Public Television, Check local listings
On this weekend’s installment, Bill Moyers takes a chilling, informative report from last year – on the influential, Machiavellian, very secretive American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC for short) – and updates it. The original story was frightening enough, and I’m afraid that the news, about how major corporations influence politics and especially state politicians, will not have gotten better.
Moyers & Company airs from Friday to Sunday on local public TV stations; to find it in your local area, click the
BillMoyers.com website.
IFC, 8:00 p.m. ET
Whether or not you’ve plunged into the new, Netflix-presented season of Arrested Development, tonight’s prime-time quadruple-feature of classic episodes is worth watching and enjoying. The second episode in this mini-marathon introduces Charlize Theron in her recurring role as lovely Rita. She’s British, but she’s no meter maid. She is, however, not quite what she initially appears, and that leads to a rather hilarious misunderstanding. Her performance, alone, is worth the visit – but in every installment of Development, there’s a lot, lot more.
Sundance, 8:00 p.m. ET
Paddy Chayefsky became television’s first well-known star writer, the first to emigrate to Hollywood, after writing such early 1950s gems as Marty. Two decades later, still in Hollywood, he reflected on his roots by taking aim at TV in the 1976 movie Network – but instead of looking back with nostalgia, he looked ahead with astonishing prescience. Before Fox existed, he tells the tale of a fourth broadcasting network that becomes successful by pandering with outrageous reality shows, while powerful companies buy established networks and impose dictates, and profit demands, even upon their news divisions. How did he know? And how did he make all of it so damned funny? Peter Finch, William Holden and Faye Dunaway star, while Beatrice Straight, Robert Duvall and Ned Beatty offer truly stellar support. A great movie – and an important one, too.
Encore, 9:30 p.m. ET
This 1978 movie comedy signaled that a new generation was coming, in a big way – not only to the movies, but on the screen and behind the camera. Watch John Belushi, already a Not Ready for Prime Time Player on Saturday Night Live, steal the movie in his big-screen debut, like all four Marx Brothers rolled into one.
HBO, 10:00 p.m. ET
Tonight’s guests include political columnist Joshua Green and author Michael Pollan, who specializes now in books and essays about food. There has been lots of news in both arenas this week, so Maher ought to be able to lead quite a discussion. Last week’s show, by the way, was the best of the season – very heated, yet very illuminating, and very smart.