House of cards

With an air of I-told-you-so, property guru Gary McCausland declares: "I've said from the start it's doomed". He's an expert at turning bricks and mortar into money, so he can afford to look on smugly as two teams are given £300,000 and one year to turn into £1m through property developing.

McCausland is around to offer advice which, as usually happens in TV makeover shows, the amateurs totally ignore.

The doomed project - and from what we see tonight, no one would disagree with his verdict - concerns Dan and Daniel, who've bought a four-storey house in Margate on the south coast.

They plan to convert it into two flats. If it doesn't collapse first, I'm tempted to add. Never mind the serious damp problem in the roof down into the basement which makes their long-suffering builders Ken and Keith wonder what exactly is holding up the house.

Three bits of wood tied together, appears to be the worrying answer. Even Daniel is prompted to dub it "the house of horrors" on learning it'll cost £6,000 for steel joists to make the place safe.

They do themselves no favours by altering plans as they go along; everything from switching rooms to the kitchen layout.

McCausland does some fresh tut-tutting. Changing your mind halfway through is a classic property no-no, he says.

Matters are progressing more smoothly in Edinburgh for the other team of Paula and Lyndsey. Having made £14,500 profit on their first conversion, they buy a flat in the most prestigious location in the city, the Royal Mile.

"Getting their hands on this flat is a real triumph," says McCausland in a rare outburst of praise. They also come up with an idea of which he approves, turning the one-bedroom flat into a two-bedroom one.

Back in Margate, he's still being critical. Despite declaring Dan and Daniel's finished flat "spectacular", he still feels it's the wrong product in the wrong location.

The moaning doesn't stop when he sees Dan/Daniel selling the house to a prospective buyer. Giving it away more like. After pointing out all the faults and unfinished areas to, he agrees to a knockdown price that will leave them little or no profit. Dan and Daniel have eight more programmes to make some money, but I don't rate their chances. Just as I'm afraid That Antony Cotton Show may not attract the audience that ITV1 desires.

The actor, who plays Sean in Coronation Street, keeps telling us he's going to be on every weekday for five weeks, presumably believing if he says it enough no one will dare give him his marching orders.

The first edition showed all the signs of being too trivial for its own good. The model is obviously The Paul O'Grady Show, a big hit in the same time slot until he defected to C4. Cotton, nice chap that he is, doesn't have the same easy rapport as the artist formerly known as Lily Savage.

Perhaps he'll grow in confidence as time marches on. At present, he seems to think that calling for the audience to give every person and every twitch a round of applause is enough.

He promises music, chat, celebrities, surprises and a lot more besides. Tim is the resident DJ who says: "I have a little window in my diary just for you, Antony", which may have been code for something he can't say pre-watershed.

Maureen, from Blackburn, was plucked from the audience to make tea for Cotton's guests, actress Alison Steadman and singer Ray Quinn. The amount of time it took her to make a brew, she must have gone to India to buy the tea. "A round of applause for Maureen," ordered Cotton.

His interviewing technique lacks the killer instinct. "What have you been up to," he inquired of Steadman, who duly listed her impressive recent CV. Every title received a round of applause.

The audience had brought him presents. He liked the cake. "Can we have a round of applause for the cake, please," he asked.

It confirmed my opinion - That Antony Cotton Show is a load of clap.