ABC2's blog

10:00pm – Thursday, January 7 on ABC2

Imagine Drop the Dead Donkey out in the field…

After years of conflict, the civil war in the African nation of Karibu finally comes under the fickle spotlight of the Western media. The corrupt President Kubwasana will now feature nightly, at least until there is a better story elsewhere. We see the war through the eyes of the BBC journalists and their team who are holed up in the Waterbuck Hotel in the capital Uzuri.

Resident local stringer Harry Chambers (Bruce MacKinnon – The Catherine Tate Show, Jekyll, Perfect Day) can’t believe his luck – this could be his big break. On the bottom of the journalistic food chain, he’s the last to learn the media circus is in town and on his patch.

The London newsroom has despatched its news team to cover the unfolding events – a team led by a broadcasting behemoth, the BBC’s senior correspondent, David Bradburn (Martin Jarvis), who is sending back nightly reports for the Ten O’clock News. His team includes producer Jane (Doon Mackichan – Smack the Pony, Brass Eye, The Comic Strip Presents) and cameraman Jack (Lloyd Owen), with Margaret Hollis (Joanna Brookes – Bad Girls) from the World Service also tagging along.

As the new team gets up to speed, Harry finds himself completely big-footed as David seeks to exploit his local knowledge and contacts, including the resident fixer Joyful (Kobna Holdbrook-Smith), who seems to be able to make anything happen.

Taking the Flak is a workplace comedy, with all the tensions and flirtations of any workplace, magnified by the fact that, in this job, a death-or-glory assignment might mean actual death or actual glory – or at least an MBE and an appearance on breakfast television. And to most foreign correspondents, death would be preferable to that!

9:30pm – Wednesday, January 6 on ABC2

Chris Langham is a BAFTA award-winning British actor, writer and comedian. He is most famous for playing MP Hugh Abbot in the British sitcom The Thick of It and presenter Roy Mallard in People Like Us.

On 2 August 2007, Langham was found guilty of downloading indecent images of children, but found not guilty of six counts of indecent assault. He was sentenced to ten months in prison. On appeal, he was released after serving three-and-a-half months. This interview was filmed only a few days after Langham was released from prison.

He tells Pamela about his rollercoaster life – his alcohol and drug abuse, and admits he was a compulsive liar, and puts it all down to an abusive experience at the age of eight.

Having been a victim then, he maintains he had never been able to get things fully back on track since. He talks movingly about how he tried to get a gram of coke on credit because his wife had just lost their new-born baby; and about his friends who stood by him during his trial.

8:30pm – Wednesday, January 6 on ABC2

Imagine just surviving on bacon and burgers, or cheese and tomato pizzas.

This new series of Eataholics welcomes two new presenters – nutritionist Charlotte Watts and fully qualified chartered counselling psychologist and hypnotherapist Felix Economakis – together they get to the heart of people’s disorders and extreme eating habits.

Each of the eight episodes features a person with a bizarre and extreme eating problem – so out of control that food has taken over normal life.

Viewers can see how the individuals change as they overcome their phobias, face their food demons, and work out the reason for their odd eating habits.

Niquita is 29 and lives with her boyfriend of 11 years, Matt.

A former child singing star she appears to be a bubbly popular twenty-something, but inside Nicky is hiding a secret – she’s addicted to bacon and burgers.

Getting through two thirds of her own body weight in salty meat every year she has bulked out with lashings of stodgy chips and beans.

Her fatty diet is so extreme that anything fresh or healthy turns her stomach.

Inside four weeks Niquita battles her demons with the help of psychologist Felix Economakis and nutritionist Charlotte Watts.

While Charlotte tackles her dreadful diet, Felix will uncover her painful past.

Can Niquita find her voice and reclaim her shattered confidence to beat a lifetime of food phobias?

7:30pm – Tuesday, January 5 on ABC2

The Emmy and Peabody award-winning comedy series, hosted by Stephen Colbert, is coming to ABC2.

Hosted and executive produced by political humorist Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report (pronounced with silent T’s, i.e. The Kohl-Bear Re-por) has been described by The New York Times as ‘one of the best television shows of the year’.

A satirical take on personality-driven American political pundit programs, it focuses on the media and political issues of the day.

Colbert began as a correspondent on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, before The Colbert Report premiered in the US in October 2005.

ABC TV will ‘satellite in’ each episode immediately after its US telecast – for broadcast on ABC2 that night.

The regular show will be broadcast on Tuesdays to Fridays every week and the global edition will be aired on Mondays from Monday, 11 January 2010.

8:00pm – Monday, January 4 on ABC2

Vernon (Adrian Edmondson) gets a whopping great bill from his divorce solicitors and they’ve passed the debt onto Mad Frankie’s Debt Collection Agency.

No one will lend Vernon the money to cover the bill and as Frankie keeps lobbing bricks at him, Vernon has to do the unthinkable… get a job!

8:30pm – Sunday, January 3 on ABC2

David is no longer aroused by Karen and is convinced that he is impotent. While playing squash with Adam he asks for advice but, as ever, Adam is not particularly helpful and sees the situation as something of a joke. Adam in turn seeks advice from Pete about a problem affecting ‘a friend of mine’. Pete, of course assumes that Adam is obliquely referring to himself and he tells Jenny that Rachel and Adam are having problems in bed.

Jenny then tells Karen who consoles David with the fact that they are not the only ones with an unsatisfactory sex life and that Adam and Rachel also have a ‘problem’. David, incensed that Adam did not tell him about this, then uses this information to taunt a gloating Adam who is winning a squash match so that Adam thinks that Rachel must have said something to Karen. Karen then raises the supposed ‘problem’ with Rachel, but this just adds to the confusion so that both Rachel and Karen end up in a state of paranoia over their performance in bed.

10:40pm – Saturday, January 2 on ABC2

The Story of G.I. Joe was based on the columns of Scripps-Howard war correspondent Ernie Pyle. Though already past 40, Pyle (Burgess Meredith) insists upon marching along with an Army infantry unit during the Italian campaign. He befriends several of the soldiers, including commanding officer Bill Walker (Robert Mitchum), family man Sgt. Steve Warnicki (Freddie Steele) and would-be romeo Pvt. Spencer (Wally Cassell).

The plot of the film is moved forward by the progression of the war itself; basically, however, G.I. Joe is an anecdotal collection of comic, dramatic and tragic vignettes. Some of the more memorable moments include Freddie Steele’s ongoing efforts to listen to a recording of his infant son’s voice; Mitchum’s casual reactions to his many field promotions; and a wedding ceremony which is ‘punctuated’ by an air raid.

Many infantry veterans consider The Story of GI Joe to be the single most realistic Hollywood war film of the 1940s, eschewing big stars, phoney heroics and overblown battle sequences in favour of the everyday trials and tribulations of the humble foot soldier. Ironically, Ernie Pyle, who acted as technical adviser (when he wasn’t busy on the front), was killed by an enemy sniper shortly before the release of this film.

6:30pm – Saturday, January 2 on ABC2

Elephant numbers are outgrowing Leopard’s Den and Danny (Stephen Tomkinson) and DuPlessis (Deon Stewardson) disagree about how to solve the problem. But Elliot (Craig Gardener), the new American owner of Mara, encourages Danny to think big. He wants the two parks to merge.

DuPlessis discovers that his family is growing but spreading wings, when his son Kirk (Wayne Van Rooven) arrives with his pregnant partner.

Another birth at Leopard’s Den tests Danny’s skills, and a cache of city bankers find the wildlife a little too threatening.

11:10pm – Thursday, December 31 on ABC2

Bring in the New Year with Graham Norton. Say goodbye to 2009 and say hello to 2010, when Graham celebrates with a very special holiday show.

Expect some of Graham’s favourite guests to drop by as well as the usual hilarious audience games and musical numbers.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, CONTACT: Peter Ritchie on (02) 8333 3127 / 0413 602 337 or ritchie.peter@abc.net.au For images please visit http://abc.net.au/tvpublicity

10:20pm – Thursday, December 31 on ABC2

Continue the New Year’s Eve celebration with Seal.

In a remarkable career that spans more than two decades, Seal has garnered countless accolades along with three Grammy Awards and has sold more than 15 million albums worldwide.

Known for his one-of-a-kind soaring, husky baritone voice and classic song writing, Seal has seen success across numerous genres of music.

His sixth studio album, Soul, is considered the tour-de-force of his career. Each song is a stone-cold soul classic, from Sam Cooke’s A Change Is Gonna Come, Ben E. King’s Stand By Me and Ann Pebbles’ I Can’t Stand The Rain to Harold Melvin And The Blue Notes’ If You Don’t Know Me By Now and Otis Redding’s I’ve Been Loving You Too Long.

A live performance shot at the Grainger Studio in Chicago; this is a show not to be missed.