Christmas in July, Smallville, The Way We Live Now & Cleopatra

This column first appeared in the Age on July 6, 2002

July is here, along with some real snow and English Christmas specials. On Thursday Sanjeev from The Kumars at No. 42 was concerned that all the extra relatives staying in his living room over the Christmas break would cramp his show's style: 'that's one of the downsides of Christmas. Families.' But really it just gave the show even more laughs, particularly when Sanjeev's father grilled football commentator Gary Linnekar on his electricity bill come Christmas time, eliciting this world exclusive: 'it goes up a bit.'

Things are slicker on the Parkinson's Christmas Special at 9.30pm on the ABC this Saturday night - perhaps too slick - though the music is great with Robbie Williams singing swing and Geri Halliwell showing how an achapella back-up band of six men can improve your style. It is worth watching for Edna Everidge's annual Christmas message and listening to her reminisce about pulling the Christmas crackers with her bridesmaid Madge with her son Kenny and his friend Clifford (Kenny and Clifford live together while looking for Miss Right.). Edna attempts to spar with Geri for a while but soon backs off - even her cruelty has limits - though she suggests if she had been a spice girl she would have been turmeric. Michael Parkinson hardly says a thing, though he looks charming and laughs a lot, which is, well, Christmassy of him.

Perhaps because it's that time of year, lots of new series have started or are about to. Channel Nine's Smallville, premiered last Thursday. It is really Superman: the early years by another name,: a kind of cross between Buffy, The X-Files and Ed, though that makes it sound better than it is. The effects are great, but its heavy on the schmaltz and it doesn't have that teen/adult crossover thing going that makes Buffy the Vampire Slayer so compulsive.

The ABC's new six part series, The Way We Live Now, premieres at 8.30pm on Sunday night. It is definitely worth watching and promises to get better as the weeks go by. Another BBC special, this is a costume drama that well deserves the awards it has won and has a fantastic cast, including Matthew McFadyen as the appalling Sir Felix, and Miranda Otto as a manipulative southern belle. A tale of greed and general corruption it could have been set in the 1980's and starred Alan Bond, or more recently, Jodee Rich. In fact it is based on an Anthony Trollope novel and set in London in the 1870s and the technology they are all lusting after is Railway. It's a great morality tale with lots of sex and general intrigue thrown in, and there's even more of that if you stay on for the documentary on Cleopatra at 9.20pm. While I knew she had slept with Rome's two most powerful men, Julius Ceasar and Mark Anthony, I hadn't known other charming details, such as the fact that she had murdered most of her siblings, including the brother she was married to. As one academic earnestly put it, while sitting perched on a red velvet couch (it must have sounded like a great idea in pre-prod): 'It was open season for murder intrigue and general mayhem.'

If you are, or ever have been, an ER fan, don't miss this week's decidedly un-Chrismassy episode in which Dr Mark Greene sends his colleagues a final letter. I was sobbing before the opening credits and after a pause for half hour, started up again for the end. The show is taking even longer to die than Dr Greene himself, but, like that venerable doctor it is dying in a dignified manner, and I for one plan to stick with it till the end.

Posted by Sophie at 10:05 AM