Can Bake Off’s new cast rise to challenge on Channel 4?
It is cake-making – but not as we know it. is returning to our screens on Tuesday but on a new channel and in a new guise.
Channel 4 has taken over the show from the BBC, where it became a muchloved national institution, and fans will be waiting with bated breath to see if the new incarnation is the best thing since sliced bread or falls flat.
Paul Hollywood is still a part of the show but he will be joined by new judge Prue Leith and presenters Noel Fielding and Sandi Toksvig.
Hollywood has said he thought filming with the new team would feel a little strange, arriving back without Mary Berry or Mel and Sue. But he now insists there has been an instant chemistry with his new colleagues. “It feels like I’ve been working with these guys for ages and it actually feels like I’ve known them for years,” he said in a recent interview.
Advertising breaks and a change to three quarters of the presenting lineup may make the revised programme hard to stomach for many viewers, but those behind the show will hope that the food, and the contestants making it, continues its irresistible appeal. (remember her?) will be jetting off to Japan this week, accompanied by British business leaders as efforts continue to build a successful future for the UK outside the EU.
She is due to be in Japan from Wednesday to Friday, with the Government promising talks with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe will focus on trade and investment opportunities as Britain’s break with the European Union approaches, as well as defence and security cooperation. But the Conservative leader has already faced criticism ahead of the trip – with concerns raised that just half the number of business officials are due to accompany her on the trip than went with David Cameron to Japan on a 2012 trade mission. the death of Diana, Princess of Wales, falling on Thursday.
Her sons, the Duke of Cambridge and Prince Harry, intend to visit her memorial garden at Kensington Palace on the eve of the anniversary and will be shown some of her favourite flowers by head gardener Sean Harkin.
They will also meet with representatives from some of the charities she supported, including Great Ormond Street Hospital and the National Aids Trust. In happier news, Diana’s grandson Prince George will be starting school in early September. He will be attending private school Thomas’s Battersea.
More than 100 veterans who played a major role in code-breaking in the Second World War will gather for their annual reunion at Bletchley Park on Sunday. The event is due to be one of the largest gatherings of former staff that the home of codebreakers in Milton Keynes has ever seen.
Veterans and their friends and families will go back to buildings where they did their secret work and reminisce with former colleagues.
Former footballers and celebrities will be raising money for the Grenfell Tower families at a charity match on Saturday. Teams led by Les Ferdinand and Alan Shearer will be taking part on the Game4Grenfell at QPR’s Loftus Road stadium, close to the scene of the tragedy. Those taking part in the televised game include singers Olly Murs and Marcus Mumford, actors Jamie Dornan and Damian Lewis, and Yorkshire’s very own Jarvis Cocker.