What’s On: The ‘Grinch’ is Back, with ‘Trolls,’ Broadway’s ‘Holiday Inn,’ 20th Anniversary of ‘Titanic’
A critical checklist of notable weekend TV:
How the Grinch Stole Christmas (Friday, 8/7c, NBC): It seems a bit early to be stealing Christmas the night after Thanksgiving, but I never pass up a chance to revisit my all-time favorite holiday cartoon classic, based on the Dr. Seuss story and directed with his usual comic verve by Chuck Jones. The great Boris Karloff provides the voice for the Grinch, who resents the happiness of Whoville—until he doesn’t. Paired this year with a new animated special, Dreamworks Trolls Holiday (8:30/7:30c), featuring the voice of Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake and Zooey Deschanel.
Irving Berlin’s Holiday Inn—The Broadway Musical (Friday, 9/8c, PBS, check local listings at pbs.org): Reminiscent of the movie classic White Christmas (and the earlier Holiday Inn also featuring Bing Crosby, with Fred Astaire), this high-spirited Broadway production was seen last season on the stage of Roundabout’s Studio 54. The dance numbers are particular highlights, as Berlin classics including “Shaking the Blues Away,” “Blue Skies,” “Cheek to Cheek” and the immortal “White Christmas” are interpreted by a cast led by High School Musical’s Corbin Bleu and Bryce Pinkham.
Titanic: 20 Years Later With James Cameron (Sunday, 9/8c, National Geographic Channel): Two decades after the epic Titanic ruled the box office and triumphed at the Oscars, filmmaker James Cameron—also National Geographic’s explorer in residence—revisits the making of the movie and reveals new research about the sunken ocean liner. If all of this whets your appetite for the movie, it is scheduled for a limited theatrical re-release in December. Cameron also appears on Sunday’s edition of National Geographic’s StarTalk with Neil deGrasse Tyson (11/10c).
Bruce Springsteen: In His Own Words (Sunday, 10/9c, BBC America): If you’re not lucky enough to get into the musician’s sold-out Broadway run, this deeply personal 70-minute documentary (presented with limited interruptions) provides an unfettered look into Springsteen’s life and influences as he tells his story to rapt audiences. Nigel Cole is director, peppering the Boss’s conversation with archival footage from his long and varied career.
Christmas Movies: So, so many holiday films to wallow in. A sampling: Hallmark’s Finding Santa (Friday, 8/7c), starring Jodie Sweetin and Eric Winter; The Christmas Train (Saturday, 8/7c, Hallmark), a Hallmark Hall of Fame original starring Dermot Mulroney as a jaded journalist who gets into the spirit during a cross-country train trip; Lifetime’s Wrapped Up in Christmas (Saturday, 8/7c), starring Tatyana Ali as an embattled mall owner and Brendan Fehr as the mall’s resident Santa; UP’s Christmas Solo (Sunday, 7/6c), starring Kelli Williams and Jonathan Scarfe as single parents of warring daughters; Hallmark’s Switched for Christmas (Sunday, 8/7c), starring the ubiquitous Candace Cameron Bure as identical twins stepping into each others’ shoes, with romantic complications ensuing; and Lifetime’s A Very Merry Toy Store (Sunday, 8/7c), starring Melissa Joan Hart and Mario Lopez as rival toy-store owners threatened and brought together by the local opening of a big-box store. Happy Endings to All!
Inside Weekend TV: Nat Geo WILD explores a truly primal game of animal thrones in the four-part docu-miniseries Savage Kingdom: Uprising (Friday, 9/8c), in which warring lion and leopard clans in Africa battle for supremacy and survival. … Fox Sports inaugurates a new series of documentaries, under the umbrella title of Magnify, with the film 89 Blocks, airing either before or after the NFL matchup (check local listings). Executive produced by Sports Illustrated and Le Bron James and Maverick Carter’s Uninterrupted, the film profiles the East St. Louis High School Flyers football team and its impact on the local community. … As a great escape before the post-Thanksgiving work week begins, CBS’s 60 Minutes (Sunday, 7:30/6:30c, 7 PT) sends Steve Kroft to the tiny, remote Isle of Eigg in Scotland’s Inner Hebrides. … Steve Harvey once again takes on the risky assignment of hosting, and announcing the winner, of the Miss Universe pageant on Fox (Sunday, 7/6c). … Smithsonian Channel’s The Lost Tapes: Patty Hearst (Sunday, 9/8c) uses news footage and audio and interview recordings from the 1970s to tell the story of the abducted heiress and her controversial dealings with the revolutionary Symbionese Liberation Army.
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He missed the Hey Arnold! movie on tonight at 7:00! Now, we need them to bring back Rugrats and Wild Thornberrys!
Holiday Inn sounds interesting. Check your local PBS stations for other specials this weekend. One of mine is showing Moody Blues: Days of Future Passed Live which I've never seen.
My weekend favorites (Z Nation, Dirk Gently, and Walking Dead) are all on this weekend not giving me much of a break!
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Hey Arnold!, Recess , Doug, Rugrats and Wildthornberrys were favorites growing up in my family!
Movies on TV this weekend. Really want to see Justice League and Thor at the theatre.
Next week is a very busy one in the sci-fi /comic book genre The CW/DC shows have an exciting 4 show crossover with Supergirl, Flash, Legends of Tommorow and Arrow. The showrunners promise it will be much improved over last season. Also The Gifted, Gotham and Marvel Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D season 5 returns with a brand new arc set in space!!
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Don't forget "Real Monsters", loved all Nickelodeon's toons.
"The Gifted" last episode was the best so far in my opinion, even though I still feel this show looks very low-budget.
Anyone watched or watching "Stranger Things"? Very well made show, it feels like a movie production, and great cast.
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Agreed, the latest Gifted ep was the best one. The storyline was more compelling. But I still feel its not a fun show to watch. Zero humor and very dull. I'll keep watching though.
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I'd never heard of Recess and had to look it up. It wasn't a Nicktoon but was part of ABC's Saturday Morning programming block.
Of course they're going to brag that this year's crossover is much improved over last year's. Last year's was a joke. I felt like I wasted my time watching Supergirl and Arrow for just a couple of minutes in each that actually pertained in a meaningful way to the crossover plot.
Even this year, it seems like most of the action is going to center around the wedding on The Flash and that brainiac guy who's their newest villain. And are they bringing back that stupid giant ape again? This week's Legends seemed to suggest that they are.
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Real Monsters ended before I got cable, so I never saw it. I don't have access to watch Stranger Things either.
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I don't expect or feel the need for humor in my comic book based shows. There isn't much in Gotham, and the feeble attempts at it in The Flash and Legends don't do a thing for me.
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What channel is Hey Arnold! movie on? Nickelodeon, I imagine. I used to watch that with the offspring, back in the day. I too liked Wild Thornberrys and Rugrats.
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Kind of late now, but it's on Nickelodeon. They'll probably repeat it again like they do with just about everything.
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Hey the Arnold movie is still on. I thought it was the original TV movie from a decade or so ago, but it's a new one. 🙂
BTW, a bit off-topic, but I'm mad at my Spectrum service. The On-Demand function is OK, except.... One of the options for On Demand TV is "Last Night in Prime TIme," and it mentions a lot of the major shows from the previous evening. BUT..... when I choose one, the most recent episode available is from the previous week. The function is "LAST NIGHT in Prime Time," but the LAST NIGHT's episode isn't available. I think I'll have to wait a couple of days before it's available. (I remember that from The Last Ship.) Grrrrr. Thought I'd vent, guess I'll have to contact Spectrum about it. (Although it's probably a question of legal rights from the network or studio.)
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My On Demand hardly ever has last night's episode of anything. Most shows don't show up until about a week after they were broadcast. However, I've found that most of them are available the next day (or even the same day) on the show's website.
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Yeah, I've watched shows online before. I was hoping to avoid that, since I've had laptop issues, but it's been better lately. In fact, I'm watching last night's Supernatural right now. 🙂
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Neither do I expect humor in my sci-fi/fantasy shows. But I do welcome the dark humor and clever humorous lines in Gotham and Marvel Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. The forced and silly parts of the CW/DC shows, namely Supergirl, Flash and Legend of Tomorrow are pointless. The humor in Marvel's INHUMANS was mostly during the Hawaiian scenes as opposed to the much more serious proceedings on the moon. The added lightness on earth helped make the show more fun to watch.
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Yes, the humor in Gotham is mostly a dark humor that's not supposed to be laughing out loud funny but rather a sinister chuckle in your mind that makes you feel like you're in on the joke.
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He's right. Seeing that I've never read the comics, I'd have thought Maximus was the hero of the story, and the rest were all villains if I hadn't read it was supposed to be the opposite.
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I do love me some Grinch. But contrary to what TV networks do, once per season is good enough for me.
I didn't know "Holiday Inn" was ever made into a play. I like that movie, and I think it should get better publicity, more so than the sappy, designed-to-pull-heartstrings White Christmas. (Except for the one scene in Holiday Inn that is now considered shameful and in terrible taste.)
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Holiday Inn wasn't a very successful stage musical. It only lasted 3 months on Broadway. The minstrel show scene has been cut from the movie for most showings on TV.
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Glad to see you finally acknowledge that one scene in HI.
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What does that mean?? Holiday Inn is a movie that's not aired that often, and I've probably seen it about three or four times over the course of the past 20 years. I hardly have every scene memorized.
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I'm confused by what he said too! It's not like we've ever discussed the movie before.
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A year or two ago I mentioned how much I liked Holiday Inn, and someone (perhaps even the poster above, since he seems to remember) mentioned a scene with actors appearing in blackface. I hadn't seen the movie in a few years so that one scene wasn't topmost in my memory. :-p
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And the scene might not have been in the version you saw. I don't remember it.
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Unfortunately, it's the one scene that stands out in my mind when I think of it even though the rest of it was entertaining enough. And it's a good reason tor it to be cut out of today's showings even though personally, I don't like censorship...
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That one scene always sticks out in my craw when I think of the movie even though the rest of it is entertaining enough. That's why when someone mentions it's better than White Christmas (which I don't think of as sappy, just a little sentimental albeit contrived) and never mentions that scene, it always makes me think they're glossing over that to make it as if it's perfect and that's far from the case, that's all! So I'm glad that scene gets cut of some of today's broadcasts even though personally, I hate censorship.
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