CHRISTOPHER STEVENS reviews last night’s TV: Quizmaster Richard has all the right answers to keep us tuned in
Richard Osman’s House of Games
Classification: ****
Hornby: A Model World
Classification: ****
All celebrity quiz shows should award extra points for pointing out virtues. Then we would see a real competition for points.
Itinerant estate agent Jasmine Harman defeated her rivals on Richard Osman’s House Of Games (BBC2) by seizing the smallest excuse to declare, “I’m a vegan!”
Jasmine, best known as the host of A Place In The Sun: Home Or Away?, was answering one of the tongue twisters in the final round.
House Of Games airs its 500th issue this week, with each episode ending with a puzzle called Answer-Smash. Players get two clues and earn points by compressing the two solutions into one word.
Osman’s House Of Games, with different puzzle challenges each day, is a great show to play at home.
For example: What is a big golf tournament in the United States and who played Margo in The Good Life? Your . . . the US Open elope Keith. This is a splendidly silly game that leaves players gibbering as they try to pronounce the answer.
Jasmine proved to be faster than any of her famous peers: teacher Suzannah Lipscomb, actor Dave Johns, and sportscaster Jason Mohammad. She was scratching her head when the image of an exotic fruit appeared under a half-finished nursery rhyme: ‘There was an old woman who…’. .’
“She swallowed a flychee!” Jasmine exclaimed. They all gaped at her, including Richard. They may have remembered the old lady who ‘swallowed a fly’, but who knows what a lychee looks like?
“I’m a vegan, so fruits and vegetables are, like, my area,” Jasmine bragged. She also got this one: a picture of a shiny black eggplant, under a question about a French mime. Answer: Marcel Marceaubergine.
House Of Games, with different puzzle challenges each day, is a great show to play at home. The effortlessly cool Osman keeps viewers engaged, turning to the camera and asking how we’re doing, and congratulating us when he suspects we’re winning.
Maybe there’s a little magic in editing, or maybe celebrities are naturally slow to respond, but no one spoils the fun by guessing too quickly. There is always a second or two of silence before someone calls after each question.
However, you’ll need to be quick if you want to burnish your credentials faster than the pros. One question (“When was the Communist Manifesto published?”) gave three of the celebrities the opportunity to tell us what they had studied at university. However, none of them got the date right. It was 1848. Give yourself a pat on the back if you knew that back home. . . As Ricardo would say.
Kudos to the toy train execs at Hornby: A Model World (Yesterday) when they literally came up with a new line. Running out of vintage steam locomotives to recreate in miniature, product manager Simon Kohler had the bright idea to make all the trains the same. . . but even smaller. Listening to his staff planning the launch felt strangely exciting, like being an office spy.
Pats on the back to the toy train executives in Hornby: A Model World (Yesterday) when they literally came up with a new line.
Simon’s celebrated range of perfectly faithful replicas have traditionally been 1:76 scale. However, the latest models are even smaller, at 1:120 scale, also known as TT or table scale.
That means smaller tracks, smaller props, and (hopefully) higher billing. It seems like a counterintuitive choice – I would have expected enthusiasts to demand larger models with more visible detail. . . but hey, I’m not a collector.
However, I couldn’t help but be impressed by the work of professional modeler Kathy Millatt in Solihull, as she built a diorama of Port Dinorwic station near Anglesey, using rolling stock made on a 3D computer printer. A very novel way to celebrate ancient technology.