What’s on TV tonight: David Oyelowo and Denise Gough star in two exciting new dramas, and more

Wednesday 16 April

Government Cheese
Apple TV+ 
British star David Oyelowo (Selma, Silo) stars in Paul Hunter and Aeysha Carr’s surrealist comedy drama set in 1969 California. Oyelowo (also an executive producer) plays Hampton Chambers, who returns to his family in the San Fernando Valley after a spell in prison. He has relaunched himself as a Christian and an inventor – but his wife Astoria (Simone Missick, comically expressive with her range of eye-rolls) and two teenage sons have changed too, so he doesn’t get the warm welcome he expected when his return disrupts the easygoing family unit they have created in his absence.

Chambers perseveres, trying to make his fortune with his invention, a self-sharpening power drill bit, but soon finds his past – mostly in the shape of the “seven brothers, one brain” Prevost crime family who now run the neighbourhood – interfering with his plans. It’s gorgeous to look at, even if the first episode (of 10) takes its time to set up the narrative. But the show’s offbeat comedy draws you in as we see if Chambers can escape crime’s temptations and rebuild his family. Four episodes drop today, the rest follow weekly. VL

The Stolen Girl
Disney+ 
This creepy five-part thriller is adapted from Alex Dahl’s novel Playdate. When Elisa (Denise Gough) and Fred’s (Jim Sturgess) young daughter is abducted after a sleepover at her new best friend’s house, in the care of mum Rebecca (Holliday Grainger), police suspect it may be related to Fred’s work as a criminal lawyer.

The Diamond Heist
Netflix 
In 2000, a south London gang planned to steal £350m-worth of diamonds from the Millennium Dome and escape via the Thames. Now that audacious crime gets the Guy Ritchie treatment as he executive produces Jesse Vile’s docuseries. The tale is told by the criminals themselves and the police who thwarted them.

Project UFO
Netflix 
Inspired by real-life events, this four-part subtitled drama is set in 1980s Poland and has been dubbed “the Polish Stranger Things” – it’s highly stylised and has a brooding soundtrack, while Cold War paranoia ups the ante. It tells how a fading television presenter and an amateur ufologist team up to investigate an alleged UFO landing.

Just Act Normal
BBC Three, 9pm 
Janice Okoh’s sparky new comedy-drama is about three teenage siblings – Tiana (Chenée Taylor), Tanika (Kaydrah Walker-Willkie) and Tionne (Akins Subair) – who, when their mother disappears, hide the truth from the authorities so they can stay together. They are helped by the local drug dealer Dr Feelgood (Sam Buchanan) and Tanika’s teacher Ms Jenkins (Romola Garai).

Pauline Black: A 2-Tone Story
Sky Arts, 9pm
The Selecter frontwoman talks about her career and personal life, including being adopted and her experience of racism. Contributions also come from, among others, Don Letts, Skin, Damon Albarn and Jools Holland, and there’s generous archive footage. It’s followed by Record On: The Specials – A Message to You, a profile of the fellow ska band, at 10.50pm.

Jimmy McGovern Remembers: The Lakes
BBC Four, 10pm
Screenwriter Jimmy McGovern recalls the creation of his “partially autobiographical” 1997 drama series, talking about his inspiration and working with its breakout star, John Simm who played Danny Kavanagh. The first two episodes of The Lakes follow at 10.15pm and 11.45pm. VL

Thursday 17 April

The Apprentice: The Final
BBC One, 9pm
With the next series of Lord Sugar’s reality show being its 20th, it wouldn’t be quite accurate to describe it as being in rude health: after two decades, we have seen every possible candidate attempt every conceivable task, while most of Lord Sugar’s jokes were old tut back in 2005. Yet it remains compelling and sometimes still physically uncomfortable to watch as the hopefuls overreach or implode.

By past standards, tonight’s final, pitting air-conditioning magnate Dean against pizza entrepreneur Anisa, goes remarkably smoothly. Both candidates prove impressive team leaders, their products are well thought through but distinct from one another and their presentations slick and persuasive. It is their reunited teammates who cause the trouble: Amber Rose’s dictatorial approach to directing an advert for Anisa creates friction, while Liam makes the peculiar decision to base his video promoting air conditioning on heating. Despite these hiccups, the final boardroom is an unusually convivial affair, and Tom Allen meets the winner at 10pm for You’re Hired. For once, it feels like there is no bad choice for Lord Sugar, although perhaps the best decision would be to make next year the last. GT

Leverage Redemption
Amazon Prime Video
This American take on the Hustle formula of a gang of grifters using their gifts for good continues to provide plenty of unchallenging fun as it enters its third season. Among their adversaries over the ensuing 10 episodes are a tyrannical mayor, a former mark still bearing a grudge and a ruthless industrialist – and watch out for the return of a familiar face, back to stir things up for Noah Wyle’s unflappable quintet.

Ransom Canyon
Netflix
From deep in the heart of Texas, “where everyone’s running from something or running to something”, comes this familiar but ravishingly filmed and reasonably engaging slice of small-town Americana. Hitting plenty of traditional genre beats (bronco riding, gridiron, ill-advised love affairs) while rooting it all in a buried secret, it follows three ranching dynasties who must unite to face an existential threat to their way of life.

Holiday Homes: Mis-Sold and Misled? Tonight
ITV1, 8.30pm; STV, 10.45pm
Defecting from her customary consumer telly slots on the BBC, Michelle Ackerley presents this overdue exposé of a growing scandal at Britain’s holiday parks, where many caravan owners are being exploited by unscrupulous figures combining sharp sales practice, poor quality homes and hidden fees to make a handsome profit. As legal action brews, what can be done?

The Madame Blanc Mysteries
Channel 5, 9pm
When beloved TV series Antique Antics arrives in the south of France with an old friend in tow, Jean (Sally Lindsay) is delighted. We, of course, know better, and soon an expert is dead and a new case opens in this amiable, well-appointed cosy crime.

Gangs of London
Sky Atlantic, 9pm
Still punctuating the increasingly implausible narrative of triple and quadruple cross with superbly choreographed action, this crime saga finally shows a little more of its hand regarding its central conspiracy, while Lale (Narges Rashidi), Asif (Asif Raza Mir) and Marian (Michelle Fairley) all face big decisions.

Love My Face
Channel 4, 10pm
This lovely new series follows people with facial differences as they ponder whether or not to have transformative surgery with the support of the empathetic Jono Lancaster and a team of counsellors and doctors.

Friday 18 April

Gareth Malone’s Messiah 
BBC One, 10.45am
Get your Good Friday off to a joyful musical start with this inspirational miniseries in which choirmaster Gareth Malone embarks on another TV quest to bring to light the “raw singing talent” of ordinary, everyday people. This time his focus is a performance of that staple of Easter choral singing (since it was first written and performed in the 1740s), Handel’s Messiah. Malone is on the hunt for eight amateur singers to train up and take part in a performance at Llandaff Cathedral in Cardiff, alongside professional soloists and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales and Chorus.

We meet him just three months before the event, trying to rustle up applicants and, from there, the process is not unformulaic – candidates’ hopes and dreams, whittling down a shortlist, the auditions, the reveal, the musical ups and downs – with all the usual moments of jeopardy. But it is never less than a rollercoaster following the individual journeys of these enthusiastic amateurs, and there’s lots of fascinating background about Handel, and his Messiah’s long history as a choral favourite. Continues through eventful rehearsals to the concert on Easter Sunday. GO

Light & Magic
Disney+
The series looking at the story of George Lucas’s pioneering visual effects company, Industrial Light & Magic (now owned by Disney), returns for a second run. This time the focus is on ILM’s pivotal role in the biggest revolution in cinema since the talkies – the industry’s transition from celluloid to digital.

Unreported World
Channel 4, 7.30pm
Love blossoms even in the most challenging situations and despite the ongoing war and destruction in Gaza, couples still want to get married. Filmed just before and during the fragile ceasefire earlier this year, this report follows a wedding photographer and two couples trying to rebuild their lives and make plans for the future.

Beyond Paradise
BBC One, 8pm
The third series of the Death in Paradise spin-off continues with a tense episode. When a competitor keels over during a hotly contested regatta race, Humphrey Goodman’s (Kris Marshall) investigations lead inexorably towards his fiancée Martha’s (Sally Bretton) drinks van. But what would Martha have to gain from spiking one of her own smoothies? As ever, the solution requires some creative thinking.

Have I Got News for You
BBC One, 9pm
Another top flight line-up on the veteran satirical news quiz. Actor Katherine Parkinson is in the host’s chair for the first time tonight, while joining Ian Hislop and Paul Merton on the panels are actor and comedian Julian Clary and Financial Times columnist Jemima Kelly.

Black Snow
BBC Two, 9pm
So far, Black Slow might be a better title for the second series of this Australian crime drama, as Detective Cormack’s (Travis Fimmel) cold-case investigation into the disappearance of Zoe Jacobs crawls along at a snail’s pace. Things speed up a little later in the episode, when Cormack’s enquiries into the missing vehicle yield a breakthrough.

The Rolling Stones: Live at the Fonda
BBC Four, 9.25pm 
A late-evening line-up devoted to the Rolling Stones begins with this atmospheric 2015 film of the band’s one-and-only live performance of their iconic 1971 album Sticky Fingers at the Fonda Theatre in Los Angeles. It’s followed by the Mick Jagger and Keith Richards episodes of the 2022, four-part BBC profile series, My Life as a Rolling Stone.

Television previewers

Stephen Kelly (SK), Veronica Lee (VL), Gerard O’Donovan (GO) and Gabriel Tate (GT)