It gives you more options and people get less pissed off with you. I want to be curious, as opposed to being phenomenally well-known for just one thing I want to keep moving constantly. If you stop moving, you're dead." So, what's Izzard's next move? "I'm going to live in a ditch for six years and eat spam."'Missed Demeanours' begins at 6.30pm on Radio 4 on 18 May. Jools Holland's had a bit of a rough time lately. A monstrously green-eyed hack berated him for being a successful mediocrity, a British stereotype in the vein of Eddie the Eagle Well, that's hardly fair.
Jools is no Art Tatum, but as far as that boogie-woogie stuff goes, he's played with the best. The fact is that if Jools were a superhumanly talented modern-day Liszt, he'd be wearing thick glasses and squeezing his spots at home, rather than presenting the country's finest music show. As Brian Eno keeps shouting from every virtual hill-top: "Process not product!". That is to say: artistry is to be found not only in the artist who creates an object, but also in the artist who creates the conditions necessary for new art to flower. As an artist in the latter sense, Jools Holland reigns supreme. What other music host would conceive the potentially disastrous "opening jam", where four or five amplified bands follow Jools's piano into a four-chord riff while the camera spins crazily and the audience dance in bewilderment? No one, that's who. It works superbly as a mood-setter for the rest of the programme, which often features other unusual comings-together, and only Jools could do it.Later with Jools Holland (11pm BBC2) is back tonight.
Courtney Love, Marianne Faithfull and Massive Attack are on it Cool.. So you've given up meat And fish (well, tuna at least, thinking of the dolphins). And eggs (because of battery hens - you can't be sure how they define "free range"). And milk and cheese (contributing as they do to the veal-calf market). You use lead-free petrol, recycle all your newspapers, bottles, perhaps even your shoes? And just when you thought you'd confronted every exploitation of nature known to man, your furniture comes under suspicion. But the hardwood trade is a serious issue, and tonight's Encounters: "Survival of the Apes" (7pm C4) is no laughing matter.
Adam Tysoe's film exposes the disturbing but direct link between French logging companies carving up the Cameroon rainforest (for sale to Europe, the biggest importer being Britain), and an increase in the great apes -- chimpanzees and gorillas, man's closest relations - being killed for "bushmeat". As well as the terrible suffering endured by these highly intelligent, sensitive animals, there is also the problem of the many orphaned apes left unable to fend for themselves. And while a few charity workers try to alleviate the symptoms of their plight, the underlying cause goes unchallenged.Sceptics would do well to watch a thorough, alarming and very convincing documentary. Sympathisers will find themselves campaigning to make pine fashionable again.. I'm still not buying one. I don't care if they are re-running Quantum Leap (10pm, Sky One) from the beginning, I'm not having one of those things on my roof. Sky-less fans will have to make do with their fix from BBC2, which is already re-running the series from the beginning at 6pm on Thursdays So much for consumer choice.
The series is what is loosely described as "cult viewing". Normally this is just Jacksonspeak for "repeat", but in Quantum Leap's case it's certainly true to say that there are those of us who go out of our way not to miss it. Mind you, there's more to cult status than mere popularity: there are plenty of people who never miss Jeremy Beadle, but no one would ever describe him as a cult... Quantum Leap's body-hopping formula is perfect cult material. Like Captain Kirk or Doctor Who, Sam can turn up in any period, any milieu, any situation, so a varied diet is assured. Unlike either of them, he is blessed with glossy production values, inventive human interest scenarios and a witty script. The most enjoyable plots are usually those which involve Scott Bakula in a pill-box hat and sling-backs.The show's other strength is that most of the plots are self-contained, one-part dramas which give us a taste of forthcoming attractions in the closing minutes as Sam leaps once more - usually to find himself hanging upside down from a trapeze.. Maeve Binchy is one of Britain's richest women.