TCM, 6:00 a.m. ET
There are 24 hours of Maureen O’Hara movies on today’s “Summer Under the Stars” TCM schedule – but let me steer you straight to the best one, and a movie that’s worth revisiting no matter how many times you’ve seen it. At 8 p.m. ET, in the coveted start-of-prime-time spot, TCM presents 1939’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame. O’Hara co-stars as Esmeralda, the beauty who catches the eye (and what a bulging eye it is) of Charles Laughton’s hunchbacked Quasimodo, who operates the bell tower at Notre Dame Cathedral. The setting is magnificent, Victor Hugo’s story is a classic, and Laughton’s performance is just as amazing dramatically as it is physically. (Even though there was a stuntman stand-in for the really difficult parts. Maureen O’Hara confirmed that in a TCM interview years ago, so it’s not just a hunch.)
PBS KIDS, Check local listings
PBS Kids can be found mornings on your local PBS station, and on line, and also on the PBS Kids 24/7 channel. And today, it launches a new season of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, the delightful animated spinoff of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood. Two episodes are shown in each half-hour installment of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, and today’s inaugural program is all new. It begins with “Won’t You Sing Along with Me?,” a way in which young Daniel learns to cheer himself up, and reach out to friends, when he can’t attend this year’s Neighborhood Carnival. There’s also “Daniel’s Substitute Teacher,” another new episode dealing with adapting to unexpected changes. Check local listings.
Various Networks, Check local listings
Today through Thursday, the Democrats present their 2020 Democratic National Convention. (Next week, the Republicans take their turn.) Usually, this is an opportunity to compare the platforms and politicians of the two parties – but this year, another compare-and-contrast exercise has to do with the way each party approaches staging, and televising, during this pandemic. C-SPAN, which features its Jack Webb Dragnet “Just the facts, ma’am” approach to political coverage, begins its convention telecast tonight at 8:50 p.m. ET. Cable news stations start setting up the convention a bit earlier, and the major broadcast networks join in at 10 p.m. ET. Choose and watch your favorite – but, as always, I implore you to bounce around, to hear other voices. Even if you disagree with them.