China's rapid expansion, Myleene Klass does Vermeer and a smug film about cancer
The Chinese are taking over the world. Such, at least, is the premise of The Chinese Are Coming (BBC2). Justin Rowlatt investigated what Chinese influence meant for African countries, nicely skewering racist presumptions about China as he travelled. Intriguingly, the Chinese have often revivified old British colonial infrastructures. But are they as rapacious as we were? Tough call. Zambians resented their new imperialist yoke, while Angolans and Tanzanians seemed pleased by their countries' reinvigoration.
Could the Chinese do the same for Britain? Probably not. At least Africans have stuff ? copper, cobalt, cheap labour ? that the Chinese want. What do we have? Our coal and oil are depleted, our manufacturing base destroyed; our only surplus is celebrities. Perhaps we could trade Myleene Klass and Stephen Fry for an overhaul to the railway network. The Chinese probably wouldn't go for that.
In Fame in the Frame (Sky Arts), Klass agreed to pose for a recreation of Vermeer's Girl with the Pearl Earring. In later episodes, Fry will sit for Vel�zquez's Pope Innocent X, Ronnie Wood will appear in Manet's D�jeuner sur l'Herbe (please God, not as the nude model), and Julia Bradbury will become Rubens' Venus in Front of the Mirror. It's like wannabe posh Celebrity Stars in Their Eyes. I've applied to recreate one of Otto Dix's war-mangled Card Players.
Excellent, but who'll be Munch's The Scream? Sky subscribers, if this is what they're paying for. But it's unfair to be cynical. A show in which convicted art forger John Myatt flatters the bottomless self-regard of some of Britain's leading narcissists is a perfect comment on modern portraiture and, therefore, programme-making of genius.
That said, couldn't Sky have commissioned more adventurously? Cameron as Holbein's Henry VIII, Clegg as his codpiece. The Cabinet as dogs playing poker. Kate Middleton having her nipple tweaked by Princess Eugenie in a re-run of the school of Fontainebleau painting Gabrielle d'Estr�es and One of Her Sisters. London's mayor as Titian's Marsyas, hung and flayed by Mrs Johnson. Boris wouldn't have to be skinned for the picture. Though in the interests of authenticity . . .
While Myatt painted, Klass told us about herself. She spent her Hear'Say proceeds on a piano. We cut to her at that piano, backless dress and hair fanned by the wind machine. I'd thought she been miscast as a Vermeer, that she'd be better as the Mona Lisa. But no: her smile isn't enigmatic, it's the twisted sister to Robert De Niro's scarily mirthless grin. At the end, Myatt threw cold coffee over his Klassy Vermeer to antique it. It was, ultimately, an insufficiently destructive liquid.
Cougar Town (Sky Living) is absolutely mystifying. The adults have had so much work done they look the same age as their kids who, paradoxically, look as prematurely mature as the pupils of Please Sir. In fact, everybody looks 28, making the (sexist, ageist) premise that Courteney Cox is a fortysomething Californian preying on younger men unworkable. It was easier to tell who was who in Chimps of the Lost Gorge (BBC2) in which 20 Kyambura chimpanzees risked predation on the African savannah. I'm no screenwriter, but if Courteney were replaced by a real hungry cougar that would make the narrative arc clearer.
Jennifer Aniston guested as a kooky shrink. Could she help Courteney get over her man issues? Oh, have a guess. Now I can see why her post-Friends career has been undistinguished: most Hollywood actors know enough to do very little; here she did too much, a symphony of twitches and tics in inverse ratio to funny. Maybe it wasn't all Gerard Butler's fault that The Bounty Hunter sucked.
Cougar Town made The Big C (Channel 4) seem like Hegel. Laura Linney played a woman whose terminal cancer turns her into a truth-telling potty mouth. Her son doesn't flush, her brother doesn't shower, and her ex is Oliver Platt, reprising his recent backsliding bastard from the film Please Give. Everyone is smug, slick, spoiled and mired in sentiment. Not for a moment was it as funny, appealingly tasteless or as properly terrifying as Bertrand Blier's new film about cancer, The Clink of Ice.
Dania Ramirez Lucy Liu LeAnn Rimes Adrianne Curry Jennifer Gimenez
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