... The Nutt House BBC 2 COMPARISONS are odious, but comparisons between odious hotels are doubly odious. Even so it is impossible, watching this Mel Brooks series, new to American and British television, to avoid thinking of Fawlty Towers. On the early evidence the John Cleese classic is the funniest and the bener of the two. But that doesn't mean that the aptly named Nutt House is second rate. ...

... Birds of a Feather BBC 1 THE COMEDY writing team of Laurence Marks and Maurice Gran are the flavour of the month and typical of the way television schedules these things they now have a new Monday series on BBC1 and a new Tuesday series, Snakes and Ladders, on I TV. Two of their previous series were Shine On Harvey Moon and The New Statesman, so if the foregoing predic tion is correct then ...

... TSW in pull-out row SMALLER independent production companies should beware of believing that verbal agreements mean firm commissions from ITV companies in view of the forthcoming franchise auction, TSW's head of documentaries warned this week. Frank Wintle was speaking after claims were made by Cornwall-based Studio Operations South West that TSW had left the company in a nightmare scenario ...

... Treasury refuses ITV cash appeal By ANGUS TOWLER THE GOVERNMENT has turned down pleas by cash-strapped ITV companies to review the amount of money they are obliged to pay to the Treasury--at least until the autumn. Under new arrangements intro duced at the start of this year, the levy paid by all ITV contractors was based primarily on net advertising revenue. Previously it had been calculated ...

... Fun And Games YTV WHATEVER cynic came up with the observation that it is impossible to underestimate the intelligence of the public had better think again. For some reason which escapes me this fun and games puzzle show has got into the ITV top ten with more than nine million viewers. Game? Certainly. But fun? I've had more excitement waiting for a train. However, this was the third series ...

... Gentlemen and Players ITV AFTER THE first ten minutes of this second series of the city slick drama I knew the title was wrong because there wasn't a gentleman in sight, just a pack of bounders and cads whose twin aims in life were, one, to become fabulously rich, and two, to humiliate their rivals at every available opportunity. As entertainment, Gentlemen and Players demands concentration, ...

... There's a stylish, colour co-ordinated future out there somewhere WILD PALMS (C Greengrass Productions Inc for BBC2, Monday, 9pm) was all very well but where was Gerald Harper when we needed him? All the men in Oliver Stone's first film for television, set in 2007, looked like clones of Harper in his finest hour as Adam Adamant. He was the Edwardian gentleman thawed from a block of ice ...

... One Way Out BBC 1 A STORY highly relevant to a UK which has the highest divorce rate in Europe. Successful architect James Carlisle (Bob Peck) has negotiated the emotional minefield of separation and now enjoys a cordial relationship with his ex-wife Lyn (Lesley Nightingale). He sees the kids at weekends and everything is very civilised, until Lyn falls in love with emotional landmine and ...

... PSI ITV HERE, we were promised, was a game show to break the jaded mould we have come to know and loathe: the formula television panel show was to be given an overhaul. Unfortunately, it didn't quite work out like that. Tuesday's first screening offered us the same old names, with Nicholas Parsons, Christopher Biggins and Ken ny Everett ranged in smarmy showbiz cameraderie against Sue Cook, Su ...

... In Sickness and In Health BBC 1 WHAT A difference a decade makes. In the seventies, Alf Garnett was seen by some as the personification of the worst sort of bigotry: anti-women, anti-left, and anti-black. He became the working class hero of the super patriot, of those who wanted Britain to remain truly British. Yet now, Alf Garnett is enjoyed by the very people who denounced him ten years ago. ...

... Mornin' Sarge BBC 2 I DON'T know what the Police Federation think about it and whether they are laughing or crying, but Mornin' Sarge is out to do for The Force what 'Alio, 'Alio has done for the French Resistance. it s a Kind oi v-arry un Lx>pper approach, pure mickeytaking farce, designed to prove that life for the boys in blue is not all masonic lodges, call girls, and drug dealers The ...

... Life Without George BBC-1 SOMEHOW I doubt whether this series would have got into production had the AIDS scare surfaced earlier but fortunately it was completed shortly before the campaign began. I say fortunately because it has all the signs of being an outright winner with a sharp and adult script by two new writers, a popular star in Simon Cadell, and some fleshed-out characters who are ...