SUNDAY
DECEMBER 3
2017

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

 

CBS, 7:00 p.m. ET

The title of this special hints at the unavoidable, unsolvable problem with this salute to 60 Minutes, the granddaddy of TV newsmagazines, which was launched by producer Don Hewitt and anchors Mike Wallace and Harry Reasoner in 1968. Minus commercials, that works out to about one minute of current CBS airtime for every year of 60 Minutes – one reason this special seems more like a slideshow on fast-forward than a salute to prime-time TV’s most enduring, and arguably most important, series. (By the way, for the record: If there were a great-granddaddy of TV newsmagazines, that would be another crucially important CBS series, 1951’s See It Now. Fred Friendly was the producer, Edward R. Murrow the host, and a much younger Don Hewitt, the director.) There’s not enough time spent with any one story in this 60 Minutes tribute, from its headline-making news reports to its unforgettable visits with Jackie Gleason and Muhammad Ali, to convey the polished beauty of those particular broadcast gems. But it’s a special worth watching anyway, not only as a reminder of things past, but a nudge to keep watching a show that, 50 years after it launched, continues to land in the weekly Top 10 with its well-timed, deeply researched interviews. Oh, and there’s a brief but fun bonus in this new special: In addition to the familiar opening footage from the premiere edition of 60 Minutes in 1958, we see formerly unshown footage of the moments just before Wallace and Reasoner opened the show – when Reasoner casually flung his cigarette across the studio and out of camera view. For a full review, see David Hinckley’s All Along the Watchtower.

 
  
 
 

CBS, 8:00 p.m. ET

You can’t blame me for wondering why, earlier this same year, CBS didn’t note the 50th anniversary of another of its very memorable and entertaining variety series: The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. But Tom and Dick Smothers quickly courted controversy, while Carol Burnett and company pointedly avoided it. Both approaches led to moments of comic brilliance – but where the Smothers Brothers were fired after three seasons, The Carol Burnett Show thrived for a dozen years. A lot of that, as you’ll see in this retrospective, is due to the talent and taste of the host herself, and the brilliance of repertory member Harvey Korman, and the costumes by Bob Mackie, and, in the later years, the riotous contributions, many of them ad-libbed, by Tim Conway.

 
  
 
 

NBC, 8:20 p.m. ET

This game ought to be hugely popular. The Seattle Seahawks, at 7-4, are second in the NFC West, while the Philadelphia Eagles, at 10-1 in the NFC East, have the best record in football. The Seahawks have home-field advantage – which, given the match-ups on the field, might be the only advantage they have.
 
  
 
 

AMC, 9:00 p.m. ET

The season is fast coming to a close, and the battle, which has taken all season to get to a rolling boil, is doing just that, with Rick convincing his compatriots to take up arms and finish the fight. Well, most of them, but not all. And when he asks that of some of the others, they strip him naked and lock him up. Nobody said being a post-apocalyptic leader was easy. Just ask the King.

 
  
 
 

HBO, 10:00 p.m. ET

SEASON FINALE: Say it ain’t so, Joe! I was just feeling merry, Larry! But tonight is, indeed, the finale for this long-awaited return season of Curb Your Enthusiasm. Will it end with a full-blown musical production of “Fatwa!,” with Lin-Manuel Miranda as the star? With Larry’s ex-wife, Cheryl, riding off into the sunset with Ted Danson? Or, as usual with Larry David’s superbly constructed comedies, with an ending that only he can see coming?

 
  
 
 

HBO, 10:40 p.m. ET

Netflix has scarfed up most of the standup comedy specials of late, but HBO isn’t giving up the fight entirely. And tonight, it’s done a great job by giving Daily Show correspondent Michelle Wolf her first solo special. If you’ve seen any of the promos, you know how funny she can be, and how quickly, and how memorably. If not, tune in, and hang on…

 
  
 
 
 
 
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David Bianculli

Founder / Editor

David Bianculli has been a TV critic since 1975, including a 14-year stint at the New York Daily News, and sees no reason to stop now. Currently, he's TV critic for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, and is an occasional substitute host for that show. He's also an author and teaches TV and film history at New Jersey's Rowan University. His 2009 Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour', has been purchased for film rights. His latest, The Platinum Age of Television: From I Love Lucy to the Walking Dead, How TV Became Terrific, is an effusive guidebook that plots the path from the 1950s’ Golden Age to today’s era of quality TV.