HBO, 8:00 p.m. ET
In 2010, co-directors Sebastian Junger and Tim Hetherington released
Restrepo, an Oscar-nominated nonfiction film documenting their year embedded with a platoon in one of the most dangerous battle areas of Afghanistan. The following year, Hetherington was killed in battle in Libya – and tonight, his former war-correspondent colleague, Junger, presents this new HBO documentary, a profile and salute to his slain friend. For a full review, see Eric Gould’s
Cold Light Reader.
TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET
Rodgers and Hammerstein’s musical about romance in turn-of-the-century New England goes to the big screen, loaded with vibrant show-off colors, in this 1956 movie, starring Gordon MacRae, Shirley Jones – and, yes, a massive carousel, with a lot of horses of different colors.
Showtime 2, 8:30 p.m. ET
SEASON FINALE: Here’s a prime-time, same-week repeat of Monday’s late-night Inside Comedy season finale – David Steinberg’s tasteful, memorable, thoroughly impressive visit with Robert Schimmel, the stand-up comedian who endured several personal tragedies and travails, only to die after a car accident six months after this interview was filmed. This season finale proves at least three things: Schimmel was a veteran talent who deserved larger exposure than he got, Inside Comedy deserves larger exposure than it’s gotten, and all episodes of this program should be devoted to one comic per show. Oh, and Steinberg? Solid, smart interviewing. Imagine how much more vibrant The Tonight Show would have been like had Steinberg, not Leno, gotten the nod years ago…
Fox, 9:00 p.m. ET
If you remember the start of this series – when the gang of musical misfits stopped the show, and launched it at the same time, by singing Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin” – there’s a knowing echo in tonight’s show, when Rachel (Lea Michele) sings the song as part of her Broadway audition for Funny Girl. Her old buddies are there in spirit, if not on stage, for a number that refers to the pilot-episode climax that started it all.
NBC, 9:00 p.m. ET
Patton Oswalt, last seen as a friend of Raylan’s on
Justified who was beaten nearly to death, yet stoically refused to surrender information the bad guys were trying to force out of him, and whose
personal reaction to the Boston Marathon bombings went viral this week, shows up in another guest-star role tonight. But this one’s a lot lighter, and a lot closer to his comedy roots: He plays a political rival of Amy Poehler’s Leslie, who tries to thwart a scheduled City Council vote by staging a “citizen filibuster” – one entirely improvised by Oswalt on the spot.