TV Review: In The Debt Warren Clarke played Geoff Dresner, an ageing safe-cracker forced into doing one last job. The way modern culture tells it the only safe-crackers left are ageing good guys on one last job. With the average age of the safe-cracker rising thus, our security nightmare will soon be over.
Anyway, the debt in question was one run up to a gangster by Geoff's idiot son-in-law Terry (Martin Freeman). There could be only one way to bail him out, of course, and it didn't entail looking into a consolidated loan plan. Quicker than he could say "I don't do that sort of thing anymore", Geoff was doing that sort of thing again.
But Terry's wits ran on a 10-watt bulb and he set fire to the security guard. This is now a murder enquiry, announced Hugo Speer as cop DS John Foster, who later planted evidence on Geoff in order to boost his own chances of promotion. He was the usual Hugo Speer character, moping about the set with a lifetime of disappointment smeared on his face in oily sweat and yesterday's stubble. His tie drooped from his neck like a worn noose.
Lee Williams, meanwhile, played Geoff's brief, James. Sporting a look that suggested he had just walked out of one of those cheeky alcopop ads, he was being blackmailed by his boss and mistress. She was played by Orla Brady, who was last seen trussed up in layers of Victorian modesty, but here vamped it up as if getting something out of her system.
The Debt was one of those dramas in which everyone was introduced via a freeze-framed moment and that kept whisking us back in time to reveal what had been hidden from us earlier. It believed itself to be far smarter than it was, but was smart enough nonetheless. Its gimmicks might have been nothing more than gaudy numbers to distract the viewer from the predictability of the plot, but if there had to be distractions then at least they were entertaining. A flimsy plot had pretty much disintegrated by the end, but the script seemed unconcerned by it. Geoff had got away with robbery. Terry had got away with murder. DS Foster had got away with planting evidence. James had got away with adultery. A man had died horribly. Everybody was happy.
As the bumper sticker says: "Jesus is Coming. Look Busy." Well, he's here. In Jesus Comes To London we learned that he is a Siberian formerly known as Sergei Torop and who lived with his mother until, at the age of 29, he decided to make something of his life. He became the reincarnation of Christ. He now calls himself Vissarion and lives among a community of 5,000 devotees. "When he eats, he leaves no crumbs," observed a disciple. When he ate an ice-cream, though, it was smeared all over his beard. What should we read into this oh Lord? Give us a sign.
Vissarion has the appearance of a decent Jesus tribute act. He has the beard and long hair. He carries a look of practised serenity, his eyes trained on the middle distance as if sitting for an unseen artist. He wears boots instead of sandals, but otherwise has stuck with the classic Son of God look; the robes hang loose about him in a style that just screams biblical Nazareth.
In October last year, Vissarion came to London to teach and have his picture taken outside Buckingham Palace. You could take that as quite a morale booster for the Church of England in advance of the Rapture. Quite what his teachings are was never made clear. His language was suitably vague. There was mention of a comet hitting the Earth and triggering the apocalypse sometime this year, but he didn't want to say more in case he spoiled the surprise.
The documentary, meanwhile, seemed delighted just to be there. Jesus Comes To London was beautifully filmed, content to revel in the beauty of the Siberian landscape and comic incongruity of Vissarion's presence in London.
Otherwise, it was as vague as its subject's teachings. It could have at least passed on a few details of what it is he says that merits such attention. If he does turn out to be the Son of God, I for one would like to be prepared in case of any pop quiz on the morning of Judgement Day.
With My New Best Friend, the television of humiliation continues. Better than that, the television of humiliation has become more entertaining. The premise here is simple: to win £10,000 a contestant must pass off a complete stranger as their closest friend. Hidden cameras record their encounters with friends and family. The contestant can throw in the towel at any point they feel it is becoming too much. The conceit must be continued even when the two are alone.
The complete stranger, however, is played by Mark Wooton, a prankster of almost dangerous intensity. He plays a different "new best friend" each week with unflinching conviction and an almost pathological cruelty. In the first week, a heterosexual contestant was instructed to come out as gay to his friends, his embarrassment embellished by how his friends kept telling him how little it surprised them.
This week, Wooton played Sasha, a wealthy, obnoxious spiv who, within six hours, had forced the contestant Matt to interrupt a walk with his friends in order to hurl a brick through a car window, steal and wear the dress found inside and then march up and down the street with a tampon shoved up each nostril. I'm aware that none of this sounds nearly as inspired in the retelling as it is when played out, but My Best Friend succeeds because Wooton takes the full weight of the joke on his shoulders and each time you expect it to collapse, he hoists it that bit higher.
The real spirit breaker for Matt came when Sasha insisted they both parade around the living-room table while reciting The Grand Old Duke of York without the ups in "when they were up", and without some of the downs in "when they were down". Matt, of course, kept getting it wrong and in a few minutes Wooton had devised something new to be prohibited by the Geneva Convention. The final straw came when, at a family dinner, Sasha instigated a conversation about cannibalism that had no place in polite company. Matt called a halt, leaving with neither £10,000 nor dignity. On the back of this success, though, Wooton will not be so easy to shake off.
All Kinds of Everything is the least pretentious programme RTÉ will show this year. It takes elements of Reeling In The Years, radio's Morning Glory and drunken conversations in a student bar and turns them into an entertaining quiz show. There was a round based on pictures of Irish personalities when they were young and naff and another on one of those old tobacco commercials so perfectly refined that it looked like it had been retrospectively created for an Irish theme pub that was never built. The big prizes in the final round included a Zig and Zag video, a copy of Peig and - in a display of comic nonchalance that will see it go far - an empty RTÉ paper bag.
It's hosted by Ryan Tubridy. To be fair to him, the quiz show was planned before he was given the Rose of Tralee. However, while the scheduling may have been timed to catch the wave of goodwill it had the potential to induce indigestion. It's usually best to allow a little time between the main course and dessert.
Tubridy seemed more aware of this than anyone. He kept relatively quiet, instead directing co-host Mario Rosenstock into the limelight. This is a curious but brave entente, because Rosenstock is the voice of Gift Grub, the comedy sketch on Tubridy's rival Today FM breakfast show. Here, Rosenstock unveiled only his lips; the moving parts to pictures on a screen of Bertie Ahern and Roy Keane, there to banter with the contestants. Tubridy sat to the side, comfortable in posing the questions, throwing in the odd joke and welcoming gentle deprecation, such as when Rosenstock/Bertie described him as having "stamped his skinny body all over the Irish conscience". Tubridy, though, proved that he also knows when it is best to tread softly.
