Viewing guide, by Joe Clay
The National Television Awards 2018
ITV, 7.30pm
“Hundreds of stars and thousands of fans,” we are told, “will join Dermot O’Leary at the O2 in London for the biggest night in British TV.” It might lack the A-list talent and glamour of other awards ceremonies, but try telling Ant and Dec that the NTAs ain’t worth a hill of beans; the duo have won the TV presenter award for 16 consecutive years. Could this be the year they finally lose their crown(s)? It would take a monumental effort to defeat the pint-sized presenting duo, but according to some bookies, bets are being placed for This Morning’s Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby to end their reign. Elsewhere, best drama will be the most fiercely contested category, with last year’s surprise winner, Casualty, going up against the more critically acclaimed Call the Midwife, Game of Thrones and Doctor Foster, plus the newcomer Liar (if the last wins, I’ll eat the aforementioned hill of beans). The best crime drama will also be closely fought, with Line of Duty, Broadchurch, Sherlock and Little Boy Blue nominated. The former Doctor Who co-stars David Tennant and Jenna Coleman face off in the best drama performance category for their roles in Broadchurch and Victoria respectively, but will come up against stiff competition from Tom Hardy’s committed grunting in the dark period drama Taboo and Suranne Jones’s vengeful Medea in Doctor Foster. The awards will also pay tribute to Bruce Forsyth, who died last August aged 89. The new Bruce Forsyth entertainment award has been launched in memory of the former Strictly Come Dancing presenter, with All Round to Mrs Brown’s and Celebrity Juice in contention. It’s what he would have wanted.
Further recommendations
Bruce Forsyth is one of the great lives remembered in 2017: We Remember, a look at those we lost last year (iPlayer, to Jan 31)
Impossible Railways
Yesterday, 8pm
The infuriatingly named Impossible Railways begins with urban challenges faced by railway engineers in London, New York, Lisbon and the German city of Wuppertal. London’s Crossrail aside — which has been saturated by another documentary — this is a neat little insight into some complex problems. In Lisbon, hills are the snag; in New York, it is water. And how does one build, in 1901, a railway in the cluttered city of Wuppertal without tunnelling or demolition? With an inverted monorail in the sky, of course. Impossible? No. Impressive? Absolutely. Chris Bennion
House of Saud: A Family at War
BBC Two, 9pm
Michael Rudin’s three-part series taking a discursive look at Saudi Arabia’s most revered family concludes by exploring how they have managed to stay in power. There are interviews with those who have worked for Saudi princes, who describe how their almost limitless wealth has enabled them to lead lives of privilege and pleasure out of the spotlight. However, recent developments could threaten their power, because the growth of social media has meant that the Saudi people are gaining insight into the behaviour of their rulers — including their many transgressions.
Art, Passion & Power: The Story of the Royal Collection
BBC Four, 9pm
What’s a royal family to do when a rabble of republicans sell off their art collection and melt down their finery? The answer, under Charles II, was buy more, buy big. It helped Charles’s cause that, when the royal family returned to the throne in 1660, people fell over themselves to make peace with him (the Dutch gave a stack of Renaissance masterpieces and the city of Exeter gave the fanciest salt cellar on Earth). Andrew Graham-Dixon’s excellent series continues, taking in more delights of the Royal Collection, including the Gold State Coach, the Windsor Beauties and 600 drawings by Leonardo da Vinci. Chris Bennion
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Inside No 9
BBC Two, 10pm
A wedding photographer called Adrian (Steve Pemberton) and his wife, Harriet (Nicola Walker), are in a marriage that has become dead behind the eyes. It isn’t loveless, just completely stale; a flat mishmash of jigsaws, small talk and Pot Noodles. She longs for him to “touch up” their marriage, the way he lovingly touches up images for newlyweds. As ever with the supreme Inside No 9, there is something darker lurking beneath the surface. And just when you think you have worked it out . . . This series has been notable for its lack of the macabre so far. Not any more. Chris Bennion
Catch-up TV, by Joe Clay
Attenborough and the Sea Dragon
BBC iPlayer, to February 6
In January 2016 the well-preserved fossilised bones of an ichthyosaur — the top predator of the early Jurassic ocean — were found locked away in the crumbling cliffs of Dorset’s Jurassic Coast. David Attenborough joins a team of scientists using state-of-the-art imaging technology and cutting-edge CGI to create the most detailed animation of an ichthyosaur. They place their computerised creation into its world, revealing what life was like in the oceans 200 million years ago. The painstaking work has an exciting twist as the scientists realise that they might be looking at a 200 million-year-old murder-mystery — what fate befell their sea dragon?
Film choice, by Wendy Ide
Akira (15, 1988)
Viceland, 9pm
Not just one of the most influential anime films made, but also one of the most important sci-fi films. Directed by Katsuhiro Otomo and based on his bestselling manga comic, this is the film that introduced “Japanimation” to British audiences. In the intervening period the animation style has dated a little, but the film has lost none of its visceral power. Set in a futuristic, post-apocalyptic Tokyo, the film tells of Tetsuo and Kaneda, biker gang members who fall foul of a secret government project that imbues Tetsuo with supernatural powers. It is bold, beautiful and very, very bloody. (124min)
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Patton (12, 1970)
Film4, 3.15pm
It’s a mystery why this 1970 Oscar winner is so ignored. George C Scott is magnificent as the war-loving General George S Patton, a man more gung-ho than a cannonball and twice as tough, and the opening scene — in which Patton delivers a profanity-laden speech in front of a huge US flag to a group of unseen soldiers — is a classic of American cinema. The film follows the Second World War manoeuvres of “Old Blood and Guts” (“Our blood, his guts,” remarks a soldier) as he blazes a trail through north Africa and Europe. One of the great Hollywood war movies. (170min) Chris Bennion
Top Five (15, 2014)
Film 4, 11.15pm
Chris Rock approaches directing with the same energy that he brings to his stand-up. And while a short attention span and a taste for filthy set pieces does not sound like a recipe for success, here it coalesces into a slick, satisfying comic package. Andre Allen (Rock), a comedian-turned-film star, is simultaneously promoting a misguided “serious” film about a Haitian slave rebellion and preparing for his televised marriage to Erica (Gabrielle Union), a reality star. Into his tightly scheduled world bursts a journalist called Chelsea (Rosario Dawson). She’s smart, funny and down to earth. And during a day roaming New York City together, Andre starts to reconnect with the man he once was. Like a hip-hop Woody Allen, Rock taps into the city’s comic pulse. This is an unexpected treat. (102min)
Radio choice, by Catherine Nixey
The Forum: The Periodic Table
World Service, 9am
The very brilliance of the periodic table can sometimes lead us to forget quite how brilliant it is. That design we know so well from countless posters, T-shirts and pencil cases seems so elemental that it feels less man’s construction than a chance discovery. It is as if the table had always been waiting to be found and it just happened to be Mendeleev who unearthed this lump of ready-formed intellectual gold. But, as Quentin Cooper and his guests show, it was nowhere near so immutable. Since Mendeleev’s table was first formulated in the 1860s, 700-odd alternative ways of displaying the elements have been trialled. But Mendeleev’s was better. Here, Cooper speaks to Mendeleev’s biographer Michael D Gordin, the chemistry professor Eugene Babaev and the author Hugh Aldersey-Williams about the table’s history and its brilliance.
Sweetness And Desire: A Short History Of Sugar
Radio 4, 1.45pm
It is apparently the only taste that humans recognise from birth. While all other tastes have to be learnt, if you give a baby from any culinary background sugar, they will instantly smile (and then presumably shout until you give it to them again). For the author Bee Wilson, the sugary passion is a deep one. In a recent book she wrote: “Sugar is not love, but it feels like it.” This is not just hyperbole: sugar activates the dopamine centres in our brain, the same areas that are activated by being in love.