DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Contributors

ALEX STRACHAN

MIKE HUGHES

KIM AKASS

MONIQUE NAZARETH

ROGER CATLIN

GARY EDGERTON

TOM BRINKMOELLER

GERALD JORDAN

NOEL HOLSTON

 
 
2011
Jul
14
 
 
It hasn't been a year to brag about for the Public Broadcasting Service. Four television stations so far this year have dropped their PBS memberships, three at the start of this month...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
6
 
 
[Did PBS's An American Family, in one generation, and CBS's Survivor, in another, lead us all, like lemmings, over a cliff from which there is no return? TVWW contributor Tom Brinkmoeller asks the question -- and connects the dots... -- DB] Several thoughts on being the first lemming into the abyss...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jun
19
 
 
History Detectives starts its ninth PBS season this week (Tuesday 8 p.m. ET; check local listings), and that's notable for several reasons. The series has longevity, something the television business displays little of anymore. It has lasted because its premise -- discovering whether privately owned items have a historical significance -- is one-of-a-kind, and is produced in a way that genuinely holds a viewer's interest...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
May
30
 
 
Had you been in New York on May 5, had an interest in seeing a top-tier symphonic performance, and had an extra $50-$180 to spend, you might have been seated on one of five levels inside Carnegie Hall to watch and hear fabulous music. Those stars weren't in alignment for most of us. But PBS' Great Performances was there for the celebration of Carnegie Hall's 120th anniversary...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
May
27
 
 
When the cost of a tank of gas now is nearly the same as a newspaper reporter's weekly pay in the mid-'70s, and the cost of a week's worth of groceries for two exceeds a mortgage payment during the same era, it's easy, in a long recession, to be wistful over what once was. Much of what television currently doles out, for me, eliicits the same reaction as filling up my gas tank: I can't help but remember when you watched TV and usually got your money's worth...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
May
16
 
 
I interviewed Dick Cavett last month to write a story for TV WORTH WATCHING. You may have read it. You might have liked it. At any event, in our conversation, Cavett provided many wonderful quotes that didn't fit the topic at hand, but were too good to ignore or bury. So here they are...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
May
11
 
 
ABC will announce its 2011-12 prime-time schedule next week, but producers are expected to learn the fates of current shows before the weekend. ABC soon could pull the plug on the most clever comedy to hit television in five years...it's in the same class as series like "Cheers" and "Taxi" and "Newhart"...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
May
6
 
 
The PBS series "Nature" has presented some memorable wildlife programming over the nearly three decades it has been on the air. Over the next three Sundays, it will memorably return a term to the wild, when it reminds viewers that mama grizzlies don't care about tea, can't see Russia and can be pretty darn accommodating to outsiders...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Apr
25
 
 
I grew up in a segregated community in a segregated America. Like many others, I learned during the late 1950s and into the '60s how wrong this was, and have tried since then to make amends for my ignorance. But as proven by PBS's current nonfiction series about slavery and its impact on Latin America, I remain more ignorant than I imagined...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Apr
16
 
 
Forget the invention of the printing press, the telephone or even the electric light. This world was nothing until the invention of doppler weather radar. In fact, it's a wonder this world still spins, and wasn't ripped to cosmic shreds before doppler arrived and saved us from complete devastation...