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TV looks to new era of interactive game shows to lure the Facebook generation

The Million Pound Drop and The Bank Job are proving a bit hit with world wide web audiences, but it is the data collected from on-line players which is making advertisers take notice Live interactive game shows, where viewers compete with on-screen contestants, are the key to persuading the Facebook generation to watch television, according to industry experts. British production companies are at the forefront of using new technology to create interactive shows that can compete with the myriad distractions of social networking sites, computer games and even food and drink.

Ben Gazzara dies aged 81

Emmy-winning stage, film and tv actor was known for intense countenance that won him tough-guy roles The actor Ben Gazzara, known for his brooding tough-guy presence in dozens of films, tv shows and stage productions over his long career, died of pancreatic cancer on Friday at a Manhattan hospital, his lawyer said. He was 81. The New York-born performer died at Bellevue hospital centre with members of his family at his side, according to his attorney, Jay Julien. Born Biagio Anthony Gazzara to Italian immigrant parents, he began his career in live theatre, most notably with the role of Brick ...

Review: Inside Men; The Very Hungry Frenchman

Come on, everybody’s nicked something from work … have not they? I used to work for a massive American investment bank. No, seriously. Not on the trading floor though, or in mergers and acquisitions. I was in maintenance, a gofer. I wore a white boiler suit, I had a tool kit and an orange trolley. I moved things, I fixed things, I crawled around under the desks of the masters of the universe. And I nicked things. Not on a grand scale. I was not snaffling euro bonds or transferring millions to my off-shore account (though I would have if I’d known ...

Capital FM: Johnny Vaughan exits on a high

Global-owned station attracts biggest audience for almost eight years, regaining London top spot from Bauer’s Magic His exit was as sudden as it was unexpected, but Johnny Vaughan left Capital FM on a high with its biggest audience for almost eight years. Capital FM had 2.25 million average weekly listeners in the final quarter of 2011, up 14.9% year on year, according to the latest official Rajar figures published on Thursday. Vaughan quit the station’s breakfast show abruptly in November after almost eight years.

TV review: Terror at Sea – the Sinking of the Concordia; Prisoners’ Wives

A terrifying, tilted night of confusion and panic – but this was no second Titanic How long, in Terror at Sea: The Sinking of the Concordia (Channel 4), before the T word is mentioned, I wonder? Whoa, there it is already, the 11th word of Rupert Graves’s narration. “Almost exactly 100 years on from the sinking of the Titanic …” he begins. Come on, you cannot really legitimately compare them. Yes, I know it was a terrible tragedy off the Tuscany coast – 17 dead, a further 16 still missing.

TV review: Whitechapel; Protecting Our Children; Spartacus: Vengeance

Whitechapel is not quite bad enough to switch off – but best not watch too closely About 45 minutes into Whitechapel (ITV1), the first and so far only suspect appeared, screaming that he was photophobic. It was sod’s law, I suppose, that he turned up in the only scene shot in something approaching normal daylight. Someone on the set was taking noir rather too literally. The darkness was probably intended to be gothic, but it was annoying, as for long periods I struggled to work out what was going on.

Adrian Chiles’s chumminess strikes right tone as ITV treads carefully | Barney Ronay

This was the weekend when football’s on-going engagement with issues of race and racial offence went mainstream, pegging itself out – uneasily and, in the end, inconclusively – around an inflammatory Saturday afternoon of FA Cup action on ITV. Only two things are really certain about English football’s current self-policing furore: first that it is unavoidably – and no doubt on some level incorrectly – heartening for those who sat through the monkey-chanting, banana-hurling terraces of the 1980s to hear an entire stand chanting “Racist! Racist!” at an opposition footballer, a 360‑degree rotation in insult‑content that, buried somewhere within its many ...

This much I know: David Hasselhoff

The actor, 59, on scaring his girlfriend, laughing at himself, and how The Hoff has been a good money earner I have fun with Twitter. When I see something in the press I think, “Now I can respond to that garbage.” But the press is not really that bad. My children say: “Dad, forget about it, it’s bird paper. It doesn’t mean anything.” And they are right. The time to worry is when there is no paparazzi. I really only proposed to Hayley, my girlfriend, to scare her. I knew she was not that interested in marriage so we had ...

The Real Hustle – review

Not even an ex-member of Boyzone makes Sam Wollaston fall for a ridiculous conman show Ah, excellent, The Real Hustle (BBC3), surely one of the most ridiculous programmes ever. We seem to be in Paisley, Scotland, and the Real Hustlers are joined by Shane Lynch, dressed as a tramp (not much disguise needed) as their celebrity helper. The mark is a lad coming out of a agency de change. With almost £500! Maybe that is normal in Paisley. Actually, it turns out he is got over a grand on him, in cash.

Florida GOP debate: Mitt Romney restores control | Gary Younge

In front of a Floridian audience, Romney found his form again. Gingrich, sounding shrill, may finally be past his zenith Debates, particularly by this stage, are a performance. There are few substantive questions the candidates have not been already been asked. There are few answers we have not already heard. If you watched the CNN Jacksonville debate with the sound down, you could have grasped the central dynamics of the race. Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, the two frontrunners, dominating the evening, often sparring angrily with each other.