northern Ireland with Siobhan McSweeney MORE4, 9PM
The Derry Girls actress meets some marauding Vikings, revels in the beauty of the landscape and shows off her artistic prowess in this bicycle tour. She follows the pilgrims route along Saint Patrick’s Way, although she struggles to hide her distaste for Ireland’s patron saint himself. JT
Friday Deceit
CHANNEL 4, 9PM
This dark and engrossing four-part drama revisits the 1992 murder of Rachel Nickell from the viewpoint of
an undercover police officer, codenamed Lizzie, sent in by the Met Police to honeytrap the then chief suspect. Investigators under pressure to get a result were convinced a loner, Colin Stagg, was the killer but they had no evidence – only a psychological profile which Stagg appeared to fit. Enter “Lizzie James”, played with intensity by Irish actress Niamh Algar, tasked with approaching Stagg under the guise of being drawn to him sexually and seducing a confession from him. Unsurprisingly, things didn’t go to plan and the ethical dubiousness of police entrapment, reliance on psychological profiling – Eddie Marsan’s portrayal of profiler Paul Britton borders on the creepy – and the impact on the officer all come under a harsh spotlight. GO
BBC Proms 2021
BBC FOUR, 7PM
Nicholas Collon and the Aurora Orchestra’s from-memory performances have become a welcome Proms fixture. Here they tackle the colourful suite from Stravinsky’s ballet The Firebird. GO