Highlights this week include The Soviet Union 100th Anniversary 1922, Napoleon and Kinky Boots.
Saturday 3 December 2022
Classic Albums: American Pie BBC2 10.10pm
Don McLean takes listeners and viewers behind the making of 1971’s “American Pie” album
Sunday 4 December 2022
Kinky Boots (2006) 10.30pm Channel 5
After his father’s demise, Charlie Price (Joel Edgerton) inherits the family business, a shoe factory in Northampton, England. He is not interested in shoes, and the factory is in such dire financial straits that he must lay off 15 employees. However a fortuitous encounter with a transvestite cabaret singer (Chiwetel Ejiofor) inspires Charlie to save the factory from closure by producing erotic footwear, much to the chagrin of the workers.
Unsung Heroines: Danielle De Nise On the Lost World of Female Composers 10.50pm BBC4
Danielle de Niese explores the lives and works of five female composers – from the Middle Ages to the late 20th century – who were famous in their lifetimes, but whose work was then forgotten.
Western classical music has traditionally been seen as a procession of male geniuses, but the truth is that women have always composed. Hildegard of Bingen, Francesca Caccini, Clara Schumann, Florence Price and Elizabeth Maconchy – all these women battled to fulfil their ambitions and overcome the obstacles that society placed in their way. They then disappeared into obscurity, and only some have found recognition again.
Monday 5 December 2022
The Soviet Union 100th Anniversary 1922 (1/3) 8.40pm PBS America
The Soviet Union was formed on 30 December 1922 after five years of civil war. Stalin’s iron fist and his Great Purge gave him unopposed murderous rule over the country, while heroically defeating Hitler’s onslaught on Kursk and Stalingrad between 1941-43 effectively won WWII for the allies, and helped mark out his geopolitical world and power until his death in 1953.
Tuesday 6 December 2022
The Soviet Union 100th Anniversary 1922 (2/3) 8.35pm PBS America
With the pace of the 1950’s Cold War increasing, alongside the the space race and the Berlin Wall, the decision to join forces with Cuba and build missile sites there brings the world to the brink of disaster. While the Cuban Missile Crisis is averted and a peace settlement reached, not long after JFK is assassinated in 1963 by Lee Harvey Oswald, a US Marine veteran who had defected to the Soviet Union in 1959
Back to Basquiat 9.15pm Sky Arts
The life and work of New York artist Jean-Michel Basquiat were marked by a long quest for identity, by his Haitian and Puerto Rican family origins, and by his pivotal trip to Africa. Portraying this major painter of the twentieth century, who died in 1988 at the age of 27, is also a way of evoking the place of black American artists in the conservative America of the Reagan years.
Wednesday 7 December 2022
Napoleon (1/3) 7.35pm PBS America
The first programme in this three-part series charts Napoleon’s extraordinary rise from Corsican obscurity, chronicling the military victories in Italy that made him a hero to the French and convinced him he was destined for greatness. Also revealed is young Napoleon’s love for a woman of extravagant tastes and habits who initially rejected his passionate affection: the legendary Josephine de Beauharnais. The programme features sites important to Napoleon’s early life, including Corsica, where this son of a provincial aristocrat was raised as one of eight children; Brienne in northern France where he spent five years at boarding school; and the Italian Alps, where he fought the Austrians with a skill that no one expected, and where his quest for power began. Numerous paintings as well as dramatic re-creations of Napoleon’s historic battles combine to bring the story of his life to the screen.
The Soviet Union 100th Anniversary 1922 (3/3) 8.45pm PBS America
With the escalation of nuclear missiles globally, Brezhnev invades Czechoslovakia in 1968, as the proxy East vs West war in Vietnam continues. Following the catastrophic invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, a new era begins with Mikhail Gorbachev, as his bold statements quickly lead to a withdrawal from Afghanistan, and by 1989, the collapse of communism. That same year the symbolic Berlin Wall falls, with the end of the Soviet Union formally declared in August 1991.
Spike Milligan: The Unseen Archive Sky Arts 9pm
Documentary featuring never before aired film, interviews and scripts from inimitable comedian and poet Spike Milligan.
Dodi: Last Days Of A Playboy 9pm Channel 5
Dodi: Last Days Of A Playboy aims to go “beyond the image of a pampered playboy portrayed by the media, to reveal how an isolated, lonely boy had to deal with his parents’ divorce at a young age, built a career in Hollywood and ended up dating the most famous woman in the world.”
Thursday 8 December 2022
Napoleon (2/3) 7.10pm PBS America
Charts his transformation from a political leader to Emperor and global statesman.
Friday 9 December 2022
Napoleon (3/3) 7.15pm PBS America
Deals with his defeat at Waterloo and exile.
Selections by Pat Harrington
As I was walking down the slope into the small valley I could hear voices ringing out and the heavy sound of machinery. This was unexpected. Gradually the sounds quietened. It got me thinking about what a surreal dream we all inhabit – bordering on a nightmare. I’ve mentioned this before but it came to me so clear. What exactly is going on? I was thinking about how we are becoming afraid of our fellow beings. Mind forged manacles indeed – now we are not simply ‘isolating’ ourselves but imprisoning our minds. I carried on and dropped still further to a stream. There stood a man, alone, looking at the waters flowing. It was an encounter. Briskly I continued and as he turned and walked to me I gave him a wide smile (the only form of ‘reaching out’). He seemed perturbed. Maybe this was just my interpretation – but it felt awkward. I said ‘hello’ (‘bonjour’) and he replied in like. After crossing the stream I watched him climb the slope I had previously come down. His trousers were salmon pink in colour – I have this fanciful idea that he came from the stream and took human form! What better time for another species to tread warily into human society. They must never have witnessed us so scared and vulnerable.
I should have been ‘banging’ the drums with a Big Band at this time; two weeks of playing throughout each day, with more informal playing during the night. But, as with everything else, the reaction to the virus forced its cancellation. Undoubtedly I would have enjoyed this as I have done in previous years but I am also content being outside my home reading. And thinking. And listening — as some magpies shout in their vulgar, guttural fashion. Have they noticed the change we are all experiencing? And now I am inside writing.
Edinburgh Little Theatre
CALIFORNIA SON, Morrissey’s twelfth studio album, is a collection of covers including a few familiar old classics and some maybe lesser known American protest and social justice songs from the 60s and 70s. Morrissey and his band never shy away from imaginative musical arrangements, often seeking out unusual instruments, and there are influences here from New Orleans, the old-time crooners and a touch of Broadway. No doubt this is a nod to his recent sell-out residency at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre in New York City (NYC).
Counter Culture 