Clive’s noble cause
The great Clive James died on the same day as the great Jonathan Miller but I know which one I…
What I learned on my speed awareness course
Speed is in my blood. My father, grandfather and great-grandfather all used to race cars in their youth. We even…
War of the Worlds is as bad as Doctor Who
Edwardian England deserved everything it got from those killer Martian invaders. Or so I learned from the BBC’s latest adaptation…
The joy of a day spent bagging almost no birds
The highlight of my country calendar is when I’m lucky enough to be invited to what even the host describes…
God awful: BBC1’s His Dark materials reviewed
‘Here’s your new Sunday night obsession…’ the BBC announcer purred, overintoned and mini-orgasmed, like she was doing an audition for…
My finest hour
Every journalist dreams of the scoop that will make his name. Ten years ago this month I finally got mine…
I’m taking inspiration from an ancient Athenian
How sorry I felt for the poor man who died this week stuck up a 290ft chimney in Carlisle despite…
![Praise be to Mary MacLeod Trump. [Photo: The LIFE Picture Collection / Getty Images]](https://www.spectator.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/TV_4.jpg?w=410&h=275&crop=1)
If we do get a good Anglo-American trade deal, we should thank Trump’s mother
In an uncharacteristic fit of almost-robustness, Culture Secretary Nicky Morgan has said she is ‘open-minded’ about scrapping the BBC licence…
How I plan to win a Bafta
I’ve nearly finished my latest screenplay, Drift. It’s a reimagining of a British imperial atrocity which took place in Natal…
Pure, undiluted genius: Succession reviewed
I have never ever watched a TV series I have enjoyed more than Succession (Now TV). There’s stuff I’d put…
At last, the TV-hogging space invaders have returned to university
‘Hands up which other university parents are bloody glad to have got rid of their lumpen, food-gobbling, space-invading kids…’ When…
Gloriously un-PC: Ronan Bennett’s Top Boy reviewed
Sir Lenny Henry, the former comedian, is wont to complain to anyone who’ll listen that there isn’t enough ‘diversity’ on…
Letting China join the WTO was the worst decision the West ever made
It’s not often that you come across a book that completely transforms your understanding of the world. Just recently I’ve…
With these documentaries, the BBC has lost any claim to impartiality
Because the rise of the Nazis is a topic so rarely mentioned these days, least of all in schools, the…
How to beat the autumn blues
You know that awful, gnawing, depressing feeling you’ve got right now? The one that notices how shockingly early the sun…
I like Brassic but the reason it’s getting such glowing notices is depressing
Brassic (Sky One) feels like the sort of TV comedy drama they last made about 15 years ago but would…
When did English A-level become a science?
Now that my youngest has got her A-level grades, I’m finally free to say just how much I have loathed…
I agree with Jeremy Deller – the birth of acid house was a revolution that changed Britain
Jeremy Deller’s Everybody in the Place: an Incomplete History of Britain 1984-1992 (BBC4) began with some footage of kids queuing…
A gang of sheep rustlers is stalking the county – who will be the next target?
Though autumn is happily still some way off, we’ve already reached that stage in the shepherd’s calendar when full-grown lambs…
McDonald’s straws and the policies of moral panic
McDonald’s has bowed to public pressure and replaced plastic straws that you can recycle, with paper straws that you can’t…
The reason Gomorrah is one of the best series ever shown on TV is its fidelity to truth
My favourite epithet about my favourite TV series was the headline in a review by the Irish Times: ‘Gomorrah. Where…
God, I hate wasps!
Halfway up the back stairs on a ledge is the body of a wasp so big it’s either a queen…
Pure hagiography – the BBC’s Extinction Rebellion: Last Chance To Save The World?
I’m beginning to feel like Donald Sutherland in Invasion of the Body Snatchers: almost the last person on Earth who…
My daughter’s gone to Magaluf, and it’s hard not to worry
At the Leavers’ Ball held to mark our daughter’s last day at boarding school, there were only two topics of…
Kanye wipes the floor with David Letterman
My plan to cut the BBC out of my life entirely is working well. Apart from the occasional forgivable lapse…
