Saturday Night at the London Palla- Oh, Hang On...

Britishness is a curious thing, tricky to quantify exactly. I know where I am on a scale of weeping at Elgar's Nimrod to putting little flags on a white van, but the two aren't necessarily mutually exclusive, yet (and allow me to be painfully middle class for a moment- although I've already given that away by admitting to the whole Elgar thing ((I just have something in my eye is all))) is there perhaps anything that presents pure concentrated Britishness quite like the Proms and, more specifically, the Last Night of the Proms. Who could argue with the flag-waving and everyone joining in (each in his or her own key ((Tom Lehrer references for the win)) of course) with Elgar's magnificent arrangements of Parry's 'Jerusalem' and 'Land of Hope and Glory'?

Well, I'll tell you who could argue with that: Bruce Forsyth and Tess Daly, that's who. For, on the very same evening as the Royal Albert Hall shook to the thundering chorus of Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1 in D Major, BBC Television centre shook to the thundering chorus of clumsy footing and celebrity clapping as another team of hapless but enthusiastic amateurs took to the floor for the launch of the new series of Strictly Come Dancing. Alright, so the events that I've listed didn't exactly coincide per se, but it sounds much more exciting this way. I should also point out that this 'launch' of Strictly Come Dancing came 3 weeks before the actual series begins and mostly resembled a PE class where Ann Widdecombe was inevitably picked last.

The roster was revealed, featuring such pop culture luminaries as Paul Daniels and Goldie, to a series of increasingly laboured gags and then paired off predictably with the show's professionals (that's 'predictably' as in the pairings were predictable, rather than them obviously being paired with professionals as opposed to say goats or members of the BNP) over what seemed like about 5 or 6 hours, with the pauses usually reserved for results shows used here simply before reading out a name in a bottom-clenchingly infuriating waste of airtime. Instead of those pauses we could have had more dances choreographed by the new team of old favourites like 'that one that won with Ramprakash' and 'the other guy, you know, the blonde one' where people drop from the ceiling on wires to swing jazz versions of pop-rock.

I say predictable pairings, by that I mean that as soon as I heard Widdecombe was involved, it was patently obvious that she would be given to Anton, who I can only assume did something to massively upset the production staff somewhere around the second series and has carved out a living as a sort of carer for the celebrities with the most left feet. I also had a suspicion that male duffer of the series Paul Daniels would be inflicted upon Ola, after her triumph last year, that proved well-founded. After each group of 3 or so pairings, Brucie would hand over to the judging panel for ludicrous conjecture from Len about 'surprise packages' and 'good pairings' based on nothing but the brand new celebrities' abilities to walk down stairs without breaking an ankle, nonsensical, superlative silliness from Bruno, camp cynicism from the maestro Craig and well, a look from Alesha that suggested she was just happy to still be there being, as she is, in no way a qualified professional dancer/choreographer.

I'll offer my own staggeringly unfounded speculations right here, right now -

• Patsy Kensit - Will be one of those ones who's either really good or really rubbish.
• Gavin Henson - Might just be too big a rugby player to be good at celebrity dancing. Good feet for a big lad, though.
• Tina O' Brien - Oh yeah! I remember her out of off of Corrie.
  
• Jimi Mistry - He'll do well... I've seen The Guru...
• Ann Widdecombe - Could be painful, but she's no X-Factor-class mug without an iota of self-awareness. She knows exactly what she's doing. Sadly, this isn't Celebrity Big Brother and 'game-plans' won't get you anywhere if Anton can't swing you around his head like a cape.

Boom!