TV choice
GRAM PARSONS: FALLEN ANGEL
BBC Two, 11.35pm
“It’s so extraordinary . . .”, says Emmylou Harris of Gram Parsons’s life and death. “It’s something that might happen in a movie.” She’s not wrong. The story of the kid behind the Byrds’ album Sweetheart of the Rodeo, who died of a drugs overdose in 1973 at just 26, and whose corpse was stolen by friends and burnt in the Joshua Tree desert, is the stuff of music legend. This profile brings together key players in Parsons’s life to tell his story, including Keith Richards, the groupie Pamela Des Barres, and Phil Kaufman, the road manager responsible for Parsons’s unusual cremation. After all these years, there’s still no love lost between any of them. GS
LIVE TENNIS: DAVIS CUP
BBC Two/One, from 10.05am
Great Britain’s opening two singles matches against Austria.
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THE WEST WING
Channel 4, 7.35pm
This episode marks The West Wing’s response to 9/11, as President Bartlet (Martin Sheen) reacts to a terrorist attack in which 44 people lost their lives. “We did not seek, nor did we provoke, an assault on our freedom and our way of life,” he says. “We did not expect, nor did we invite, a confrontation with evil.” The rhetoric now has an uncomfortable familiarity, and Sam (Rob Lowe) is congratulated on writing the speech. To suggest, in the aftermath of 9/11, how even sincere emotions need to be packaged and spun for public consumption is unusually brave for US network television.
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A YEAR AT KEW
BBC Two, 8pm
Summertime, and life at Kew is full of incident. The long drought has begun and the trees have started to drop their branches in protest. But the main event takes place in Paris, where Unesco is deciding whether Kew Gardens should be declared a World Heritage Site and take its place alongside the Pyramids, the Grand Canyon and the Taj Mahal. Quite apart from the kudos, this would boost visitor numbers and guarantee future government support. “Will everything come up roses for Kew?” asks Alan Titchmarsh.
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GREEN WING
Channel 4, 9.30pm
This unusual hospital comedy remains an eclectic collection of gags and sketches, held together by frantic editing and performed by an exceptionally talented cast. Those qualities alone raise it above most television comedy. But after three episodes, there is little sign of any story emerging and none of the characters is developing. There is nothing wrong with an extended sketch show, but there is a lot to be said for narrative. Any quotation from P. G. Wodehouse is going to be funny, but his novels are the work of genius. DC
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Multichannel choice
THE LIFE AND SONGS OF KIRSTY MacCOLL/WHO KILLED KIRSTY MacCOLL?
BBC Four, 9pm/10pm
An evening dedicated to the singer, who died in an horrific boating accident in Mexico in 2000, begins with a tribute from friends and family, and the first half of the second film covers much of the same ground. But the second half looks into the mystery surrounding MacColl’s death — her diving instructor had been neglectful about marking the dive area, while the owner of the boat that hit her escaped conviction by claiming that a young deckhand was at the wheel. MacColl’s devastated mother travels to Mexico to try to bring the boat owner, a powerful businessman, to justice. GS
WADE ROBSON’S SHAKEDOWN
MTV, 7pm
If you loved Har Mar Superstar’s dance-off with Ben Stiller in Starsky & Hutch, thrilled to John Travolta’s smooth groove with Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction or hand-jived along to the Rydell High rock’n’roll contest in Grease, then tune in for the final few weeks of this pan-European dance competition, a kind of Pop Idol for the light-footed. Wade Robson, Britney Spears’s choreographer, will be putting the 30 shortlisted hopefuls through their paces at a week-long bootcamp in London that will whittle the competitors down to eight for the final. Tonight’s health check-up takes the smokers out of the pack.
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LIVE FOOTBALL LEAGUE: LEEDS UNITED v SUNDERLAND
Sky Sports 2, 7.30pm
A few seasons ago this fixture would have been one of the biggest in the Premiership, between two clubs with their eyes set firmly on a European place. But Leeds and Sunderland have been reduced to the status of sleeping giants and are trying desperately to scrap their way back to the big time. However, if their poor early season form continues, both sides will be happy just to stay in this division — whether their fans will be equally overjoyed remains to be seen.
KIRSTEN DUNST/ DREW BARRYMORE Biography Channel, 8pm/8.30pm
They may both be blonde former child actors, but their teenage years couldn’t have been more different. Barrymore went from being the cute five-year-old in E.T. to a drug-taking, hell-raising pubescence, while Dunst was setting out on her film career at the tender age of 11 in Interview with a Vampire, in which she famously shared a kiss with Brad Pitt. But they are now two of Hollywood’s leading ladies — Barrymore a successful producer and Charlie’s Angel, while Dunst can be seen on the arm of Spider-Man and in the new British rom-com Wimbledon, which opens in cinemas tonight. GS