Steps back, in amazement

Last month, Lisa Scott-Lee announced her plans to Wales On Sunday:

FORMER Steps star Lisa Scott-Lee has revealed she’s moved to Dubai and is writing a children’s novel.

Apparently this is what writing a novel looks like.

Yes, Steps have come back together to do a series for Sky Living - way to strike while the iron's hot, Sky Living; there are few cultural forces which resonate more strongly in 2011 than Steps.

Rumours that Sky execs looked at that comeback picture, asked 'which one is Rachel Stevens?' and then looked a bit queasy as they realised they'd made a terrible mistake, could not be confirmed at time of writing.

Funnily enough, it's only a month since Scott-Lee insisted that she had standards about what crappy reality TV project she'd get involved in:

Lisa, who starred in Dancing On Ice, said she’s also like to give Strictly Come Dancing a go. She said: “ It’s the best one. “I wouldn’t go into the jungle or do Big Brother.”

I'm not sure if a show about your old band sits at the Strictly end of the scale, but you have to wonder if she's only prepared to work on the quality end of the market, what was she doing on ITV's pretend-to-be-an-air-steward CelebAir?

Griffin done: Mitch Winehouse

Living TV's plans for a web series of interviews done by Mitch Winehouse in a taxi has already picked up a lot of publicity, but Zoe Griffin has her own angle on the story, naturally:

The Hoff is one of the coolest and funniest celebs I have ever met and Amy Winehouse’s dad Mitch is a straight-talking genius so I was really excited to hear that the two will combine for a 3.5 minute show for internet site Liv.

David Haselhoff is really one of the coolest and funniest celebrities you've met? Good god, who are the other famous people you've come across? Tommy Cannon and The Singing Postman?

You might have thought that such an admirer of the Hoff would, erm, be able to spell his name correctly:

If only they added him to spell check, eh?

Let's just pause for a while at the idea of Mitch Winehouse being "a straight-talking genius". Fair enough, it would mean there was more behind the decision to sign him up as a chat show host than "he's related to someone famous", but how does this "genius" manifest itself, exactly? And what would a genius get out of talking to The Bloke From The Programme That People Watched To See The Women In Swimsuits, exactly?

Still, nice to know that it's "3.5 minutes". Hopefully Living will provide a digital clock counting down to the end of the affair.

We don't want to spoil the surprise, Scott, but...

Call me old-fashioned, but if you issue a photocall to promote a TV series, it can't really be very much of a surprise, can it?

Where: Main Entrance, BBC Radio 1, Yalding House, Clipstone Street, London W1
What: David Hasselhoff arrives at BBC Radio 1 studios with his two daughters, to surprise buddy - DJ Scott Mills
Time: 17.00 hrs

This is all to push the sequel to the series where Scott Mills went to live with David Hasselhoff - to be honest, I'd assumed that had just been made by accident last year, but it turns out it was commissioned.

This time round, Scott and David have to unite to save the world from a gang of criminal masterminds, intent on stealing the Buletter diamond - the gem which regulates gravity itself. Can they beat the gang and stop everything from floating into space - while disguised as chipmunks? Tune in to Living TV this... oh, hang on... wrong synopsis:

TV legend and pop culture icon, David Hasselhoff, is set to return to LIVING for an all-new six part series, which will air exclusively on the channel from September. Following the runaway success earlier this year of The Hoff: When Scott Came To Stay on LIVING (March ‘09),

"Runaway success" = somewhere between 'no sanctions imposed by Ofcom' and 'Pick of the day in Now! magazine.

the new series will continue the story

'Man makes television programme with other man' - can't wait to find out what happened next.

and follow the whirlwind life of the epic Knight Rider and Baywatch star.

Didn't know KITT was in Baywatch as well.

David will spend this summer in the UK and wider Europe along with his Hoff-spring, daughters Hayley and Taylor-Ann, and plans to immerse himself in British culture and embrace everything that makes our summer great.

Hoff-spring? Really?

What's with "wider Europe", exactly? What does that mean? Can't they find enough to keep him entertained in the UK? Have they had a cross-promotion deal with the manufacturers of Hovercraft?

Still, the idea of David experiencing a British summer - sitting in a traffic jam ten miles from Stonehenge, putting rubbish in a bin full of wasps, skeeting grey rain washing in across Robin Hood's Bay and trying to get the wrapper off a lemonade sparkle - might make for a good TV show. Well, not a good TV show but a fitting punishment for David Hasselhoff.

But that's not what they've got in mind:

We’ll join David on everything from country pursuits in stately homes, having a traditional cockney knees up and picnic-ing and kite flying on Hampstead Heath to playing polo, rowing with the Oxford Blues and inspiring lifeguards on the Devon coast. The Hoffmeister will be taking viewers on a tongue in cheek VIP journey through British summertime that’s anything but quintessential.

Hang about - is this embracing everything about the summer, or not? It can't be both the quintessential British summer and anything but the quintessential British summer, can it?

Hot on the heels of his hit appearance as a judge on America’s Got Talent, The Hoff has wasted no time nestling firmly back in the bosom of his British fan-base. Episode one will follow the chaos of his arrival in London as hurricane Hoff is reunited with Scott and taken on a sightseeing tour across the capital.

Hoff on an open-top bus, then.

Other series highlights will chronicle David as he’s joined by daughters Hayley and Taylor-Ann, who are pursuing a pop career,

Nooooooooooooooooooooooo!

as they take in the best of Britain and its stellar summer events line up. David will put paid to the theory that an Englishman’s home is his castle, as he holes himself up in a haunted castle and takes in a spot of clay pigeon shooting.

Is it even worth pointing out that an American staying in a haunted castle has very little of value in exploring the contention that the writ of British law stops once you are own your own property? And if he really wanted to test the theory, he might be better off talking to Tony Martin?

Fulfilling a lifetime dream, David will also be hiring a barge and cruising through the canals, locks and backwaters of the British countryside to Oxford, spending quality time with his girls.

What exactly is David's "lifetime dream" here? Has he really always wanted to go on a barge? Couldn't he have made a booking with Hoseasons?

Anyway, there you have it: The David's summer plans. All starting with trying to get Scott Mills to at least act surprised, dammit, this afternoon.

David Van Day is not an animal, he is an 80s star

David Van Day, out of Dollar and Bucks Fizz but mainly Dollar, had to go into hiding because he was so hideous:

But the 52-year-old thought he looked so ugly after the facelift that he barred his two daughters from looking at his face.

Olivia, 16, and Amber, 12, had to wait eight weeks before they could see their father.

He said: "My head was the size of a TV and I don't want them to see what it was like."

The key word is "facelift", as this was after he went on Living TV's Pop Goes The Band, where acts for whom the nostalgia circuit work has dried up have their dignity removed on television. His normal face, and his post facelift face, was apparently acceptable viewing for his children.

You might have thought that a sixteen year old would be more than capable of understanding the after-effects of a facelift, and might be happier to see them than go two months without seeing their Dad, but all families are different.

I suppose it's just lucky Pete Burns never had kids, isn't it?

Pete Burns will be delighted: Boy George follows his lead

In these times, news of the formerly rich in serious financial difficulties isn't published first in the London Gazette. Oh, no: the first sign of financial stress of the famous is signing up for a fly on the wall series on Living TV. Like what Boy George has done.

Also tucked into the winter schedule for the channel which has come far - oh, so far - since it used a nice cup of tea as its logo - is this:

Living is also airing Pop Goes the Band, in which bands including Bucks Fizz, Dollar, Cleopatra, 911, Shakatak and Visage, will be "restored to their former glory through strenuous fitness regimes, painful cosmetic and in some cases, major plastic surgery".

Those last three words turn a bit of harmless fun into something a bit sinister. And we'd have thought for a couple of those bands - notably Bucks Fizz and Dollar - it'd be less about teeth whitening and more about relationship counselling wouldn't it.

Still, it'll be interesting to watch 911 trying to reclaim their glory days - although how Living will recreate that Thursday and Friday back in 1997 isn't clear. And making Cleopatra look like they did when they were successful - and about twelve years old - is going to be a challenge, too.

Snow globes

The Golden Globes finally turned up on British TV last night (on Living, of all channels - we presume this must be part of a deal under which UK Bright Ideas will show the Oscars) which meant we were finally able to see what a bloody shambles U2 were. Eminem has never been a young man to shy away from feeling life's dealt him a bad hand, but with their weedy little tune for Martin 'Joe 90 specs' Scorcese's Gangs of New York to have eclipsed 8 Mile in the tune awards, this time he's got good cause. And how on earth did Die Another Day get nominated for a music award?

Even shabbier though was when Bono bumbled on stage to read the citation of GoNY's best thing nomination - which, with all the panache of a PE teacher, he did (badly) from a crumpled sheet of A4 paper. When Mestipho came on stage, we were frankly staggered to hear that his appearance on stage had led to someone in this audience of Not Easily Impressed celebs actually whistling with joy and respect. Unfortunately for Mr. Vox, the producer cut quickly enough to show that the person delighted to see him was, um, The Edge.

Can we also say: Lara Flynn Boyle? If we were a star, we'd choose to wear a tutu too. That, surely, is the whole point of being a star?