TV Cream: the truth!
It has been noted herein that much-loved telly nostalgia website TV Cream is down, with a rather terse notice replacing its fetching homepage naming and shaming "an aggressive man" from the MCPS-PRS Alliance for intervening on behalf of their "megacorp clients". It went on: "I'm sorry if you mistook this for the vibrant sharing of culture etc. etc." Anyway, this was later replaced by the following testcard:



I contacted a Cream insider, who gave this official response:

Dear Andrew Collins Collective ... Thanks for taking TV Cream's case to the highest court in the land - Andrew's blog. Don't worry, it's all been a big fuss over not-too-much. After nine years of providing uncleared TV themes for download, TV Cream has been busted, and we hold our hands up. The themes have now been removed, but the site itself will go on.

So now you know.

Lifting the lid on Banter
Third recording of six for this, the second series of Radio 4's Banter, last night at RADA. Shows one and two we did back-to-back, in one evening, which proved a real slog, so doing just the one seemed like a luxury. Perhaps too much of a luxury, as it descended into anarchy. Hopefully an anarchy that was fun to witness for the audience, and an anarchy that can be edited into 27 minutes of entertaining radio by our intrepid producer, who spent much of the 90 minutes sobbing into my headphones. As chairperson, I have to keep order and say what each round is. This is not difficult - as Richard Herring (top, right) likes to say, a monkey could do it. However, last night it was difficult.

It's great recording in the little theatre at RADA, although because we're up on stage and most of the audience are below us, it does create a void that's not there at the Drill Hall or the Riverside (where we recorded series one of Banter, largely because it was really handy for our producer to get home from there). This means we have to work a bit harder to "reach" the audience. Because we can't afford a warm-up man, part of my job is to jolly the audience up a bit before I introduce the guests. This was a lot easier at the Riverside, even though I tended to make jokes about serial killers. You're just closer to the audience - it's easier to connect with them. At RADA, I've had more difficulty. This may be because I tried out some material (and I use that word loosely - I'm not a comedian) about killing tramps. I tried something else out last night, but it fell flat and I lost confidence and just brought on the guests. In other words, I did not do my job properly. I didn't warm them up.

On Banter we have a core of regular panelists: Richard Herring who's on every show (I don't know why), Russell Howard (bottom, right), Perrier Newcomer nominee 2006, who's on four out of the six shows, and Will Smith (bottom, left), Time Out Comedy Award winner 2004, who's only on two out of the six, due to a booking failure. These regulars are augmented by the likes of Sue Perkins, Chris Addison, Rob Deering, Lynn Ferguson, Arthur Smith and Jenny Eclair. This series, we have Barry Cryer booked, which is a thrill and a privilege. He's on tomorrow night's. Lee Mack, who I haven't seen enough of this year, was on last night's, along with Julia Morris, the brassy Australian who also happens to have a part in one episode of Not Going Out, as a brassy Australian (we wrote the part for her). So bonhomie was high in the dressing room beforehand. Comedians all know each other anyway, and like to share war stories backstage. I have only appeared at the Edinburgh Festival twice, but I have at least written some comedy, and I hope that's enough to command a little respect. I don't attempt to join in the war stories though, obviously, as I don't have any good ones. Backstage at Banter is characterised by Pret A Manger sandwiches and one conspicuous tub of Marks & Spencer soup, which I think I once asked for on the first series for a wheat-free alternative, and it's still there, on the rider. I hope somebody takes it home and eats it.

What went wrong last night - and when I say "went wrong", you'll hear the finished show go out in a few weeks' time and you won't know, due to the skill of our producer's editing - is that Lee relied on his quick wit to get laughs, and managed to get the audience onside almost immediately with some blue material. Now, it's traditional for radio comedy recordings to descend into unbroadcastable bawdiness - the live audience love it, because it's naughty, and because they know it won't go out on Radio 4 and is thus exclusive. However, last night, the scales were tipped and whole swathes of the recording were filthy. Funny, but filthy. Lots of laughs. Also, lots of exasperation from our producer in my headphones, which put me off a bit. I was actually sweating up there. Because of "the voices in my head", I was missing quite a bit of the banter, and this was dislocating. Now, you can either look upon this unruly, anarchic filth as top adult comedy the audience don't even have to pay for, or you can look upon it as "unusable". I prefer the former, but then I don't have to edit it together. Either way, it meant I lost control, which looks bad. I'm probably dwelling too much on it, but it is interesting how the whole show can come away from its moorings, even with strict rounds and quickfire rounds to keep it linear and ordered. By the time it got to "pickups", that is, retakes of individual lines that our producer needs to assist with his edit, I was actually getting tetchy that nobody would keep quiet when I asked them to, and the pickups took ages to get through. I was thinking of the audience, sitting there for the best part of 90 minutes, and yet, they seemed to lap up the naughtiness.

Either way, I came offstage relieved that it was over and rather battered. The finished programme will, inevitably, come out fine, even without Lee's recurring gags about venereal disease and Jimmy Savile being a paedophile, which of course he isn't. And Russell's lengthy paean to the illegal drug marijuana. And Richard's actually very carefully constructed routine about masturbation making you blind. If you were at the recording, you will have enjoyed these, which I always say are going on the DVD, as part of the extras, even though there isn't a DVD. (I know that.)

Comedy is a serious business. The fact remains, I love being around comedians. They are such impressive people. And I love being the host of Banter, which had a fantastic write-up in the new Radio Times from Jane Anderson. Most of the rest of the magazine is taken up with Not Going Out (oh, and a bit of Cracker). It's strange how both of these shows have fallen in the same week. For the record, Not Going Out starts on Friday October 6, BBC1, at 9.30, and Banter starts on Wednesday October 4, Radio 4, at 6.30. Hope you like them.

I have been without internet access for a couple of days due to the house move to London, but all that remains is to do this:

Things I'll miss about living in Reigate
The deer
The green woodpeckers pecking the grass in the garden
The fact that it's pitch black at night
Ten-minute drive to Gatwick Airport
The rose-ringed parakeets
The heron that used to fly over
The bat that used to flutter around at dusk (I'm sure there was more than one bat in the area, but he's the one I knew)
Reigate Screen cinema (it's the only time in my life when I've known the manager of my local cinema by name - Toby!)
The twenty-minute walk to Redhill Station via Wray Common
The taxi drivers at Redhill Station
The staff at Toni & Guy, especially Laura and Mel.

Things, with the greatest of respect, I won't miss about living in Reigate
The quiet
Developers tearing down perfectly nice houses and building "luxury gated apartment blocks"
The bonfires (the people round there are pyromaniacs!)
Morrisons (or at least, the dominant supermarket in the town being Morrisons - what a waste of a prime piece of what I believe the Americans call real estate)
Planned engineering works in the Thornton Heath area
Getting the "regional" edition of the Guardian Guide (like I care what's showing at the Bath Odeon!)

I can't think of any more. It's time to move on!

Another box
Finished Seinfeld Season Six last night. Quite a low-key finale, The Understudy, despite the appearance of Bette Midler, who seemed to bring out Kramer's inner gay. It's been a rollicking run (The Race, The Switch, The Doorman, The Big Salad and of course The Fusilli Jerry). Even though the hand of Larry David is ever present, it's interesting how much a raft of new writers injected into the formula. The Understudy was actually written by an all-woman team, Carole Leifer and the late Marjorie Gross, which showed in the nail salon subplot. Good to see the first appearance of J Peterman, who will become Elaine's boss in Season Seven, which I have to wait until November to buy! The decision at the beginning of the end of Season Five (The Opposite) to have George in gainful employment really opened up successive storylines. I suppose I could go back and start watching them from Season One again.

And to reiterate, these box sets are surely the finest ever put together. The extras (especially Inside Look) actually enhance the episodes, and the bloopers, which you must, by law, save up until you've seen the whole season, are a laff riot. (Interesting, too, how much less harsh and authoritarian the unseen director Andy Ackerman sounds in these outtakes. The cast used to really get told off by the original director, Tom Cherones! "Come on, guys!" Maybe the success of the show allowed everybody to relax a bit, and lean into those corpses.) Oh, and The Understudy appears to be the first ever Seinfeld that isn't topped and tailed by a stand-up routine.

Please be upstanding
They're all saying it, and it's true: The Queen is great. Went to see it at Reigate Screen this evening with what can only be described as Queen fans. These were elderly ladies who, after the film, were excitedly discussing the pearls worn by Helen Mirren's monarch and the veracity thereof. I am not a Queen fan, but you don't need to be to enjoy Stephen Frears' film, which, if it wasn't made for TV, still kind of is. It was odd seeing it at the cinema, but worthwhile. It's not especially cinematic, but it's quite impressive seeing news archive clips blown up on a big screen. Written by Peter Morgan, who wrote The Deal (about the Blair-Brown pact at Granita), and again starring the uncommonly talented Michael Sheen as the pixie-like PM, this took place over the week after Diana's death. It's been pointed out elsewhere that Diana dominates the film like a ghost, and as much as a dramatised study of the relationship between the Queen and the Prime Minister, it's also a snapshot of the nation going mad in September 1997 - a collective madness from which I don't believe we've ever recovered.

This is a film about people watching telly, whether it's the Royals in Buckingham Palace or Balmoral, or the staff of Number 10, they're all fixated on the telly - just as we all were that week. It's the government living through the media, another telling point. If anyone thought the 90s weren't worth dramatising, they reckoned without the death of Diana. It's a serious piece, ultimately, but Morgan and Frears manage the comedy with aplomb. The cast are uniformly terrific - Mirren is so convincing you will forget it's her, James Cromwell is a great Prince Phillip (again, never resorting to Spitting Image buffoonery, but he does get this great line about the guest list at Diana's funeral: "It's all soap stars and homosexuals!"), Roger Allam is all deference and wisdom as Sir Robin Janvrin, Alex Jennings has perfect poise as Prince Charles, and Sylvia Sims is the Queen Mum.

It's strange that we will sit for 97 minutes and watch a drama about a queen having a PR disaster, because that's all it is, but then this is England, and it's as English as Volver is Spanish. It's not a republican film, but even though it takes us back to Blair's honeymoon period (how long ago it seems), Morgan saves up a warning for him at the end.

Oh, and because it's a 12A, Alistair Campbell says "Flippin' heck", which is the only wrong note in the film.

Glad Tidings
Had to push on to the end. Last two episodes of The Sopranos (I feel like I did after reviewing every match of the World Cup, except there's been more bloodshed): Episode 12, Long Term Parking, written by Terence Winter, and directed by Tim Van Patten; and Episode 13, All Due Respect, written by David Chase, Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess, and directed by John Patterson. In the first, Carmela and Tony get back together, on the proviso that Tony ceases all dalliances and Carmela gets $600,000 as a downpayment on a piece of land upon which she can build "a spec house" (Kevin McCloud would be intrigued). At the same time, Johnny Sack (crowned King of New York after Little Carmine retreats back to Florida) gets nasty and demands Tony Blundetto (who's hiding in the farm) "on a spit", making a threat about "raining a shitstorm down on your family like you have never fucking seen." Tony Soprano is once again caught in the cleft stick of familial duty and work commitments. It all goes off between Christpher and Adriana, after the Feds make an ultimatum: bring us the head of Tony Soprano or go to jail. (They've discovered that a vicious stabbing took place at her bar and that she removed evidence - own goal for the colitis-knotted stool pigeon.) Christopher reacts well to her revelation - he only almost kills her. An emotional moment for the couple, Chris disappears ("for a smoke") and the next thing you know, Adriana is being picked up by Sylvio and it's Carlo Rizzi and the canoli all over again. Bang bang. These are the last days.

In the final episode, something has to be done about Tony Blundetto, and Tony Soprano is the man to do it. With a shotgun. To the head. It offers a grim but satisfying end to this particular cycle. The Fredo moment, except rather more hands-on. This clears the air for Tony's family, who are all dark mutterings about their boss's favouritism towards his cousin. There's a terrific scene around a table (the occasion is the birthday of Ray, an old-timer who's also giving information to the FBI, which gives the set-up further crackle): Tony asserts his authority but you can sense the unease even from his most loyal captains. Where will this end, you wonder? "I'm willing to die for a good cause," says Vito. "But this is bullshit." It's been a difficult season for Tony. But hope springs eternal in the final act: after making peace with Johnny Sack, the Feds turn up. Sack is taken in (and, one presumes, his associates, including the dangerous Phil Leotardo, who we saw earlier attacking one of Tony's drivers, Benny, in the parking lot). Tony escapes, despite his bulk, and ends up humorously emerging into his own back garden via the bushes. Home is where the heart is. Even AJ is showing an interest in "event planning" which is right up there with "waste management" if you ask me. A chip off the old block, as it were. The season ends with a reprise of Glad Tidings by Van Morrison. "Be of good cheer," are the last words, from Tony's lawyer.

It's been a fabulous series. Now all we have to do it wait for Season Six to come out. Next stop: The Wire.

Oh no, not another dream sequence!
Don't stop me now! Two episodes of The Sopranos back to back (which means only two to go - a parlous situation salved only by the arrival of The Wire on DVD, following mass recommendation on this blog): Episode 10, Cold Cuts, written by Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess, directed by none other than Mike Figgis, and Episode 11, The Test Dream, written by Matthew Weiner and David Chase (the guv'nor!) , directed by Allen Coulter. In the first of the two, things get prickly between Tony and Johnny Sack over the non-delivery of some Vespas at the Newark waterfront. It's "fuckin' payback" for Tony B whacking Joe Peeps. Janice beats up a rival "soccer mom" and attends anger management classes, for fear of Bobby leaving her (I like it when he admitted preferring the "spitfire type" - such a gentle soul, he is). But Tony, a man with issues of his own who's just beaten Bada Bing barman Georgie to within an inch of his hearing for a benign comment about living for the moment, acts like a total prick and winds Janice up until her new-found state of grace shatters. Bad man. A big contrast to the bucolic scenes at Uncle Pat's farm, where Tony B and Christopher bond over the exhumation of some previously-whacked skellingtons. Uncle Tony turns up, and Captain Rehab Christopher's the butt once again. Adriana urges him to think about the pair of them running away, but he has to stay. He's a soldier.

Tony gets his comeuppance, of sorts, in the next episode, as he is caught up for most of the running time in a dream sequence. These must be fun to write and direct, but they're tiresome to watch, I think. Funny to see Annette Bening turn up, as herself, and to see Tony shagging Artie's wife, while Artie watches, but beyond the psychological insight into Tony's childhood and his guilt, it's a major indulgence. Also, and I may be dim, but I couldn't work out why Tony was spending the night alone in the New York Plaza in the first place. Anybody help me out here? Worst episode of the series, at any rate.

It is September 11 by the way
I managed to avoid the TV and radio news all day, as I know it will have been filled with mawkish overstatement, lead item, even though the attacks happened in a different city in a different country half a decade ago. Anyway, I dislike "news" when it is emotive (talk of "evil" does not belong in news, and yet it crops up again and again in this case). Call me an old stick-in-the-mud, but emotion is not the job of the news. News is. I noticed that the Evening Standard had the headline, THE WORLD REMEMBERS. It would be hard for THE WORLD to forget. I respect the right of those who lost people in any tragedy to memorialise, whether in private or, if needs be, in public, but we seem to have mistaken these memorials as events of international import. And the one-minute silences have become two minutes. That's just oneupmanship (my tragedy's more tragic than yours - listen!). I don't know why people constantly replenish roadside memorials to victims of car accidents year after year either. It's a similar need to exhibit grief rather than just experience it and be cleansed by it.

Anyway, I remember September 11, 2001 very well. I am hardly trying to forget it. I watched all five hours of The Path To 9/11 today, the first half on tape , the second half on TV this evening, and the first segement of C4's latest, The Man Who Predicted 9/11, which was, even for me, one September 11, 2001 too many. I really admired the five-hour epic though, dramatised, but based on the 9/11 Commission and other transcripts, except where it wasn't. Harvey Keitel starred as John O'Neill, the FBI counter-terrorist officer who was ultimately thwarted in his efforts to nail Bin Laden, but beyond him and Donnie Wahlberg (very good as a Fed called Alex), it was a no-star cast, which added to the documentary feel - not disimilar to United 93, although director David Cunningham was a lot artier than Greengrass, with his out-of-focus shots, and inistence on cutting back to exotic foreigners playing drums at moments of high drama. It gave context, beginning with the 1993 attack on the World Trade Center and joining the dots through Nairobi, Lewinsky, Sudan, the USS Cole and the big day itself. To its credit, it criticised a lot of Americans, not least the squabbling CIA and FBI, who deserve each other, but it singled out Clinton, or at least his administration's Sandy Berger, for a big can of blame. (I liked the line attributed to the security chief who, when first told of the plot to fly planes into buildings, accused the potential terrorists of having read "too many Frederick Forsyth novels.")

I've seen criticism of the film for being right wing, but it seemed pretty delighted to show Bush read My Little Goat, or whatever it was called, and anyway, it put Al-Qaeda's case across loud and clear, and the suggestion was always that US foreign policy inflamed Islamist extremism, which doesn't exactly strike me as right wing. Surely a right wing film would have demonised the Arabs? It makes a good companion to World Trade Center, which offers no political context whatsoever and in that sense, cops out. Instead, Stone went for a film about heroes (and I don't question the heroism of the emergency services), very much a sidestep of broader issues thrown up by that day.

By the way, the man who predicted 9/11, Rick Rescorla, worked at Morgan Stanley and was born in Cornwall, although according to the first part of the documentary, it was actually his mate who predicted 9/11.

I think I might have seen enough now. It's almost September 12.

Put me in, coach
It's like an addiction now. I was tired anyway. We'd just watched the last, variety-themed episode of The Story Of Light Entertainment (which has been exceptionally good), it was 10.45, but something inside of my sleepy bones said, "Yes! You can manage one more episode! Do it! Do it!" So I did it. The Sopranos, Episode 9, Unidentified Black Males, written by Terence Winter and Matthew Weiner, directed by Tim Van Patten, its title firstly referring to a comment made by one of Vito's wiseguys on lawnchairs at the construction sight after one of them glasses another after a "breaking balls" comment. It seems that these unidentified black males are the default explanation for any violence, an allusion explained in Tony's "giving birth" session with Melfi after a golf course panic attack, which all goes back to the night of the heist that put cousin Tony Blundetto in the can, effectively in Tony Soprano's place. The myth was, he was attacked by two black males and couldn't make the heist. In fact, he'd had a panic attack and hit his head. Getting this out to Dr Melfi was another milestone. This is why he feels so guility protective towards his cousin, and why he gave him extra responsibility despite finding out about his freelance hit on Joe Peeps. ("Peeps", his nickname, is disrespectfully carved into his headstone at the funeral, a fuck-up by Tony's crew which looks very bad at this most sensitive time between the families.) Meanwhile, Meadow's boyfriend Finn is given a job at the construction site, where he witnesses the aforementioned violence, and, early one morning, Vito blowing a security guard in the front seat of a car. This, you understand, is bad knowledge. It puts Uncle Junior's oral sex into the shade. You don't want to know. Carmela has served Tony with divorce papers. It's going to get ugly.

Don't believe the hype
If ever a film was garlanded in undeserved praise, in my opinion, it's Brick, released on DVD next Friday. A stylish debut from Rian Johnson, you can see what he was driving at - a film noir in the style of The Big Sleep and The Maltese Falcon except transplanted to a modern 21st-century California high school. And he has a real photographer's eye for suburban vistas in the early evening. Brick looks very nice, in an indie kind of way - bleak and blue and desolate and apparently devoid of people most of the time - and it's framed beautifully. But it's all surface. It's all conceit. There's a whodunit here, as the boy from Third Rock From The Sun tries to find out where his ex-girlfriend, the pregnant girl from Lost, is. This means he has to hang out with a load of drug dealers, the leader of whom carries a cane and was the little boy in Witness who did the witnessing. They speak in a weird vernacular ("Who's she eating lunch with these days?") and it's all deliberately obtuse rather than actually complicated, and because the whole thing is delivered at the same pace, in the same deadpan tone, all their voices roll into one long drawl. It's impossible to care about anybody once the body turns up in the storm drain. Third Rock From The Sun bloke doesn't seem that bothered, so why should we?

At the end of the day, this is the kind of film that gives "indie" a bad name. It fancies itself. It knows how to pose. And I wouldn't have taken against it so violently if the DVD box wasn't so plastered in plaudits. Five stars in The Independent! Five stars in Total Film! Four stars in Empire! Are film critics so starved of decent films they fall at the feet of anything that doesn't star Will Ferrell or J-Lo?

I say: beware. Worth a look, but keep your expectations low.

At our age it's enough surprise we're still alive every morning
In the week when one New Labour insider said that the Blair-Brown infighting was "like an episode of The Sopranos," it was good to remind ourselves why it fucking isn't. Watched two tonight, after bailing out of the critically acclaimed Brick on DVD, which was atonal, pretentious toss (and I have to watch the rest as I'm reviewing it!): Episode 7, In Camelot, written by Terence Winter and directed by none other than Steve Buscemi, and Episode 8, Marco Polo, written by none other than Michael Imperioli and directed by John Patterson. A fine pair.

In the former, Uncle Junior visits four funerals in a row, and loses it, while Tony dallies with Fran Felstein (Polly Bergen, the sort of autumnal actress you feel you recognise, but in fact she's been in no films of any note, and seems to have spent her entire career since the 50s on TV - I suppose I could have seen her in The Love Boat). She was Tony's father's bit on the side, and at first he is fascinated by her and almost attracted to her, despite being old enough to be his mother (and yes, Dr Melfi spotted that), especially with her stories about having it off with JFK and meeting Sinatra. But this soon sours, when he realises that no matter how much he claims to have hated his mother, his father did a bad thing. We see Tony as a teenager in flashback, forced to lie to Livia in hospital to cover for his philandering father. Meanwhile, we see Christopher trying to help out an old friend, JT, from rehab, a TV writer (cue: plenty of in-jokes about TV being an inferior medium to cinema - JT can't pawn his Emmy award for smack money!) - at least this shows Christopher in a good light. Well, until he kicks the shit out of his friend for non-repayment of a loan, smashing a framed Dr Strangelove poster over his head. I'm sure there's symbolism there.

The final, wordless shot, lingering on a cigar-sucking Tony at the Bing, is one of those that just bristles with history and depth. There is so much going on in there. And that's the reward you get for watching it all these years. A great line from Phil Leotardo, when Johnny Sack reminds him that Tony, whom he just called a "kid", is also a boss: "Jersey? Come on."

In the latter episode, action centres around the 75th birthday of Carmela's dad, Hugh, and a surprise party he knows all about. Tony is invited for his sake (he's "crazy about your sausages"). He's back at the barbecue, master of all he surveys. "A doctor in the house?" Tony says to Carmela's parents' "cultured" Italian friends, one of whom is a diplomat. "That's good, because somebody usually goes down at these things." Nobody does, but a comment by one of Tony Blundetto's twins afterwards about how much they wish they had a big house like their cousin Anthony Jr, causes him to cross the floor - for money to top up the airbags operation. Wooed by Little Carmine's capos (one of whom is played by Frankie Valli, who may just have "had some work"), he takes on a hit, which just happens to be Leotardo's bodyguard Joe. The prostitute he's giving a lift to takes a bullet also, and their car rolls over Blundetto's foot, reminding you of Buscemi's character in Fargo. So somebody does go down. I had a worrying moment when Blundetto seemed to be ogling Meadow, but perhaps he's just jealous of Tony's relationship with his daughter, when his has disappeared. There's a lot to keep up with, not least the ongoing repairs to Leotardo's car, damaged when Tony ran him off the road for disrespecting him. Something's up with the recline, and the paint job. Got myself a gun.

How best to convey the horror of September 11, 2001: fiction or fact?

On Tuesday, I saw World Trade Center, the new, big-guns Oliver Stone movie about the date I will continue not to call 9/11. The night before, I saw The Miracle of Stairwell B on Channel 4, an hour-long documentary (in a week that's full of them) with a similar true story at its heart but told without recourse to dramatisation. In many ways, it was more effective at doing the same job, and did so with less fuss, and a lot less money.

Stone's movie - whose mawkish, sensational trailer had already given me the willies ("the world saw evil that day" - did they?) - concentrates, with admirable economy, on the emergency services trapped beneath the wreckage after the collapse of the North Tower on September 11, 2001, specifically a small group of Port Authority policemen. I won't say what happens, in case you don't know the true story it's based on. Needless to say, much of the action occurs after the collapse ie. after the action.

I have complicated feelings about September 11 - not least because of the carnage it paved the way for in the Middle East and beyond - but I am drawn to it as a subject matter. I was nauseated by the press coverage that followed it, but now that the dust has, literally, settled, it's possible to see that it did change the world, as the media and politicians predicted, albeit perhaps not in quite the same way. There are some who believe it's "too soon" for feature films on the subject. I respect their view. But, as with United 93, families of those involved have been consulted on World Trade Center, so you have to respect their judgement too. (A widow of one of the officers who died has objected to the portrayal.)

As a disaster movie nut, this film is tailor-made to appease me, with equilibrium-shattering catastrophe, spectacle, peril and rescue, but the fact that it really happened makes any pleasure from the medium voyeuristic. (So, you might say, why make it exciting and melodramatic?) And for all its respect and restraint for those who lived or died on the Big Day, Oliver Stone has still made a disaster movie that's shot and designed to thrill and involve and unnerve. For my money, as an action movie, there's a lot of inaction. It feels churlish to complain, and in fact, the scenes under the rubble are played out with much less cheese than I'd expected. Nic Cage, usually so preposterous, is quite low key. Mind you, they had to immobilise him to make him that way. The waiting wives, played by Maria Bello and Maggie Gyllenhaal, are exceptionally good. If there's a problem with the film, it's that the opening is so good (New York awakes on an ordinary day; extraordinary event occurs; people jump to it), once the towers are down, the story has a built-in lull. Also, although it's factually correct, the pivot for the rescue is unbelievable. If I hadn't read of its apparent veracity, I would have put it down to melodramatic licence. You'll have to judge for yourselves. Here is the news: it's nothing like as bad as I had feared. And the only stars and stripes hangs forlornly from a pole. No fluttering.



Stairwell B, where the "miracle" occurred (and I say let's not allow religion into a structural anomaly), saw 12 firemen, one police officer and one civilian survive the collapse of the North Tower. The firemen had stopped to help escort Josephine Harris and it was this that saved them. The documentary was based on testimony from the survivors, a commendably doughty but self-effacing bunch of Noo Yawkers from Engine Company 16, Engine Company 39, Ladder 6, the 11th Battalion and Port Authority Police K-9 Unit. Some of them were tearful as they remembered preparing to die, others tight-lipped and practical, but all conveyed the insanity of that day and their particular ordeal. Real footage was mixed in to illustrate, but clearly not of the "miracle" in question. You had to imagine that. And that's why it was such a good programme. Who's going to dispute the recollections of the actual protagonists? Their testimonies even backed each other up. This was what really happened, not a dramatic reconstruction. Though it was mainly guys (and one woman) talking, it was moving, arresting and really bloody scary. You got to know characters like Battalion Chief Rich Picciotto, and firefighters Mickey Kross, Jim McGlynn, Michael Meldrum and Sal D'Agastino. No actors needed to make these men dramatic.

I could watch September 11 documentaries all week. Which is handy. I know I'm not going to see any footage that hasn't been shown a million times, but this doesn't reduce the power of those images. What I don't need is guff about evil and heroes and "America is at war", nor the creeping feeling that the 2,749 who died on September 11,m 2001, are somehow the most important casualties in any conflict or act of aggression ever perpetrated. The most powerful stories are those of people doing their job, and getting through it. The Miracle Of Stairwell B, despite the m-word in the title, was a plain-speaking document about an amazing occurence. No bugles. No fluttering flags. World Trade Center, without giving anything away, ends with applause and stirring music and slow motion and a setting sun, and ultimately, I would argue, subtracts from our understanding.

A shoe up his ass
The Sopranos, Episode Six, Sentimental Education, written by Matthew Weiner, directed by - yes! - Peter Bogdanovitch, this one rolled out two important stories: Carmela's fling with Bob (David Strathairn), and Tony Blundetto's ultimate failure to go straight, setting up a massage "storefront" with his Korean boss. Both end in tears. Both end up being reeled back in by Tony Soprano, Carmela by his influence (Bob accuses her of "using" him to get better grades for AJ, which she actually wasn't - she blames this on the fact that she was married to Tony: "My motives will always be called into question"), Blundetto by his cousin's offer of some good, dishonest work - frankly, a lot less hassle than painting a massage parlour, passing an exam and installing a koi pond. It's horrible to see Carmela treated so badly by her seemingly good-hearted academic boyfriend, and to see Blundetto violently lose it with his boss. Even when a plastic bag of money ($12,000) falls in his lap, he spends it all. This is a guy who needs looking after. But what will Tony do when he finds out that Carmela slept with AJ's counsellor? He will receive worse than a shoe up his ass. ("Where the fuck is my Tupperware?", yelled by Paulie at Vito, apropos of nothing important, may be one of this season's finest lines so far.)

You'd fuck a catcher's mitt
The Sopranos, Episode Five, Irregular Around The Margins, written by Robin Green and Mitchell Burgess, directed by Allen Coulter, in which a lot of fuss is made of such a little thing. Adriana, possibly spurred on by the Feds, comes on to Tony in his office (it involves darts - I didn't even know Americans played darts!), but he resists, which Dr Melfi considers a milestone. But a late-nite trip in his tank to her coke dealer, all platonic, leads to a raccoon-related road accident while Christopher is away pinching cigarettes. The rumour mill begins (what gossips these wiseguys are!), until Christopher is wracked with jealousy, despite Tony's continued - and sincere - denials that anything happened. Christopher starts drinking and runs amok with a gun in the club - he must be subdued, in the middle of nowhere, by the headlights of a car, naturally. It's good to see Steve Buscemi just gradually slipping into gangster mode, albeit of the cautious, emollient type ("I'm a pre-board certified massage therapist"). I also liked the fusebox row with Vito Spatafore (the one's who's fatter than Bobby), a real GoodFellas just-busting-your-chops moment. They all make up in the end, of course, including Tony and Carmela - just for show, just to reset the status quo. (Remember the fuss about Uncle Junior and the rumour that he performed oral sex? That nearly ended in bloodshed.) This series continues to impress. And what a speech Christopher makes to Adriana when she reveals, much to his macho disgust, that she has Irritable Bowel Syndrome and puts it down to stress that he, by definition, cannot know about:

"What do you got to be stressed about? That bar?"
"War, Christopher? The Middle East?"
"You don't listen to the president? We're gonna mop the floor with the whole fuckin' world. The whole world's gonna be under our control. So what are you worked up about?"

Ever since he can remember, he's always wanted to be a gangster.

Independent win battle in wallchart war
As the Guardian prepares to launch its second offensive next week, with another round of wallcharts, the Independent gets in an early broadside with a week of RSPB-linked bird posters. This is how it's done! Illustrated by Mike Langman and annotated by the RSPB, these are actually based on wildlife found around these shores and not in Scandinavia in the 70s. They're in a different league to the Guardian's. They actually recognise the existence of the nuthatch as a British garden bird! As I've said before, I admire any newspaper that goes under the radar of free DVDs and CDs in cardboard sleeves, and thinks laterally, but a ropey wallchart bought in from a Scandinavian company is just that, and these are the real deal. I like the fact that the Indy are calling them "glossy posters" to differentiate them from wallcharts, and that the Guardian are flagging theirs as the "original wallcharts". The first casualty of war is restraint.

Like watching an angel fall
The Sopranos, Episode 4, written by Toni Kalem, directed by Rodrigo Garcia, All Happy Families, an episode without sensational incident, but driven by the voltage of family. AJ's at that difficult age. Carmela thinks he hates her. He doesn't. He just hates everybody. His one aim is to get wasted with the guys. Tony buys him a jeep. That helps a lot. AJ says, "Fuck you" to his mom after being rumbled after a hotel-room stopover in New York (he's supposed to be at his sister's), where the textbook frat boy rituals take place: the passing of a bong, the redecorating of a toilet bowl, the shaving-off of eyebrows and the drawing on of new ones, the writing in marker pen on the bare ass of someone passed out, face down (how homoerotic teenage boys are!) - at which she sends him to live with his father. His father, meanwhile, is having trouble with Feech ("Did I learn nothing from Richie Aprile?"), who's too big for his boots, and too fond of recalling the old days (ie. when he wielded power, and Tony was "a kid"). Instead of whacking him, they get him sent back to the can. I suspect this is not the last we'll see of him. Tony is now paranoid, after an incisive comment by Carmela, that he has no real friends, only associates, who laugh at his jokes even when they're not funny. He tells this one about an accountant and a plane at a poker game ("A Boring 747") and we see through his eyes the likes of Paulie and Sylvio busting a gut. But do they mean it? David Lee Roth is at the poker game, apparently playing himself. Must be a mate of Steve Van Sandt's. And there appears to be romance brewing between Carmela, rattling around in that big house on her own now, and AJ's counsellor, played by David Strathairn. Good night, and good luck.

Eat your scones!
A much stronger episode - number three, Where's Johnny?, written by John Patterson and directed by Michael Caleo - in which Uncle Junior shows definite signs of Alzheimer's, driving off to the old neighbourhood in search of his dead brother Johnny Soprano (who was, as we remember from Livia's catchphrase, "a saint"). A literal turf war between Paulie and Feech shows just what a violent pyscho the old capo is - breaking the arm of a gardener whom he felt was encroaching on his nephew's patch by dragging his inert body, by the balls, to a kerbside, and stomping on the bone. Ouch. Anyone who saw Robert Loggia, who plays Feech, in Lost Highway or Scarface will know how good he is at this kind of thing. Tony, now sharing with Artie Bucco, is seen trying to mediate a tripartate power-sharing arrangement between Johnny Sack, Angelo Garepe and Little Carmine (he of the "wet t-shirt contests" in Florida). Sack, his eyes darker than ever, tells him where to stick it ("What's this, the fucking UN now?"). Meanwhile Junior insults Tony at the dinner table about his lack of athletic prowess as a kid. Tony takes it badly and says that his uncle is "dead to him." (Good to hear that phrase.) Then he finds out about the Alzheimer's and they almost have a Moment at the end of the episode. Some great conflict in this one - not least Tony's frustrated flare-up at Janice, who went off to California and left him with their mother. "I'm left here mired in her bullshit, trying to be a good son, and you're off dropping acid and blowing roadies!" Her hapless husband, Bobby, looks at her and says, "Roadies?" (Oh, it was Paulie who said the scones line, to his Aunt. Men are talking!)

Boo!
This is to mark the sideways move of Leona McCambridge, who has been my producer on 6 Music for two and a half years. These things happen. It's good for presenters to have the comfort blanket pulled out from under them, keeps things fresh etc. I've been at the BBC for long enough now to know their ruses. Just when you're getting into some kind of rhythm with a programme team (and at weekends, in the studio, Leona is my programme team), it's management practice to "mix things up". Thus, Leona is moving back to the weeks, to look after Gideon, and Jude is coming over to weekends, from Steve's show, to look after me. (I can promise you I don't take much looking after. I do my own photocopying. I don't require links "scripting" for me. I usually refill my own water bottle, and often supply gluten-free biscuits for all. I even nitpick the programme's webpage, which is a joy for whoever has to update it.) Anyway, it's been a gas, and it sure beat working. That's the long and short of what I wish to say on the matter. I shall look forward to working with Jude, but I shall miss Leona, with her apparently fantastic shoes and her microwaved Quorn leftovers and her LA Law ringtone and her constructive criticism and her Gary Davies anecdotes and her occasional misspelled word on the Chart Show running order (Return To Cookie Monster a great favourite) and her military precision and her childlike pouts and her 80s tunes and her salute to the opening credits of The West Wing. All who appreciate good radio - and behind every good show there's a good producer, usually silently going about their infrastructural work - should salute her.

Grandpa Munster over here
I can foresee getting through Season Five at a lick. Episode Two, The Rat Pack, written by Matthew Weiner, directed by Alan Taylor, who I'm sure used to present Mr & Mrs before Derek Batey took over, revolved around the appearance of Tony's cousin, Tony (Buscemi, downplaying his rattiness somewhat), which led to much manly hugging and back-slapping - a useful way to check to see if someone is wired, of course, as much as an Italian-American display of brotherly love. Tony wishes to go straight, put the massage course he did in the joint into practise, and Tony gets him a legit job driving for a Korean laundry firm in the interim. The trouble comes when Tony forgets that Tony is now the boss, and he casually disrespects him in mixed male company. (He also calls Paulie Grandpa Munster because of those magnificient white wings of his, and that goes down badly too. Hey, he was just busting your balls a little bit!) It's amazing how quickly familial love can turn to paranoid distrust. There's a lot of business with a horrible painting of the Rat Pack too, given to Tony as a gift (he doesn't usually like "modern art"), and climactically thrown from a bridge at the end. The significance, of course, is that various people are ratting, including Adriana, who's reaching the end of her informer's tether.

They're ba-ack!
Return of The Sopranos. And not the return you're thinking of. Season Six, the final season, is back on E4. We're watching Season Five on disc. It was the much-trumpeted return on E4 that forced us to reassess our lives. Fearful that we were in fact two seasons behind, a quick recap on the episode guides revealed that we had seen Season Four (Adriana and the Feds, Johnny Sack, Pie-Oh-My), and thus were only one season out of whack. Duly purchased, we have decided to catch up with Five, and then purchase Six when we're ready. The world of DVD box sets means you're never in synch with the real world, but, as Tony would say, what da fuck?

So, you enjoy Six, and we'll enjoy Five. It feels so long since Season Four ended, I can't even remember whether we watched it on E4 or C4. Certainly, in the early days of E4, the digitial picture was so poor, we opted to wait until terrestrial transmission. This teaches you patience. The Sopranos needs watching in sequence, in controlled conditions, and without missing a single episode. (Likewise The West Wing, which I had to abort mid-season due to missing two in a row. I await the final-series box set, which is coming this month. I found that missing a whole chunk of Six Feet Under didn't harm the flow. I don't know why. But I got bored of the last series, and never saw it to the end. You have to trust your instinct.) My instinct on The Sopranos is that I've never seen a bad episode, except perhaps that dream sequence one at the end of Season Two, with the talking fish, but that was redeemed by the shooting of Pussy on the boat. So ... Episode 1 - or 65, in sequence - The Two Tonys, written by David Chase and Terence Winter, and directed by Tim Van Patten:

Tony and Carmela are separated. She and AJ have a bear in the yard. AJ has a "five thousand dollar" drum kit - a noisy manifestation of his father's silent guilt. Paulie and Christopher are at odds, not least over restaurant tabs, which leads to the accidental death of a waiter. Tony's after Dr Melfi in a non-professional capacity. Carmine, the old don, has a stroke at the golf club, after smelling "burning hair" (is that a common warning sign?). But the most important strand, seeded here, is the emergence of the Class of '04 - that is, a wave of mobsters released from prison back into the community, including Tony Blundetto, Tony's cousin (Steve Buscemi - as yet unseen), Phil Leotardo (Frank Vincent, who I can't wait to see, as he was killed by Joe Pesci in one Martin Scorsese movie, and kills Joe Pesci in another!) and Feech La Manna (Robert Loggia), a vest-wearing, vicious old capo who's amazed mainly by the shaved "bushes" since he got out ("I went over to Silvio's - it's like the Girl Scouts in there"). It's these supporting characters, and actors, who make The Sopranos. That said, it's comforting to know that the principal cast remain solid, with James Gandolfini still spitting out his lines and brooding like a bear, Edie Falco mixing indignance with hurt at that breakfast bar, Michael Imperioli cursing and bitching like an old man while still deep down a boy, and the imperious Lorraine Bracco refusing to let down her guard, all the while smouldering beneath.

A great set-up episode, leaving Tony in the leaf-strewn yard (shades of the Corleones' Lake Tahoe compound), with an AK-47, waiting to make bear meat. Protecting his family, which is what he does at the end of the day. (Oh, and the Easter baskets was something Christopher made excuses about to Tony. Tony didn't know what he was talking about. Neither did we. I love touches like that. The Easter baskets!)