TV Weekly: From chocolate Cavapoos to life in Thatcher’s England

Telly picks for the coming week…

Morecambe and Wise remain Britain’s best-loved double act, over four decades after they last performed together. This special programme features rare footage of the comedy duo doing what they did best – entertaining the nation. Some of the footage is previously unseen on network television, some unseen by a British audience, some unseen since an original single transmission, and some unseen by Eric and Ernie’s star guests who appeared alongside them in it.

The programme also includes testimony from some of Eric and Ernie’s guest stars who regard working with them as a highlight in their own careers. For the first time on TV, Dame Judi Dench recalls the thrill of appearing on their show in 1978 and working with them on a sketch set in Victorian London.

Wayne Sleep performed a dance routine with them – a “tribute to Hollywood” – and remembers the fun of rehearsing. Rula Lenska recounts how much she learned about comedy when working on their Christmas show in 1982. Valerie Singleton interviewed them for a 1973 children’s programme and remembers how actively they engaged with the young audience. And Tommy Boyd remembers welcoming Eric Morecambe onto what his last performance on television would fatefully be, and on which Eric would perform his final broadcast sketch.

Also included is Eric’s last television recording, for a programme that never transmitted, and Ernie’s guest role in an American sitcom. There’s also the newly-discovered earliest existing footage of Morecambe and Wise and some of their appearances from the earliest days of TV, unseen since their original transmission.

Eric’s children Gary and Gail watch some of the footage for the first time and reveal the Christmas Day routine in the Morecambe household, when – along with the rest of the nation – they settled down to watch The Morecambe and Wise Christmas Show.

5, April 12th from 9.15 pm

Morecambe and Wise at ATV

Choirmaster Gareth Malone is taking on an enormous challenge: he’s coaching eight people with no experience of classical choral music to sing Handel’s Messiah alongside the world-class BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Chorus of Wales, at Cardiff’s Llandaff Cathedral, in aid of BBC Children in Need.

Handel’s Messiah is the nation’s favourite choral work. It has now been a consistent hit for 275 years, performed all over the country, year in year out, since it was put on as an Easter fundraiser at London’s Foundling Hospital in 1750. The choral masterpiece has a deep personal significance for Gareth being one of the first pieces of classical music he saw performed and a work his parents and grandmother also loved singing. Although he has known, loved and sung Messiah since he was a boy, this will be his first time conducting a performance.

In the first episode, he heads to a local cinema on Penarth Pier, with pianist and vocal coach, Jane Samuel. There, they face the important task of going through hundreds of tape auditions of Scarborough Fair to find the best candidates.

After whittling down the applications to the chosen eight – Foo Seng, Nia, Harry, Rosie, Aaron, Ami-Louise, Naomi, and Richard – Gareth meets them in Cardiff for the first rehearsal. All eight have their own personal stories and motivations, including Naomi, who has been diagnosed with secondary breast cancer, and Richard, who recently lost his wife to the disease. All are showing promise. But with only six weeks to go, can Gareth and his new recruits handle the Handel in time for the performance of their lives?

Interwoven with the singing, the series sees Gareth dig deeper into the history of Messiah, its religious meaning and its place in British culture over many generations. In this episode he visits Halifax Choral Society which has performed the work annually for 206 consecutive years and meets early music expert Dr Hannah French at Handel’s home in London’s Mayfair. He also spends time with Cardiff vicar Father Jarel Robinson-Brown looking at artworks that help explain the theme of Handel’s Messiah: the life of Christ.

BBC One, April 18th at 10.45 am

In this brand-new series, Denise van Outen discovers savvy shopping secrets from the people who really control our weekly shop: the supermarket buyers.

From the discount disruptors to the premium grocers, this series lifts the lid on how buyers decide what items will sell in stores and, ultimately, in our shopping trolleys.

How do they predict demand and what the next big trends will be? In this first episode, Denise learns amazing truths behind the scenes at Waitrose, from the in-store bakery to cheese, smoothies and free coffees

Channel 4, April 14th at 8 pm

From luxury truffle filled Easter eggs to the juiciest of hot cross buns. From chocolate Cavapoos to sizzling shoulders of lamb, in this Easter treat of a show, 5 put Aldi and M&S’s Easter fodder head-to-head in a revealing taste off.

With competition among supermarkets to win our Easter food and drink spending more intense than ever, today’s savvy shoppers are willing to shop around. So, as this programme pits surprising rivals, M&S the premium brand, and discounter Aldi’s, head-to-head – it will attempt to discover who does Easter best.

5 have recruited dedicated food experts Phillipa Davis and Gavin Wren to put signature Easter treats to the test, whilst also heading behind the scenes of one of the UK’s biggest hot cross bun factories and tulip processing plants.

Plus, the show dives into the history of both stores to see how the way they sell Easter has evolved over the decades.

5, April 18th at 7 pm

Pauline Black is the living embodiment of the 2-Tone music movement and a woman who has made her mark on society.

She helped shift British society towards diversity with a whole new ethos of anti-racism, sexism and gender politics that we still strive towards today. Her band, The Selecter, had a unique sound and energy defined by Pauline’s distinctive voice and performance. They were a reflection of working-class life in Thatcher’s England, and their music was social reportage.

In this new film, featuring unseen archive from the era, we see how Pauline’s life story imitates her art, music and informs her activism as she discusses her experience of adoption, abuse, persona, gender and perseverance.

Contributors include fellow The Selecter member Arthur ‘Gaps’ Hendrickson, film director and DJ Don Letts, Skin (Skunk Anansie), Damon Albarn(Blur), Rhoda Dakar (The Bodysnatchers), Lynval Golding (The Specials), Mykiell Riley (Steel Pulse), artist Sonia Boyce and Jools Holland.

Sky Arts, April 16th at 9 pm