Matthew Jenkin takes a look ahead at the week’s TV schedules (March 9 to March 15).
NETWORKS struggling to fill a couple of hours of the TV schedule with anything remotely resembling quality entertainment have one of two options — show a Friends marathon or commission some pre-packaged fluff with the word celebrity in it.
With E4 still enjoying the monopoly on the former, Channel 4 chose the latter option.
From the makers of 100 Top Celebrity Anorexics and The Greatest Celebrity Oops I Forgot To Wear My Knickers Today Moments, comes Celebrity Naked Ambition (Saturday, 9pm).
Dropping the words Top and Greatest from the title doesn’t hide the fact this is nothing more than a vacuous, but worryingly addictive, countdown of stars who have bared all in films to boost their sagging careers.
With more flesh on display than in a butcher’s window, busty beauty Kelly Brook, who is no stranger to getting her kit off to get ahead, tallies up the A-listers’ scores according to what extent their naughty bits helped box office tills ring.
Listen carefully and you will hear the sound of teenage boys across the nation unzipping at revealing shots of everyone from Madonna to Ewan McGregor in their birthday suits.
If Celebrity Naked Ambition has left you feeling like your soul has been raped, my best advise is to tune into Professor Brian Cox’s physics for hippies series Wonders of the Universe on BBC2, Sunday at 9pm.
The former pop star’s boyish enthusiasm is infectious and his quest to unravel the mysteries of life, the universe and everything continues with an investigation into the matter from which everything on Earth is formed.
Blending philosophical pondering with fascinating science, the programme is more a chilled out cruise through the cosmos than a head-splitting science documentary.
And it’s all the better for it as our loveable geek zips around the world for an hour, visiting a Hindu cremation in Nepal to draw parallels between the faith’s beliefs in cyclical existence and the lives of stars and ending in an abandoned prison in Rio to explain how elements are forged in the heart of a dying sun.
Unless you have been hibernating in Lady Gaga’s plastic egg for the past year, it would have been hard to ignore the TV phenomenon which has been sweeping the world.
Love it or hate it, comedy musical Glee has spawned similar school show choirs across the nation.
Comic Relief Does Glee Club, starting Monday on BBC1 at 5.15pm, sees the charity bank on the show’s success with a search for the UK’s best all-singing, all-dancing group.
Culminating in a spectacular live final on Red Nose Day on March 18, a panel of judges will decide which of the 18 selected groups will claim the title of ultimate Glee Club.
Get ready to release your inner Gleek.
You can follow Matthew Jenkin on Twitter @matthewjenkin
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here