Let’s designate this as the ultimate tourist experience:
One day in 2011, Susan Olsen says, a bus had stopped outside the house that used to be shown as the exterior of the “Brady Bunch” home. Tourists looked around at … well, not much. And then …
“The ‘Wienermobile’ pulled up and Cindy Brady got out.” Read more…
1) “Country Music,” 8 p.m. Sunday, PBS, rerunning at 10. Here is Ken Burns at his best – the start of an eight-night documentary that has depth, detail, great music and rich waves of humanity. Dayton Duncan wrote superb narration, supplemented by smart talking-head commentary – especially from Marty Stuart, Dolly Parton and the late Merle Haggard. The opener starts with the 1927 recording sessions that discovered Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter family (shown here), then sees the Grand Ole Opry begin. Read more…
1) “Saturday Night Live,” 11:29 p.m., NBC. As a first-time host, Halsey reflected on when she was a Jersey girl named Ashley Frangipane, watching “SNL” every week. Now, at 24, she’s a mono-named star – and an impressive one. As music guest(shown here) in this rerun, Halsey had some Gaga-esque moments, offering visual and vocal splendor. And as host, she blended into sketches well. It was a night that had a so-so start, then soared, including some clever satires of politicians with blackface pasts. Read more…
Memories of Valerie Harper – fun ones, funny ones – will reach digital TV over the next few days.
The reruns are from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show” and “Rhoda,” Both shows seemed to share the upbeat approach of Harper, who died Friday (Aug. 30) at 80.
“I had a very positive mom,” she said in 2014, adding: “I’ve always thought that life is here to have fun and to meet people …. But this really brings you up short, when you hear that you have limited time.” Read more…
1) “Live From Lincoln Center,” 9-10:30 p.m., PBS. OK, this isn’t live AND it isn’t from the Lincoln Center; other than that, the title is quite accurate. We follow the Chamber Music Society, as it visits and performs in iconic Greek settings (shown here). Classical pieces flow from the Ancient Amphitheater of Larissa, the Church of the Taxiarchon in Pelion and more. Read more…
1) Pro football season-opener, 8:20 p.m. ET , NBC. In 1920, the Decatur Staleys were 10-1-2, almost becoming the first champions of what’s now the National Fooball League. They became champs the next year … then changed their name to the Chicago Bears. The ’21 season was also when the Green Bay Packers joined, creating a fierce rivalry. Now the NFL’s 100th season begins with the 199th game between them. The Packers (led by Aaron Rodgers, shown here) lead 97-95-6, but the Bears, who host, are coming off a 12-4 season. Read more…
A generation ago, Teal Piper (shown here) recalls, wrestling didn’t seem like an equal-opportunity workplace.
“Women were really accessories to the men,” she said. They were there for sex appeal.
She once expressed that opinion to her father – possibly in a snarky, teenager way. “He just let me have it.” He slammed his fist, broke the table, and lectured that women work twice as hard.
It should be mentioned that her dad, the late wrestling star Rowdy Roddy Piper, had table-thumping strength plus social consciousness. “He had three daughters and he was a feminist at heart.” Read more…
1) “MasterChef,” 8 p.m., Fox. Two weeks from its finale, this is down to the final six home chefs. There are four men, ranging from Nick DiGiovanni, 22, to Subha Ramiah (shown here), 54, and two women – a stay-at-home mom (Shari Mukherjee, 34) and a former Army interrogator (Sarah Faherty, 31). Now — in the show’s first global episode – they’re flown to Gordon Ramsay’s flagship restaurant in London, where they serve 36 guests, including his family. Read more…
As Conan O’Brien prepares to help Donald Trump buy Greenland, let’s admire the symmetry.
Greenland was discovered (or re-discovered) by Eric the Red. He has:
— A little in common with O’Brien, whose special airs at 10 p.m. Tuesday (Sept. 3) on TBS. Mostly, it’s just the red hair.
— A lot in common with Trump. Eric, it seems, was a felon, a colonialist, a control freak, a slaveholder, a multiple killer and a guy who exaggerated the value of real estate.
.That last one, incidentally, is the part that directly relates to Trump. (I just thought the others provided extra information.) Read more…
By the time he was a teenager, Rza would be immersed in New York’s hip-hop scene.
He would eventually be linked with Method Man and Ghostface Killah and Ol’ Dirty Bastard and more. He would create Wu-Tang Clan (shown here), the powerhouse group depicted in a new Hulu series
.But some of the first poetry he heard wasn’t rap … and he wasn’t in New York … and he wasn’t Rza. He was Bobby Diggs, living in North Carolina and listening to his uncle.“
He spoke in song, nursery rhymes all day,” Rza said. “Or old folk tales.” Read more…
