Half woman. Half fringe. 100 per cent rip-off

Published: 16:00 EST, 27 April 2013 | Updated: 16:15 EST, 27 April 2013

The Great British Sewing Bee   Tuesday, BBC2          4/5
The Politician’s Husband           Thursday, BBC2        3/5
The Wright Way                           Tuesday, BBC1          0/5

The Great British Sewing Bee finished last week and it’ll be missed in this house. Yes, yes, I know, it was knock-off goods. 

I know it was dreamed up in Room 567  at the BBC which has, I’m told, been exclusively set aside for thinking of ways to rip off The Great British Bake Off, and even has a sign on the door: ‘The Great British Bake Off Rip-Off Room. Quiet. Ripping Off In Progress’.

The Great British Sewing Bee was presented by Claudia Winkleman, who is smart and ironic and, best of all, half woman, half fringe

So, hardly original but, still, it was sweet, and I grew fond. It was not hysterical. It was good-natured.

All attempts to ratchet up  tension – Will Sandra pull her scallop  out of shape? Will Stuart’s zip pucker? – were as heroic as they were sublime.

Some of the judges’ comments will, in time, surely become classics of the genre, as in: ‘You’ve got a decent pair of trousers there.’ And: ‘Nice pocket!’

It was presented by Claudia Winkleman, who is smart and ironic and, best of all, half woman, half fringe.

Some have said Claudia’s fringe should be awarded its own show, but it isn’t quite as straightforward as that. What about Kate Garraway’s fringe?

You imagine Kate Garraway’s fringe won’t have something to say if Claudia’s fringe were given its own show? Have you seen Kate Garraway’s fringe lately? And you don’t think it’s spoiling for a fight? 

But the winner? The winner was Ann; lovely, lovely 81-year-old Ann, whom I’d wanted all along, unlike my sister, a keen seamstress, who wanted pretty blonde Lauren on the grounds that ‘it will give sewing a cool, young image’. (Yes, dear, a win for Lauren and all our teenage children will stop drinking cider in the woods behind the recycling centre and stay at home to perfect their buttonholes and pleats. Why has no-one thought of this before?) But it was Ann for me, and only ever Ann.

When Ann first went to university, after the War, she wore a skirt she’d fashioned from a pair of her father’s old trousers, so if anyone deserves a prize in life it’s Ann.

She’s now a reality star, I suppose, although time not exactly being on her side, she is skipping the bit where she is meant to fall drunkenly out of a dress in a nightclub and is going straight to having her own crummy column in Reveal magazine. (Or Closer! Or Heat! Or Now! Or Look!; there may be a bidding war.)

The Politician’s Husband is a three-part drama starring David Tennant and if it seems to you David Tennant is currently everywhere this may be because he is.

Written by Paula Milne, the initial set-up was swift and neat and sure. It opened with Aiden Hoynes (Tennant), minister for business, resigning from government on what we assumed was a matter of principle until his motive became clear: he was positioning himself to take a tilt at the leadership. His plan, however, backfired and, betrayed by his closest friend, he soon found himself hung out to dry.

He felt all this as if it were a physical pain – ‘It hurts, Dad!’ he cried out to his father – and nothing could console him: not his glass kitchen extension, not hot sex with his wife, Freya (Emily Watson), and not even, I’m betting, Claudia’s fringe, had it somehow wandered into view.

The Wright Way is tired, hackneyed, formulaic, ranty, unfunny and dated. Put it next to My Family and My Family would seem avant garde

But Aiden spots a way forward when Freya, also a politician, is offered a cabinet post.

Once she’s on the inside, he reasons, he can work her like a puppet to mastermind his own comeback. But will Freya play ball?

Milne has said she wanted this to be a drama about what happens to a marriage when a wife’s career starts overshadowing her husband’s but, so far, it is all a bit thin emotionally, and is playing out more as a straightforward melodrama on the venal nature of politics in a world which doesn’t always ring true.

Why doesn’t anyone ever do any work, for example? Wouldn’t they have sharp-elbowed their son, who has Asperger’s, into a specialist school by now?

Still, early days, and highly watchable, although I’m worried about that metaphorical crack in the bedroom ceiling.

They are well-connected people, so why don’t they know a metaphorical builder who specialises in fixing metaphorical cracks?

The Wright Way is the new sitcom from Ben Elton about a health-and-safety jobsworth, and how it got through all the hoops required to ever be green-lighted is anyone’s guess.

You’d think one person, just one, would have spotted it for the diseased dog it is, and said: ‘Let’s be kind and take it outside, so we don’t disturb anyone in Room 567, as they may be mid-ripping off, and shoot it in the head.’ 

The Wright Way is tired, hackneyed, formulaic, ranty, unfunny and dated.

Put it next to My Family and My Family would seem avant garde, and if you thought you’d never see ‘My Family’ and ‘avant-garde’ in the same sentence, me too. I didn’t know where to look. 

Shall we just forget it ever happened? Least said soonest mended, as the old saying goes, and although old sayings aren’t always to be trusted – I watched a pot boil the other day; no problems to report – it may be the only humane option. End of.