Queens of British Pop

BBC One, 10.45pm

This is one of those simple, clever ideas for a two-part series that is straightforward to produce and fascinating to watch. With the help of old footage, talking heads and interviews, the first episode tonight follows the careers of half a dozen rock divas from the past — Dusty Springfield, Sandie Shaw, Marianne Faithfull, Suzi Quatro, Siouxsie Sioux and Kate Bush. Although their singing styles and backgrounds are entirely different, all were pioneers in their different ways. Dusty Springfield pioneered Motown. Marianne Faithfull pioneered survival. Siouxsie Sioux, described here as “a freak of nature”, pioneered music as suffering. (“I wanted to make it painful for people,” she said.) Kate Bush was one of the first female singers to establish herself at the centre of a creative community of musicians. It is an engrossing compilation of fresh insight and cheerful nostalgia.

Live International Football

ITV1, 7.30pm

England’s last competitive fixture was back in October 2008, when a comfortable 3-1 victory over Belarus ensured an unbeaten start to the 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign. Since then, despite a friendly win over a wretched Germany side, the prospects of Fabio Capello’s team winning the tournament in South Africa were tempered after they were outplayed by the European champions, Spain, in another friendly match. Tonight, Ukraine are the visitors to Wembley; a talented but limited side, who reached the quarter-finals of the 2006 World Cup and have the Chelsea-flop-but-still-really-rather-good Andriy Shevchenko up top. This shouldn’t be too taxing for England — injuries permitting. Steve Rider presents; Teddy Sheringham, Joe Cole and Andy Townsend swap banal clichés in the studio. Joe Clay

Alan Whicker’s Journey of a Lifetime

BBC Two, 9pm

Alan Whicker introduces clips from films that he made about life in California during the 1960s and 1970s. Whicker has changed little during the intervening years, except that his dress sense has got markedly worse. (He wears a tie in tonight’s episode that would frighten even Jon Snow.) But the films he introduces are, in many ways, remarkably prescient. He reported on the summer of love in Haight-Ashbury in the 1960s. He filmed the first hippy openly smoking a joint on television. He went to a swingers club and attended one of the first gay marriage ceremonies in California.

Extraordinary People

Five, 9pm

Last week, Extraordinary People followed Dede, a 36-year-old man from Indonesia whose body was covered in growths that hung down like the gnarled branches of a tree. He made a living working in a freak show alongside others with similarly horrifying afflictions, known by their stage names as “The Melting Lady”, “The Bubble Man”, “The Snake Man” and “The Elephant Man”. When the troupe disbanded they returned to their villages, where they are unable to work and were treated abominably by their neighbours. In tonight’s programme, a sympathetic specialist from the UK, David Koppel, travels to Indonesia to see if anything can be done to ease their suffering. One man has an operation to remove the largest tumours on his body, which allows him to wear glasses and sleep on his back.

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