Enjoying some well earned sofa time over the next seven days? Here's John Byrne’s TV choices for the week ahead: Saturday July 18-Friday July 24.
It's hello to Imelda May, The Saboteurs and Witnesses, and cheerio to The Outcast, Celebrity Masterchef and The John Bishop Show.
Pick of the week
The Best of The Late Late Show, Friday, RTÉ One
Feeling that Friday night telly nights have been a little bare since The Late Late Show went on its annual summer break? Well here's something to tide you over, as Ryan Tubridy invites viewers to have a look back at some of his favourite moments from the recent season of the world's longest-running TV chat show. With music from legendary songwriter Albert Hammond, there's also the hypnotic Keith Barry, an insightful Margo and a very entertaining John Cleese. And plenty more besides.
Here's recent guest Jason Byrne recalling holidays in Mosney:
Star of the week
Imelda May
The Imelda May Show, Friday, RTÉ One
There's nothing shabby about Imelda May Clabby. Born in Dublin's Liberties in 1974 she grafted her way through the music business for many years before making a breakthrough during the Noughties, on the back of her second album, Love Tattoo.
Now one of Ireland's top music acts, she's back for a second run of The Imelda May Show. Guests this season include Bob Geldof and The Boomtown Rats, Lulu, Kodaline, Delorentos, Hothouse Flowers, Coronas, Damien Dempsey, Soak, Mundy and Marc Almond.
Filmed in front of a live studio audience, the show will once again feature a mix of chat and live performances. On Friday's opener, the acts are Kodaline, Hothouse Flowers, Fight Like Apes and The Lost Brothers.
Here's a clip from last year featuring John Sheahan:
Starting this week
The Gleneagle, Sunday, RTÉ One
This new fly-on-the-wall series goes behind the scenes of one of Ireland's best-known venues, The Gleneagle Hotel in Killarney.
"Nobody has to dress for dinner in the Gleneagle and they don’t have to mind their Ps and Qs. Most guests don’t even know what star rating we have. They come here to kick up their heels and have a good time," says hotel owner Patrick O’Donoghue.
In the opening episode the hotel welcomes a group of golden oldies who have come for a marathon of old-time dancing. For the 30th year in a row, they’re here to reunite and tread the boards with old friends at the Lisdoonvarna Reunion. Meanwhile, in the INEC there's the up-and-coming Dingle band Walking On Cars entertaining 3,000 fans in the biggest headline gig of their career.
Trailer Time:
Desi Rascals, Wednesday, Sky1
The Only Way is Essex creator Tony Wood's non-scripted drama returns for a second run. This time around the show delves deeper into the eventful lives of its multi-generational cast of British-Asians.
The Saboteurs, Friday, RTÉ2
This Norwegian series stars Anna Friel (that's two shows she's in on Fridays on RTÉ2) and follows one of the most gripping episodes of WWII as the Nazis sought to develop an atomic bomb and the Allies desperately struggled to prevent them.
Wallander, Monday, RTÉ One
Kenneth Branagh stars in this BBC remake of the Swedish crime drama. Inspector Kurt Wallander's investigation of a suicide uncovers wrongdoing and corruption at the heart of the establishment.
1864, Sunday, RTÉ2
This is a Danish television series about the Second Schleswig War between Denmark and Prussia and Austria which ended in 1864 with Denmark conceding around 25% of its territory to Prussia.
One Born Every Minute, Wednesday, Channel 4
The Bafta Award-winning series returns to Liverpool Women's Hospital for a new run of seven episodes, beginning with a baby that has a life-threatening illness.
Ending this Week
The Outcast, Sunday, BBC One
Last week's first episode was pretty gloomy, so what can this finale offer? Determined to get his life in order, Lewis returns to the village where he is regarded as a notorious figure. His attempts to lead a normal life are quickly destroyed by the people around him and, captivated by golden girl Tamsin, he finds himself in trouble again. Pushed to the edges of society, Lewis seems to be completely abandoned - but there’s one girl whose love might just save him.
Trailer Time:
Britain's Forgotten Slave Owners, Wednesday, BBC Two
Historian David Olusoga concludes this series by exploring how in 1834 the UK government took the decision to compensate the slave owners with the equivalent of £17bn in today’s money.
Celebrity Masterchef, Friday, BBC One
Season ten of this show reaches its finale as the three remaining celebrities battle it out to impress judges John Torode and Gregg Wallace and clinch this year's cookery crown.
Virgin Atlantic: Up in the Air, Tuesday, UTV Ireland
The airline ushers in a new era with the initial delivery of its new Boeing Dreamliner planes, but the lighting has an undesirable effect on the crews' blouses.
The John Bishop Show, Saturday, BBC One
Irish comedian Jason Byrne is among John Bishop's final line-up of guests that also includes Jo Caulfield, Andy Askins and Daniel Sloss. Music comes from Andreya Triana and John Newman.
Superfoods: the Real Story, Monday, Channel 4
Kate Quilton tests the credentials of three superfoods – kefir, oily fish and wheatgrass - that many believe can help with people's hearts, blood and guts.
Married at First Sight, Thursday, Channel 4
Just hours after their first meeting, the two couples finally get some time alone and spend their first night as husband and wife before setting off on their honeymoons, one in Iceland and the other in Ireland.
Hoff the Record, Thursday, Dave
Christopher Biggins joins in the fun as this mockumentary about former Baywatch star David Hasselhoff ends with Hoff heading to work in a panto when he discovers that his daughter's been abducted.
Drama of the week
Witnesses, Wednesday, Channel 4
The last French TV drama shown on Channel 4 was The Returned, which was outstanding. Here's hoping that this latest Gallic gogglebox offering is of a similar quality.
In the north of France, the bodies of a man, a woman and a teenager have been removed from their graves. Things become even more disturbing when these missing bodies, which have no connection to each other, are discovered in a show home, posed as if they were a family. The police soon make the connection with a similar scene discovered a month earlier.
Near one of the bodies, a young detective finds a photo of a retired police officer who's a legend among the Northern France Crime Squad. His connection with the case forces him to come out of retirement and join the hunt for whoever is behind these macabre stunts.
If the trailer's anything to go by, it'll make Broadchurch look like Bosco.
Comedy of the week
Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Sunday, RTÉ2
We're getting close to the end of season two and there's no let up in the fun on this Andy Samberg sitcom about a wide and varied bunch of New York's Finest. Jake gets injured on the job, so Terry makes him take some time off. R&R just doesn't come easy for him, even though he's naturally lazy. Meanwhile, Holt and Rosa go on a double date with their significant others.
Trailer Time:
On Demand
The Leftovers, Sky Box Sets, from Thursday
Here's a chance to binge on the entire first season of the gloomy-but-gripping drama created by Damon Lindelof (Lost) and Tom Perrotta which is itself based on Perrotta's novel of the same name.
The Leftovers takes place three years after a global event, known as the Sudden Departure, which caused the unexplainable disappearance of 140 million people, 2% of the world's population. The story focuses primarily on the Garvey family and their acquaintances in the fictional town of Mapleton, New York. Justin Theroux stars as Kevin Garvey, the Chief of Police. His wife, Laurie, played by Amy Brenneman, has joined a cult called the Guilty Remnant.
Christopher Eccleston and Liv Tyler also star, but the stand-out performance come from Carrie Coon as Nora Durst, the only resident of Mapleton who lost her entire family in the Sudden Departure. It's Coon's first major TV role and she is amazing. You might remember her from the movie Gone Girl – she played Margo, the twin of Ben Affleck’s accused murderer Nick Dunne.
Trailer Time:
Music
What Ever Happened To Rock ‘N’ Roll? Friday, BBC Four
As part of the BBC’s Rock ‘n’ Roll season, Radio 6 Music presenter Lauren Laverne hosts a debate with a panel of special guests to discuss what rock ‘n’ roll music means today. Recorded in front of an audience at London’s 100 Club earlier this month, Laverne is joined by punk icon Dr John Cooper Clarke, Savages frontwoman Jehnny Beth and Eric Burdon, best known as the frontman of The Animals and a member of funk band War.
The hour-long show features specially filmed video contributions from a host of music stars including Noel Gallagher, Foo Fighters’ Dave Grohl and Taylor Hawkins, Brittany Howard from Alabama Shakes, and Sleaford Mods. Guided by the clips, the debate will explore history, politics, class and other musical genres as the panel discuss whether rock ‘n’ roll remains subversive and dangerous, or whether it’s perhaps now more about lifestyle and decoration.
Here's Cooper Clarke in his prime:
Documentary of the week
Man on Bridge, Tuesday, RTÉ One
If, like me, you missed this when it was first broadcast last Christmas, here's an opportunity to catch up with what's sure to be a treat for anyone interested in old photographs. This documentary tells the story of Arthur Fields, a street photographer who captured passersby on Dublin’s O’Connell Bridge from the 1930s to the 1980s. He took hundreds of thousands of photos throughout his career but no negatives survive, so all the images used here are from personal collections. Arthur Fields became a Dublin institution, and - as is self-evident here - the photographs that survive form an alternative visual archive of the capital, showing the physical changes the city and its people experienced over fifty years. The accompanying book is a treasure trove, so this documentary should be equally evocative.
Trailer Time:
Film of the Week
The Breakfast Club, Friday, Film 4
You don't have to have been a teenager in the 1980s to appreciate this cracking 1985 American coming-of-age comedy-drama film written, produced, and directed by John Hughes. It stars Emilio Estevez and Molly Ringwald as two of five teenagers, each a member of a different high school clique, who spend a Saturday in detention together and come to realise that they are all more than their respective stereotypes.
Trailer Time:
John Byrne
