The Stage

TV review

Published Monday 16 November 2009 at 13:05 by Harry Venning

For several years Miranda Hart has been cheerfully stealing scenes from under the noses of her more illustrious co-stars, so it was only a matter of time before TV producers rewarded her with a comedy series of her own.

Episode one of Miranda would appear to justify their faith. It has a genuine sense of fun, a distinct style, several very sharp lines and some cleverly constructed set-pieces. But, God, it was manic. In the words of Michael Winner in that memorably atrocious insurance advert: “Calm down, dear.”

Hart, who also wrote the script, works very hard for her laughs, but an occasional change of pace would have been very welcome. It might also have afforded a little breathing space for some character development, which was in seriously short supply. A disproportionate amount of the jokes were predicated on Hart’s size, which, personally, I don’t find particularly disproportionate.

When not addressing the camera, Hart is busy bantering with joke shop co-owner Stevie (Sarah Hadland), being socially inept and lusting after hunky chef Gary (Tom Ellis) who, in an interesting reversal of traditional sitcom gender objectifying, is underwritten to the point of non-existence. Hart is much more generous towards her female co-stars, providing Patricia Hodge and Sally Phillips with the opportunity to do some scene-stealing of their own as neurotic mother and bitchy best friend respectively.

ITV drama produced five consecutive nights of car-crash TV, courtesy of the excellent Collision. Creator and writer Anthony Horowitz contrived a spectacularly filmed pile-up on the A12 and proceeded to extricate several plot lines from the wreckage. Needless to say, the subsequent police investigation found most of those caught up in the mayhem to have either murder or mischief on their minds at the time - people traffickers, industrial whistleblowers, randy millionaires, murderous son-in-laws, dope-smokers and unmarried piano teachers with dodgy downloads on their hard drives, all coming together, quite literally, on the turn off to Chelmsford.

With its multiple strands, explored through extensive use of flashbacks, Collision could have ended up as tangled as the traffic accident at its core. But the scripts were concise and confident enough to meet the challenge, complemented by terrific performances from a star-studded ensemble cast. Douglas Henshall held it all together as DI Tolin, whose own family had been devastated by a car crash just a year earlier.

Filmed in mock documentary style, with journalists such as Garry Bushell and Miranda Sawyer playing along, The Execution of Gary Glitter was an unpleasant and idiotic exercise in lynch mob fantasy fulfilment. Having envisaged a Britain with a reinstated death penalty and new laws to punish crimes committed overseas, it proceeded to put Paul Francis Gadd, aka Gary Glitter, in the dock for sex crimes against children.

What it failed to do was provide any form of defence for its protagonist, or any coherent argument against capital punishment. Hilton McRae’s performance as Gadd lent the singer humanity, if not sympathy.

But he would possibly have fared better by claiming mitigation on the grounds of his really great musical back catalogue, which the film was more than happy to exploit.

PROGRAMMES

Miranda BBC2, Wednesday, November 9, 8.30pm

Collision ITV1, weekday evenings, 9pm

The Execution of Gary Glitter C4, Wednesday, November 9, 9pm