Dennis Potter

Television satire grew as quickly as fungi on damp tree stumps - and was brutally yanked out by the roots before we could digest the poison. But last night Granada planted a few more seeds with its intriguing Second City Reports: a massive spoof dressed up in sober clothes and mock solemnity.

Yes, Dick Emery was back on BBC television last night with yet another armful of impersonations from his grotesque comic gallery. Some of them were brilliantly funny, but others were as dull as an opinion poll. This often attractive and usually lively show is made up of whirling bits and pieces, yoked together by song and dance - a formula so simple that it can be disastrous.

Lectures go down on TV like cold trea on a frosty morning. How bold, then, of Frank Muir and Denis Norden to dream up a comic lecture, complete with wagging pencil and statistical charts. Last night's attempt was the first of a new ITV series derivatively entitled How to be an Alien.

There is a fascination in watching Snudge that is hard to resist. His straggle of damp moustache, rubbery lips and inability to talk without spluttering fit him as a potentially great comic character. But successful TV comedy needs more than splendid facial expressions. A good script also helps.

The Arthur Haynes Show, on ITV, for instance, has an anarchical, bitter note of protest rippling through even its wilder moments. Perhaps it is no accident that scriptwriter Johnny Speight's two straight plays have dealt with mental illness. Echoes of them thud through his workaday comedies like footsteps in the dark.

Steptoe and Son has swung TV humour into a brilliant new dimension. How distant it all seems from the days of Mr. Pastry and the lingering red-nosed humour of television's equivalents of Workers' Playtime. Instead of pumping out mere buffoonery or joke-a-minute patter, the little screen now thrives on adult comedy, tailored to the mood of the times.

Poignant moments lengthen all the time in Steptoe stories. Writers Simpson and Galton take the most appalling risks - and somehow pull them off. Triumphantly.

Last night's Sunday Night at the London Palladium on ITV was handed over to the Stars' Organisation for Spastics. We had a list of big names as long as Jack's beanstalk and an audience prepared to bruise its hands in generous enthusiasm. It did not matter that much of the material was stale, for the show was enjoyable.

Perhaps, too, Harry was not at his peak last night. He triumphed most surely when trampling a way through the form-filling jungle of English officialdom. But for me, his owlish incomprehension when plunged into some new catastrophe was so delightful that I watched with a big, silly grin permanently fixed on my face.

Domestic comedy, British style, is usually about as appetising as a cup of cold tea. ITV's Dickie Henderson show is unfortunately no exception.