For full TV listings for the week, see thetimes.co.uk/tvplanner
Viewing guide, by Joe Clay
And Just Like That . . .
Sky Comedy/Now, 9pm
The title sounds like a Tommy Cooper biopic, but And Just Like That . . . is the long-in-gestation, much-hyped Sex and the City revival. No previews were available, so we will have to add to the avalanche of words written about it having seen only the glossy, deliberately vague trailer. What we do know is that the Manhattan-set comedy drama will run for ten episodes, following Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) and Charlotte (Kristin Davis) as “they navigate the journey from the complicated reality of life and friendship in their thirties to the even more complicated reality of life and friendship in their fifties”. You might notice one name missing from that roll call — Samantha, played by Kim Cattrall, the most sexually adventurous and outrageous member of the quartet. “Samantha isn’t part of this story,” Parker said. “But she will always be part of us.” Cattrall has been more forthcoming, revealing that Parker “could have been nicer” about her desire not to appear in a third film spin-off from the original series (which ran from 1998 to 2004). A series without Samantha can only be a less colourful affair, but there is still much to intrigue. The most pressing issue for SATC fans is: are Carrie (the former magazine columnist is now a podcaster, natch) and Mr Big (Chris Noth) still together? And will it be woke? The original series has been re-evaluated and condemned for racism, transphobia and denying that bisexuality exists, and a more diverse writing team has been hired. So pop on your Manolo Blahnik Chaos sandals, pour yourself a cosmopolitan and get ready as the story continues . . .
The Stonehenge Enigma: What Lies Beneath?
Channel 5, 9pm
Rob Bell fronts yet another documentary purporting to reveal previously unknown secrets about the most recognisable prehistoric monument in Europe. This time it’s the discovery of a subterranean ring 20 times the size of Stonehenge. Created more than 4,000 years ago, until now it has remained hidden. Two miles east of Stonehenge, a team of archaeologists led by the landscape archaeologist Vince Gaffney use advanced technology to investigate this ring of underground anomalies. Are they man-made? If so, how did the neolithic people create this monument?
Touching the Void
Sky Arts/Now, 9pm
One of the most visceral stage hits of the past few years with the original West End cast is brought to the small screen with the help of binaural sound and a multi-camera rig. Filmed at Bristol’s Old Vic, this mountain-climbing disaster tale is terrific, eye-popping, hold-your-breath theatre. We struggle and fall into the abyss with Joe Simpson and Simon Yates as they tackle the treacherous Siula Grande in the Peruvian Andes. The onstage origami and steel mountain is a thing of wonder, while David Greig’s script adds an ingenious, bare-bones theatrical spin to the true story. Ann Treneman
Adrienne
Sky Documentaries/Now, 9pm
Adrienne Shelly was the indie movie siren and muse of the director Hal Hartley (she starred in his classic films The Unbelievable Truth and Trust). She had embarked on her own career as a writer/director and was in the process of making the acclaimed film Waitress when, in November 2006, she was murdered in her New York office by a neighbour after complaining about the amount of noise he was making in the flat below. In this deeply personal documentary her husband, Andy Ostoy, who found her dead, sets out on a journey to bring her back to life by telling her story.
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How to Make It on OnlyFans
Channel 4, 10pm
OnlyFans is a subscription-based online platform known for its adult content (people can pay to see videos and photographs from sex workers and porn stars). Pitching herself as “the one-woman Trinny and Susannah for slags”, the former glamour model Alex Sim-Wise has set up a consultancy to help people to emulate her success (she makes £10,000 a month) on the platform. One of her clients is Zoe, a sales worker with distinctive feet. “If you could make a few hundred pounds’ extra spending money a month from your feet,” she says as she prepares to walk through a pile of jelly, “why the f*** not?”
Catch-up TV
Agatha and the Truth of Murder
Britbox
In 1926 Agatha Christie went missing for 11 days. It’s a mystery worthy of one of her novels, and this decent drama, first shown on Channel 5 in 2018, speculates what the crime writer got up to during those missing days — turning sleuth to try to solve the murder of Florence Nightingale Shore (the goddaughter of the nurse), who was bludgeoned to death on a train. Ruth Bradley plays Christie, who, with her personal life in tatters and her writing career in crisis, tries to unmask the murderer while speculation about her disappearance reaches fever pitch. Christie is assisted by Florence’s partner, Mabel (Pippa Haywood), and a gruff police inspector played by Ralph Ineson. Joe Clay
Film choice
The Manchurian Candidate (15, 1962)
BBC4, 9pm
John Frankenheimer’s dark, intelligent and prophetic Cold War conspiracy thriller is full of hypnotic twists and turns. Laurence Harvey stars as Raymond Shaw, a US soldier brainwashed by North Korean intelligence, then sent home as a hero and political assassin. Frank Sinatra co-stars as Bennett Marco, a fellow veteran plagued by bad dreams and wary of Shaw’s story. It was allegedly the film that Lee Harvey Oswald watched days before shooting John F Kennedy, and it was withdrawn for 24 years after the assassination, apparently as a mark of respect by Sinatra. The 2004 remake stuck close to the plot of the original film, but it was reimagined for the Gulf war era, with Denzel Washington stepping into Sinatra’s shoes. (126min) Wendy Ide
Blood & Wine (15, 1996)
Talking Pictures TV, 9pm
Michael Caine was on the verge of quitting acting when his friend Jack Nicholson convinced him to take a part in Bob Rafelson’s noir-tinged crime thriller. Caine plays Victor, a British safe-cracker, who helps Nicholson’s debt-ridden Miami wine merchant Alex Gates to pull off a risky heist. The job involves stealing a valuable diamond necklace from the house of Alex’s clients, the Reese family, where his Cuban mistress Gabriela (Jennifer Lopez) works. However, things get messy when Alex’s alcoholic wife, Suzanne (Judy Davis), and his son, Jason (Stephen Dorff), become involved. Rafelson has stated that the film forms the final part of his unofficial trilogy with Nicholson, with whom he made Five Easy Pieces and The King of Marvin Gardens in the 1970s. (101min) Joe Clay
Radio choice, by Joe Clay
The Forum
BBC World Service, 10.06am
Algae is indispensable to life on earth (it is the most efficient capturer of carbon in the world) and yet toxic in excess (harmful algal blooms can have severe impacts on human health, aquatic ecosystems and the economy). So there is much to discuss in tonight’s edition of The Forum devoted to algae and its evolution. Rajan Datar is joined by experts including Ruth Kassinger, the author of Slime: How Algae Created Us, Plague Us and Just Might Save Us, and Dr Gothamie Weerakoon, the senior curator of lichens and slime moulds at the Natural History Museum in London.