Louis Theroux: Behind Bars

BBC Two, 9pm

There are two programmes this week in which presenters show considerable courage. Michael Portillo allows himself to be used as a guinea-pig in Horizon’s The Science of Killing (on Tuesday), while Louis Theroux – protected by guards and body armour – spends two weeks walking anxiously around San Quentin prison, meeting inmates. Some of them are inside for crimes beyond the imagination, including one man serving 11 life sentences for robbery with torture. But Theroux’s gift, as ever, is to find a skewed normality inside worlds that are anything but normal, and here he discovers the way in which prisoners are able to forge strong relationships with one another and even with the guards.

Dancing on Ice

ITV1, 5.50pm

More stars, sequins and swoops. Last time out no fewer than 11 million viewers saw the former rugby player Kyran Bracken crowned champion 2007. Torvill and Dean train more celebrities, including Sarah Greene, Samantha Mumba and Suzanne Shaw ( left), to compete in a live ice-skating championship. Prepare to be razzled and dazzled.

Lark Rise to Candleford

BBC One, 7.40pm

Tonight marks the start of a ten-part adaptation of Flora Thompson’s memoir of her Oxfordshire childhood, first published in 1945, which is described by the BBC as a “heartwarming” love letter to a vanished corner of rural England. The action shifts between the hamlet of Lark Rise and the richer market town of Candleford, with events seen through the eyes of a country girl (Olivia Hallinan) who begins a new life working in the post office. This is a world where the sun shines, the corn is golden, the squire is kindly and the poor are happy.

The tone of the piece is nostalgic and low-key, with most of tonight’s episode focused on a boundary dispute. To the stony-hearted among us, it feels like a long Hovis advert.

Kingdom

ITV1, 9.20pm

Stephen Fry – by now a fully fledged national treasure – reprises his role as the kindly, broad-minded and avuncular solicitor of Market Shipborough, who bumbles through life healing wounds, soothing squabbles and making the world a better place. Tonight, he saves the local lighthouse, solves the mystery of the broken coastal fence and reconciles two warring brothers who own rival burger vans on opposite sides of the road (Burger It and Burger Off). He now has an adopted baby and a dog to add even more cuddliness to the genial mix, while his young clerk is busy falling head-over-heels in love. Alternatively, you could always light a few candles and soak in a hot bath.

Damages

BBC One, 10.30pm

It is not enough for the corporate villain (Ted Danson; See interview, page 32) to sell his shareholders down the Swanee. He has to sleep around, snort cocaine, order the murder of witnesses and smoke cigarettes in no-smoking areas. La Close smiles her wintry smile and dispenses charm with all the subtlety of a bunny boiler. It’s a factory-farmed version of Nasty vs Nasty, without the energy of The Shield or the dark genius of The Sopranos.

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