Wuthering Heights? More like depths of despair

Last week's version was adapted by Peter Bowker, who recently did Desperate Romantics. That turned out to be television Marmite: you either loved its jaunty, fun-loving attitude or you hated it as lightweight, frivolous and insufficiently instructive about the lives of the pre-Raphaelite brotherhood (though this is like complaining that Carry On Don't Lose Your Head omitted several key incidents from the French revolution). Bowker made a fair job of Wuthering Heights, which must be one of the most difficult novels to bring to TV. Catherine Linton, daughter of the doomed heroine, put her finger on the problem early in the action. "Can it be that my mother loved this monster?" she wonders, after meeting Heathcliff. Indeed. How do you persuade the audience that this brutish, charmless man is capable of enduring, obsessive love for Cathy Earnshaw? More to the point, what does she see in him?

Tom Hardy played Heathcliff with a floppy hair-do and a quick temper, like Marco Pierre White after a bad day at the chopping board. What convinced more were the blank eyes, the disguise of a man who has learnt the hard way to hide his feelings. Charlotte Riley was slightly more difficult to believe as Cathy. You could see her stealing a spirited and mischievous kiss outside the withdrawing room with Mr Darcy, but not roaming the moors with a wild and unpredictable lover.

Framed was much more cheery, even though it featured one of television's most moth-eaten plot devices: the metropolitan smartarse who finds himself in a small village just off the middle of nowhere. As one who has decamped to deepest Somerset from London, the metropolitan smartarse in me sighed deeply and possibly tutted as well. Who says men can't multitask? Because like every other remote television village, the people of Manod in Wales were all mad as balloons (but warm and somehow profound once you got to know them), while the children were wise beyond their years. The butcher wouldn't sell liver because it moved on the plate and might be alive; an elderly blind woman drove a car while taking directions from her sister; and - to ram home the point - nobody could tell their macchiato from their skinny latte. I was very surprised not to catch a glimpse of Dawn French.

Trevor Eve played Quentin Lester, the metropolitan smartarse in question. He works for the National Gallery, which has been forced to relocate its entire collection because of a plumbing fault. The paintings are stored in a large cave outside Manod, where they were evacuated during the second world war. One of the first people he meets in the village is a feisty schoolteacher called Angharad (the love interest), but the entire comedy rests on an exchange between Quentin and a small boy called Dylan. Quentin is surprised but moved to discover that Dylan has a passion for the Italian Renaissance, particularly Raphael and Donatello. Dylan, of course, is talking about the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, but Quentin doesn't discover that until late in the action.

As I say, the metropolitan know-it-all in me thought he'd seen it all before in Doc Martin, Northern Exposure, Local Hero, Distant Shores (do stop me when you've had enough). But the new country villager in me didn't give a hoot about all that and thought the script was nimble enough to carry it off with what is known in the world of television criticism as "great charm". I was even prepared to overlook the acres of Welsh corn at the end when Quentin and Angharad, now pregnant, posed together in front of The Arn­ol­fini Wedding. I might even have said "Aaaaaah", but I'm admitting nothing in public.

Have any TV chefs visited a Welsh village lately? Because they've been virtually everywhere else. There will come a time when chefs have been on so many television journeys of discovery that there is simply nowhere else to discover. Some say we have already reached a tipping point with Rick Stein in Vietnam. Others are more optimistic. Look, they say, at the untapped resources of America, where the huddled masses have been queuing up for Jamie Oliver to call them "mate" and "bruv" (and in one case "sir", which was a bit of a shock).

Jamie's American Road Trip began in a Mexican district of Los Angeles, where he met a chef called Rigo ("bruv") and a couple of his chums. Rigo used to be a member of the Bloods, one of the two gangs that have fought for control of the LA drugs trade for 40 years. An uncle is serving a 75-year prison sentence, along with a cousin. Another uncle was shot dead. Rigo was saved by a training programme that taught him to cook. His friends haven't been so lucky. One was in a wheelchair after he was shot in the back. Then there was Fabian, who was once a crystal meth addict and carried an AK47. He is now a doting father of four who invited Jamie to a family baptism. It was a genuinely heartwarming moment (and don't forget, hearts should be warmed to about 160C for 20 minutes, then served with a chilli sauce). Perhaps The Wire is right: inside every bad guy there is a good guy struggling to get out and teach visiting Englishmen to make an authentic enchilada.

You'll notice I've not really mentioned the cooking. That's because here it is incidental. The food was really a chance for people to meet and chat without feeling awkward. And isn't that what food is mostly about?

The phrase "feeling awkward" brings us to Rich Man, Poor Man, which is more of a social service than a television series. It examines the life of one rich bloke each week and suggests they're just as empty and dissatisfied as the rest of us. This week's subject was Ben Dover, who is Britain's biggest porn star (doesn't that name say something about our attitude to sex?). Ben has won something called the Golden Genitals five times in a row, but at the age of 53 he is now looking for something that will stretch him a little more. He mentioned the stretching bit, by the way, not me. Tempting though it was.

This won't do my reputation as a wild, devil-may-care man of the world any good at all, but I'd never heard of Mr Dover. I wondered occasionally whether the whole thing might be an elaborate hoax dreamt up by Steve Coogan. Ben certainly wasn't what you might expect of a porn star; he looked more like an extra from The Sweeney. It's true that there was a trampoline in his back garden, but I assume that was for his children. He was modest and amiable and ever so slightly ashamed of his career (despite the Bentley and the Ferrari).

Ben's real name is Lindsay Honey - which sounds like a female porn star - and the cameras followed him as he tried to become a conventional actor. They nearly kept a straight face, too, but not quite. Was it really necessary to linger so long on the retractable bollard that shrank into the ground to allow his car to pass, but which re-emerged, proud and mighty, as the car disappeared into the distance? And when Ben had to read a bit of Shakespeare, was it coincidence that he was given a speech from Macbeth: "Is this a dagger which I see before me?"

Life as a straight actor was much more difficult than Ben imagined. He has previously had no trouble exposing himself in the way you'd expect from a porn actor because, as he said, he was larger than average in the trouser department (and I don't mean he was fat). But he was not used to undressing emotionally. He auditioned for Ken Russell, who said he might have the right stuff, but agents seemed more sceptical. So perhaps it's back to the comforting world of porn, where he will be welcomed with open legs.

Incidentally, when Lindsay left school, his headmaster said he'd never make anything of himself. Do headmasters say that to everybody, or just to pupils who will later become millionaires and appear on television?

Wuthering Heights (ITV1, Sunday, Monday)

Framed (BBC1, Monday)

Jamie's American Road Trip (Channel 4, Tuesday)

Rich Man, Poor Man (BBC4, Tuesday)

AA Gill is away