It's odd, being the Queen: you're woken by an infernal bagpiper, and meet lots of nervous people
Remember the last one of these, the BBC's A Year With The Queen a few years ago? A misleading trailer appeared to show Her Maj storming out of a photoshoot with Annie Leibovitz in a huff, but the storm was created in an edit suite. An almighty fuss ensued; orf with their heads, cried the Daily Mail. And orf they came – both BBC1 and the media company behind the film lost theirs. Crowngate it became known as.
So no one's taking any chances with Our Queen (ITV, Sunday), which trails respectfully around behind her during her big jubilee last year. Respectfully, correctly, chronologically, and not as interestingly as the BBC film (which actually had some really good material in it when it got shown, but that was forgotten in all the brouhaha).
Here we join the Queen on a visit to a primary school near Sandringham, shopping with the girls (Fortnum and Mason with Camilla and Kate), for a gathering of world monarchs at Windsor, more jubilee celebrations, that dreary Thames boating event, the state opening of parliament, a state visit, yet more celebrations ...
There's loads of pageantry, and polish, and table placement. People – equerries, private secretaries, Black Rod, a few PMs (present and past), various kowtowing toadies, other members of her family, the Queen of Denmark – say the right things, about how marvellous she is, so hard-working (which I believe), down to earth (which I don't). Boris livens it up a bit, at least acknowledging Harry's Vegas romp; Robbie Williams is funny, says the Queen had no idea who he was. Gary Barlow meanwhile scuttles around behind her, panting for the good-boy OBE he knows she's going to toss him. Gary is now officially a corgi.
It's not a short two hours. But nor is it without interest or insight. I don't really feel I know her any better after this, but I do know more about what it must be like to be her. It looks very odd, being the Queen. You're woken by an infernal bagpiper outside your window; you spend the day meeting dozens of people who are all nervous and pretend to find your stories hilarious (maybe you think you are hilarious); on Wednesdays at 6pm David Cameron comes for a chat about the eurozone crisis or elections in Greece; sometimes you go to Scotland; you used to go to the Commonwealth to meet people with masks and boobs, but now Charles does all that.
It's the little details I like best; the shabbiness of the interior of Balmoral, the electric heater in the fireplace, the fact that she doesn't actually talk to the children in that Norfolk school, just their teachers. Oh, and she never says hello or goodbye to anyone. That's right, I met her once (I'm one of an estimated four million), I don't think she said hello or goodbye to me. Rude woman.
Briefly, elsewhere ... It's Kevin (BBC2, Sunday), Kevin Eldon, who's been lurking around the edges of the funniest television (Brass Eye, Nighty Night, Alan Partridge, Hunderby) for ages, and now he gets his own show. At 53! A victory for middle-age in a world obsessed with youth. It's a sketch show, yes, but it's OK because he pretty much rips up the sketch show book, throws himself and his warped imagination at it, plus a healthy dollop of lunacy. The Führer with the voice of Beatles produce George Martin? Ha!
Then In the Flesh (BBC3), a zombie series that you don't have to be into zombies to appreciate. Because it's about hysteria and bigotry, mob rule and intolerance. There are parallels all over the real, non-zombie world (for zombie you can read any number of minorities). And it's so very well done, chilling and strong.
Which The Lady Vanishes (BBC1, Sunday) isn't. Oh, it's not really bad, and Tuppence Middleton puts in a spirited performance as (an oddly unlikable) Iris Carr. Why though? Why remake Hitchcock? It is, quite simply, never a good idea. Never.
And finally, another grand gathering of monarchs, though in Mexico this time and they are insects: The Incredible Story of the Monarch Butterfly (BBC4, Sunday). They fly all the way down from Canada, no one knows why. Millions and millions of them; they darken the sky and turn green pine trees into golden butterfly trees. It's like magical realism natural history (the Mexican poet and Kristin Scott Thomas's rather flowery narration have something to do with it). It's real though. And magic.
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