1) “America’s Got Talent” season-opener, 8-10 p.m., NBC. A Nigerian-born engineer dances without music; a Chinese engineer (shown here) dances without humans; Canadians dance with dogs. There’s much more, including a Cuban-born rapper, a French comedian and also some Americans who, like the others, have talent. It’s an impressive (and sometimes emotional) start. Read more…
1) “Bring Me the Beauties” opener, 9 p.m., HBO. Hoyt Richards is a Princeton grad who was called the first male supermodel. He worked for elite brands (Versace, Lauren, Cartier, etc), made a fortune … and gave it to a cult. This three-parter starts on a busy documentary day: At 8 and 9, ABC reruns films on Richard Simmons and on Kennedy conspiracy theories. Read more…
1) “The Audacity” season-finale, 9-10:29 p.m., AMC, repeating at 11:06. At a tech showcase, Duncan (shown here) plans to unveil his data-mining scheme, PINATA (Privacy Is Not A Thing Anymore). At the same time, his wife and daughter have a big school event. There are pivotal moments here, especially after a school stunt goes bad. It adds up to a great (but incomplete) finish. Read more…
1) “America’s Got Talent” season-opener, 8-10 p.m. Tuesday, NBC. The ratings leader is back, ready to spend most of the summer on auditions. The panel — Simon Cowell (shown here), Sofia Vergara, Howie Mandel and Mel B — will see lots of acts, some of them weird and most of them talented. On Aug. 18, they’ll finally shift to live shows, with viewers voting, Read more…
1) “Beverly Hills Cop” (1984, shown here) and its sequel (1987), 6 and 8:15 p.m., Sundance. On Sunday, Netflix will add this year’s ceremony, with the America Film Institute giving Eddie Murphy its Lifetime Achievement Award. First, here are two of his best films, skillfully mixing action, intensity and big, Murphy-style humor. Read more…
Strolling through a broadcast museum recently, I was struck by:
1) The immense role of late-night TV; and
2) How odd it is that CBS shed its late-night role. By dumping Stephen Colbert, it abandoned a slot it had struggled to get.
For CBS, late-night had long been a serious void. It was the “empty piece of the jigsaw puzzle that’s glared at us over the decades,” Howard Stringer, the network president, once told reporters.
That void was filled by David Letterman in 1993 and then by Colbert in 2015. For 33 years, CBS had a piece of what NBC has had almost forever. Read more…
1) “Broadway Musicals: A Jewish Legacy,” 9-11 p.m., PBS. This joyous journey includes, as some people put it, everyone except Cole Porter. It traces the Gershwins, Lerner and Loewe, Kander and Ebb, Comden and Green, Rodgers and Hart and then Hammerstein (raised Protestant, with Jewish roots). It savors Sondheim and Bernstein (including this scene from the movie of their “West Side Story”) and more greats. Read more…
1) “There She Goes,” 8-10 p.m., Fox. Utkarsh Ambudkar competes with himself tonight. He’s Jay in “Ghosts” (he’s shown here, center) and stars with Rachael Leigh Cook in this film based, loosely on her experience. They play high school sweethearts who broke up when she became a teen star; now they meet, 25 years later. Read more…
1) “Brilliant Minds” return, 8 p.m., NBC. When we last saw Dr. Oliver Wolf, he was obsessing over saving Sofia, a friend of his dad. Then came a shell-shock: Does she really exist? We saw her, but was that just his perspective? Now others try to untangle the mystery … while handling a tough case (shown here) at the hospital. It’s a strong start to the show’s final six episodes. Read more…
1) “Bear Grylls is Running Wild,” 9 p.m., Fox. Elizabeth Banks is an actress and game-show host, but she was also the director of the successful movie, “Cocaine Bear.” Now she’s with Bear (Grylls, not Cocaine), heading into the frigid wilderness. (They’re shown here.) They try to navigate the crevasses of a melting glacier, then kayak to the site of a cold extraction. Read more…
Best-bets for June 2: “AGT” opener and an indie gem 
Best-bets for June 1: old “Talent,” new “Beauties” 
Best-bets for May 31: audacious finales, risky rabbit 
