Sixteenth century Tv critic Howard Elston (DOA) tells us what to watch on the box today
6Am- 9AM: Tudor Breakfast News: Sir Grenville Foulke and Lady Elizabeth Bolynne offer a wide range of news and current events- foreign correspondent Sir Averill Coningtower gives us on the spot reportage of the Armada fleet leaving Spain; there’s swan and boar recipes from Lower Saxony and live sat-feeds of Sir Francis Drake as he rounds the Straits of Magellan looking to plunder poor people’s lands. Plus Lancaster v Yorkshire bowls and royal tennis quarter finals from Hampton Court
9:12- 9.30 AM: Tudor DIY: The Earl of Southampton offers us an inside look at fixing those pesky oriel windows; how to transform your basement into a torture chamber for under £10; and an exclusive interview with The Earl of Southampton’s son Fontesque who has invented a perpetual motion machine to power England’s first tabloid newspaper to be published by Sir Rupert Caxtonne
9.45- 9.50: Tudor Location, Location, Location: Dickie Bolynne checks out Ye Olde Worlde property bargains seized in religious wars by Sir Cecil Walsingham’s secret police. Plus an intimate peek at Queen Elizabeth’s summer coastal hideaway in idyllic Hull-by-the-Sea
10AM-10.45: Clarkson’s Tudor Hiways: Lord Clarkson takes his latest horse carriage for a spin through famous Tudor battlefields where he charts Henry VII’s progress at Bosworth in his 3bhp war chariot. In addition, he blesses us with his tempered take on the Spanish, French, Scots, Flems, Lapps and any other race he deems to be not English
10.50-10.55: Tudor News: Breaking on the spot stories from Spain, Calais and an exclusive report on a new playwright in London soon to take the theatre by storm thanks to his links with Castilian siren Lady Jenyffer Lopez, Dame Helena de la Mirren and doyenne of the boards, Dame Lady Vynessa Reddegrave.
11- 11.30: Tudor Munchies: Nigella Purloin-Fatbumme explores the secrets of behind the scenes food production in the bowels of Blair Manor and also gives us an insight into how poor people bake mud pies to keep up their calorie intake when ground down by vicious French absentee landlords. Plus, more on those great baked swan cupcakes
12.3- 1Pm; Tudor Panorama: Sir Jermaine Paxman reveals how lords, marquises, earls and minor royals take grubby backhanders to raise issues regarding Fiji, the Virginia colonies and annoying Puritans . Plus Tudor weather.
1pm- 3pm: Tudor Afternoon Movie: Sit back and enjoy that rollicking comedy Carry On Headless: Lowborn Kenneth Williams meets rollicking blueblood Sir Sydney James and courtesan Mme Hattie Jacques on the scaffold after rollickingly attempting to steal the crown jewels . But the rollicking Earl of Dudley has other plans…
3pm-6pm: The Only Way Is Tudor: A fascinatingly original idea to put cameras in the homes of six Tudor households and edit it to look funny and enable the participants to be made to resemble unspeakable baboons. Today Eustace de la Troop gets turned on by horsewhipping servants; how Mary Rope-Girdlestrap has hair problems as she attends her first witch burning and an hilarious romp with the Middleton Jones family as they argue about who has the last word when it comes to denouncing secret Catholics.