... (centre) and director Nic Phillips. Valentine Park is a six-part comic love story about a park gardener who falls in love for the first time. Also featured in the cast are Liz Smith, David Thewlis, Katy Newell and Daniel Peacock. The other co-writer is Nicholas Hyde. The series is due for transmission later this year. ...

... Coast to Coast BBC 2 MRS WHITEHOUSE is no pin-up of mine, but I do believe there are boundaries in comedy that should not be overstepped, least of all in an ostensibly realistic comedy-drama such as this. I refer to the scene in which two Liverpool policemen discover the mutilated body of a small-time crook in a sack in the river. Both his feet have been cut off, a discovery that seems to ...

... BBC-2 The Story of English THIS nine-part BBC series is an essay in popular education. Such programmes tend to be welcomed in theory and carped at in practice. This series deserves better. It promises to be rewarding viewing, despite some problems with the first episode, which seemed over-eager to persuade its audience of the importance of the subject. We were drowned in statistics, and the ...

... Getting ready for the big pop A FORMER Top of the Pops producer is behind a spectacular pop show which looks likely to rival the seasonal edition of his former show in the battle for the top television pop programme this Christmas. Gordon Aylesbury has persuaded Cliff Richard to record a spectacular music show, which will feature him for the first time with a series of stars of his own choice. ...

... Lost Belongings THAMES TO UNDERSTAND the tragedy of Northern Ireland takes more than historical data. It requires an intimate knowledge of the people and then convictions, religious or otherwise. Stewart Parker possesses that insight having lived in Belfast most of his life. In this six-part series from Euston Films he attempts, not for the first time, to unravel the baffling muddle ol ...

... On the Palm BBC-2 THE PICTURE of a North of England industrial city in David Sheasby's On The Palm was really too convincing for comfort. Not that Yorkshire has ever been a particularly comfortable place to live, as I know from my own mis-spent youth before I discovered that there was an excellent train service to King's i>ross. inow tne victim ot inatcnente economics, it has gone from the ...

... Service with a grimace BILL McCOID on a drama that captures reality CENTRAL Hard Cases HARD CASES makes a good drama out of a crisis. Any programme which has a copy of The Stage in the opening titles can't be all bad. This is the kind of drama that comes from secure funding, a large cast, well researched, and cinematic style location shooting. In this new series the soap formula has again been ...

... A Neighbours gala NETWORK TEN AUSTRALIA'S Network Ten recently marked the 1,000th episode of Neighbours with a special programme centred on a gala held at Ten's Melbourne studios to celebrate the occasion. One learned that Neighbours began four and a half years ago, produced by the Grundy Organistion for the Seven Network, who actually cancelled the series, whereupon it was taken up by Ten. ...

... Regional companies back down over new scheduling system By ANGUS TOWLER THE 15 regional ITV companies are understood to have given way over the issue of whether or not to allow independent producers direct access to the commercial network's new central scheduler. From January 1993, ITV's sched ule will be drawn up by a single body, ending the controversial system of 'guaranteed hours for the ...

... London's Burning actor wins damages after explosion AN EQUITY extra this week won damages from London Weekend Television after he was involved in an explosion while filming the hit series London's Burning. Derek Van Weenen won the out- of-court settlement because of per manent ear damage sustained when a barge exploded during shooting in January 1 990. Van Weenen claimed that he was told to ...

... Smith And Jones BBC 1 THERE is no doubt which side of the television 9pm kiddiewinks artificial divide that Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones are. Griff opens the show from inside a womb (and at the end thanks Janet Street Porter for the use of it) and Mel arrives via the fallopian tube and stands on the cervix The Oxbridge pair, Griff once vice president of the Cambridge Footlights Society, and ...

... Falstaff KENT OPERA OF ALL the comic characters in Italian Opera none is greater--nor closer to an English heart--than Falstaff, as recreated in Verdi's masterpiece. Kent Opera now have this work in their repertoire, in a translation by Michael Irwin which returns the vain old knight completely to his home ground. Jonathan Miller's production, too, whilst faithful to Verdi, em phasises the ...