While you may have been preoccupied over the weekend with the Oscars and/or Jade Goody's wedding – which even repeatedly made the news on Radio 4, bizarrely – two things transfixed me.
Iran and the West concluded, compelling to the last. As well as being reminded, for some reason, of Battlestar Galactica (I think it was the pure drama of it all as well as the eerie way that events suddenly made more sense in retrospect, particularly the assassination of the leader of the Northern Alliance on 10 September, 2001) I came away with the unavoidable and depressing feeling that the possibility of detente between Iran and the western world may have slipped away, thanks to the intransigence – idiotic or ideological, I'm not sure it matters now – of America.
But perhaps I'm oversimplifying. The Iranians aren't exactly cuddly, and, as my previous knowledge of the country consisted of the bits and bobs you absorb growing up and what I gleaned from the series six of Spooks, I'm clearly no expert. Still, Brook Lapping's superlative, insightful and (thanks to the A-list nature of its talking heads, which this week included Vladimir Putin) jaw-dropping series at least illuminated one of the possible reasons why Obama is sending more troops to fight in Afghanistan. With the Iranians implacably opposed to the Taliban, is there ever a more apt time to note that my enemy's enemy is my friend, and that a strengthened commitment in Afghanistan plays well in Tehran?
The other mesmerising circumstance over the weekend was Robert Webb performing What a Feeling on Let's Dance for Comic Relief (we are nothing if not postmodern in our house). Unless it's The League of Gentlemen, I am usually unconvinced about the hilariousness of men dressing as women, as often there's a subliminal misogyny at work – that or public-school-boy homophobia. But Webb, in a shimmery leotard and Jennifer Beals wig, was absolutely brilliant. That all the other acts were pretty diabolical (the chefs?) should not detract from his wonderfulness. "I do comedy to live but I live to weld." Ace. Is it wrong to enjoy that? I don't care.
In other news, am I the only one worried that Damages seems a bit straightforward this series? Famous last words, I can only hope.
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