The Real Cliff Richard (C4); DNA: The Story Of Life (C4)

THE randy young man in the film clip is annoyed that his girlfriend won't go all the way. "Sex is natural when two people are supposed to be in love," he tells her.

Hey, just a minute, the frustrated young lover looks very familiar. It's Cliff Richard, a man with an image more squeaky clean than a floor washed in Flash, who's bemoaning the absence of pre-marital sex.

Fear not fans of the Peter Pan of pop - and I know there are plenty of you out there - The Real Cliff Richard hadn't unearthed previously-unseen early footage of the bachelor boy in his wild and willing youth. This was a scene from a religious film, Two A Penny, made when he temporarily hit the gospel trail after becoming famous as Britain's rocking and rolling answer to Elvis Presley. Rather than stuff his face with hamburgers and make endless rubbishy movies like the King, Cliff turned to Christianity.

Mind you, if those teenage fumblings had been from real life it would have done his reputation the power of good. Cliff, as the programme pointed out, has been plagued by gay rumours. But, as one interviewee said, no one has come forward with cast-iron proof that he is. Then again, another added, celibate doesn't mean non-homosexual.

Cliff, or the Queen Mother of Pop as he was rather unkindly referred to, didn't appear to provide us with the definite answer. We had to make do with an interview with an old girlfriend, Delia Wicks, a singer and dancer in the 1960s. Not that he seemed very serious about their relationship - she said that when they went to the pictures, his mother and three sisters came along as well.

He's always been more interested in his career and Christianity, it appears. As Tony Meehan, of The Shadows, said: "I don't think he's desired any form of relationship with anyone, male or female".

The scientific world portrayed in DNA: The Story Of Life proved every bit as scandalous as the pop world inhabited by Sir Cliff. Rumours of improper behaviour, skullduggery and even plagiarism were revealed in the tale of scientists dedicated to uncovering the secret of DNA, the most powerful substance on Earth which, until 50 years ago, almost no one knew existed.

Three teams of boffins were seeking to unlock DNA and the very secret of life back then. Some of them are still alive and willing to talk about the rivalry in the race to be the first with the answer. The scientific stuff was beyond me, but the human story was a fascinating one, and, to most I suspect, an unknown one.

The winners were Jim Watson and Francis Crick. After making the breakthrough, they ran into a pub in Cambridge shouting they'd found the secret of life. Drinkers must have thought they were mad, but they'd pulled off the greatest scientific discovery of the 20th century - their equivalent of Cliff hitting the number one spot in the charts.