HD Heads-Up: July 21
July 21, 2016 
1 Comment
Yet more feckin’ laughs … MasterChefs hit the road … What really happens in Thailand doesn’t stay there … Big love Muslims … Galveston-bound …
After disappointing ratings for Roots, TV One will try to brighten up Sunday night with a Mrs Brown’s Boys special ahead of its Hillary miniseries launch. Mammy’s Punch will air 8.30 on July 31, between the premiere of a new local lifestyle half-hour, Karena and Kasey’s Kitchen Diplomacy, and new episodes of In the Club. It was broadcast as a 2015 Christmas special in the UK, winning praise from The Telegraph for its “dextrous comic exchanges” and blend of “crudery and buffoonery, sight gags and pratfalls, acid observation and sickly sweet sentiment” …
MasterChef NZ winners Karena and Kasey Te Awa Bird get their own 10-part spin-off in Karena and Kasey’s Kitchen Diplomacy, in which the small-town, self-taught Maori cooks embark on a world trip that combines culture with cuisine …
TV2’s newcomers in the week starting July 31 include the specials Budgies Make You Laugh Out Loud (7.30 Tuesday) and Never Teach Your Wife to Drive (7.30 Thursday) and the premiere of What Really Happens in Thailand (9.30 Monday). What Really Happens is an Australian franchise that includes a controversial take on the Gold Coast that tourism bosses dubbed “trashy … tabloid journalism of the worst kind” …
Traveller magazine said the series isn’t really about Thailand as a destination but Australians as travellers. “Is this how we behave abroad? In Thailand? Over the 10-part series we’ll meet lots of Aussies whose reason to be in Thailand is exemplary … But we also see plenty of characters who show the ugly side of Australian tourism … When it comes to ugliness overseas, we Australians do it better than any other nation, and it is all displayed here, in cringe-worthy fashion” …
TV One will screen an acclaimed late-night documentary about polygamy among British Muslims, The Men With Many Wives (August 2, 11.55). The programme estimates there are up to 20,000 polygamous marriages in the UK, unrecognised by the British courts but permitted under Sharia law. The Guardian thought it “unusually clear-eyed” and The Telegraph “deft and fascinating” …
The sole network movie premiere for the week starting July 31 is the 2014 sci-fi obscurity I Origins (TV3, 10.30 Sunday). Other coming attractions in HD include: Beverly Hills Chihuahua (TV2, 5.10 Saturday), Shark Tale (TV2, 7.00 Saturday), Eragon (TV3, 7.00 Saturday), America’s Sweethearts (TV2, 8.35 Saturday), The Day the Earth Stood Still (TV3, 9.00 Saturday), Two Night Stand (TV2, 10.35 Saturday), The Perks of Being a Wallflower (TV2, 2.10am Sunday), Elysium (TV2, 8.30 Sunday), Silent Hill: Revelation (TV2, 12.20am Monday) and The Wolverine (TV3, 8.30 Monday) …
Monday’s 60 Minutes (Prime 8.30) takes in the tragic aftermath of the Bastille Day truck attack, interviews US Presidential hopeful Donald Trump and his running mate Mike Pence, and explores how technology could help to stop shark attacks …
In other Prime news: Guesting on The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon are Mila Kunis, Mike Birbiglia and A$AP MOB (10.30 tonight), and Alicia Vikander and Celine Dion (10.30 tomorrow) … Mayday will air here in HD for the first time when it return on August 1 at 9.30 … Glen Campbell — I’ll Be Me (August 2, 8.30) follows the musician on his last US tour soon after his Alzheimer’s diagnosis … MasterChef USA returns on August 5 at 7.30 — the same night Bones and Sleepy Hollow share crossover episodes …
Warning: preg_replace(): Unknown modifier '/' in /home/customer/www/screenscribe.net/public_html/wp-content/themes/headlines/includes/theme-comments.php on line 66
July 21, 2016 at 12:48 pm
And TVNZ will bow to pressure – and put Terry Teo on a broadcast schedule earlier than planned. Public outcry, despite a WHOPPING 30,000 views via TVNZ Ondemand, will see the masses get an opportunity to see a NZ funded show via mass media.