Nationwide tribute (BBC 4, Thursday); Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares USA (Channel 4); Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life (BBC1, Sunday)
Nationwide began 40 years ago, and on Thursday BBC4 showed a tribute. The show ran nightly up to 1983, and was always the cheekie chappie of BBC programming. In the early 1980s I did a series of jokey sketches for them from the party conferences, and we ran an item about Denis Thatcher signing autographs for a disabled charity. ‘Good old Denis,’ I said, ‘helping legless people everywhere.’ That would be far too bland for Mock the Week or HIGNFY now, but back then we had a long discussion which ended with the line being broadcast. It seemed to be daring while being actually entirely inoffensive, which was in the Nationwide spirit.
We forget how for millions of households it defined the evening. It was after-work, after-school viewing, a beguiling blend of skateboarding ducks, beer-drinking snails, singing horses and general self-conscious mucking about, dotted with the odd serious item.
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