On TV

Dunblane: A Decade On (five)

AS John McEnroe said under other circumstances, "You cannot be serious". Watching reality series The Armstrongs leaves me with the feeling that someone is having a laugh.

I wouldn't be surprised if at the end of the series the BBC announces it wasn't a fly-on-the-wall documentary series but a comedy show.

Conservatory tycoon John Armstrong and his wife Ann are great comic creations not entirely unrelated to David Brent of The Office fame or Del Boy of Only Fools And Horses.

The pair run Coventry's third largest double glazing company. Anne has spent thousands of pounds on motivational training. It doesn't appear to be money well spent. The only thing that would motivate the lacklustre sales team would be to light a stick of dynamite under them.

When you learn that the Mr Motivator, the man running the course, is called Basil Meanie, you become even more suspicious that this is a wind-up.

I may be doing the Armstrongs, not to mention Mr Meanie, an injustice. Perhaps they are real. They're certainly struggling to find work for their 28 factory staff.

So Anne began organising the Christmas party. Something different, she thought, rather than the usual celebration where people drink too much and fall down. She suggested a two-day break, flying from Coventry airport "to somewhere exotic like Bournemouth".

Meanwhile John was trying to motivate the sale team, whom Mr Meanie observed "haven't a clue". You didn't have to be an expert to see that as they lounged at their desks looking bored.

The boss outlined his sales strategy: "We run a business here and two plus two has to equal four". This did not seem an unreasonable approach and demonstrated that his maths was fine, even if his ability to sell double glazing lacked sparkle.

To mark the tenth anniversary of the massacre in a primary school in a small Scottish town, five opted for a documentary that was as straightforward as the title Dunblane: A Decade On.

Sixteen children and a teacher died when a disgruntled youth worker opened fire in the school on March 13, 1996.

A teacher - the first one to be shot - recalled how the killer entered the gym and started shooting "and never stopped for the next few minutes - three and a half minutes of carnage".

We learnt that disgraced scout leader Thomas Hamilton had 743 rounds of ammunition, enough to kill every person in the school. In the end he turned his gun on himself after killing almost an entire class of children in cold blood.

It was a horrifying act and one can't imagine the courage it took for teachers, pupils and parents who lost children in the massacre to go over it all again.

In the wake of the tragedy, local mothers launched a campaign for a total ban on the private ownership of hand guns.

I'm sure other programmes will deal with the repercussions but the focus of this documentary was a simple and effective retelling of a chilling real life story.

Kensuke's Kingdom, Darlington Civic Theatre

A JOURNEY of a lifetime sailing around the world with his parents becomes a voyage of discovery for Michael when he is washed overboard and finds himself in Kensuke's Kingdom.

Stockton-born Iain Ridley, convincingly playing a youngster, believes he is alone on a Pacific island apart from his dog Stella Artois (Anna Drayson, who without speaking a word makes a popular presence felt). Hungry and thirsty, Michael finds he has been left food and water by the elderly Kensuke.

Ozzie Yue gives a touching portrayal of the 75-year-old, marooned towards the end of the Second World War. Believing his family died at Nagasaki, he has no desire to leave the island.

The growing friendship between the old man and the boy is perfectly performed and their ultimate parting is poignant as Michael is torn between his desire to stay with Kensuke and wanting to go back to his parents (Julia Hickman and Mark Carleton).

The Birmingham Stage Company delivers a huge amount of excitement and adventure in an action-packed hour and 20 or so minutes. The stunning set is ingenious, turned seamlessly by the actors during the confusion of Michael's disappearance from yacht to island.

This is a superb adaptation, true to the story and the spirit of Michael Morpurgo's acclaimed book. When asked which part of it he liked, an eight-year-old in the audience said: "Everything''.

Catch it before it leaves for its next port of call.

l Until Saturday. Box Office: (01325) 486555.

Linda Hetherington