by Clif Garboden

THURSDAY

7:30 (2) Basic Black: A Conversation with bell hooks. Host Darren Duarte interviews the Happy To Be Nappy writer and social critic. (Until 8 p.m.)

7:30 (5) White Christmas (movie). Speaking of Christmas-movie annuities: this 1954 Michael Curtiz classic won’t go away. With Bing, Danny, Rosemary, and Vera-hyphen-Ellen. (Until 10 p.m.)

8:00 (2) J.R.R. Tolkien. Just in time to stir up interest in the Lord of the Rings movie. Coincidence? Judi Dench reads from the works of John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. Plus interviews with JRRT himself, and others. To be repeated tonight at 10 p.m., on Saturday at 11 p.m., on Monday at 1 p.m., and on Wednesday at 8 p.m. — all on Channel 44. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (2) P.O.V.: Promises. A film by Justine Shapiro, Boston native B.Z. Goldberg, and Carlos Bolado in which they interview children in Jerusalem about their perceptions of Arab-Israeli issues. An award winner at this year’s Rotterdam and San Francisco Film Festivals. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

10:00 (44) J.R.R. Tolkien. Repeated from this evening at 8 p.m.

10:30 (2) Race. Filmmaker Brent Lestage’s short drama about one Holocaust survivor’s struggle with guilt. (Until 11 p.m.)

FRIDAY

10:00 (2) Life 360: A Place in Time. Tonight’s theme is survival, and the show includes a documentary film by Kelly St. John about the aftermath of being abducted and raped at age 14. (Until 11 p.m.)

10:00 (44) Austin City Limits. Featuring music from Toby Keith and Allison Moorer. (Until 11 p.m.)

SATURDAY

1:30 (25) Football. The Arizona Cardinals versus the New York Giants.

8:00 (2) Brit-Com Christmas Specials. Three from Keeping Up Appearances (1991, 1993, and 1995) and two from that monolith of holiday cheer, Are You Being Served? (1975 and 1976). (Until 11 p.m.)

8:00 (7) National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (movie). Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo survive holiday economics and family relations. Predictable, but Randy Quaid makes it all worthwhile. (Until 10 p.m.)

8:00 (44) The Cliburn: Playing on the Edge. A set of documentary profiles of young pianists selected to play at the annual Van Cliburn competition in Fort Worth, Texas. (Until 9:30 p.m.)

11:00 (2) Indie Select: Undetectable. This powerful film by Jay Corcoran about the realities of surviving on AIDS-drug cocktails tracks the physical and psychological effects on six multi-drug-therapy patients over three years. (Until midnight.)

11:00 (44) J.R.R. Tolkien. Repeated from Thursday at 8 p.m.

SUNDAY

1:00 (4) Football. The Pats versus the Buffalo Bills.

1:00 (25) Football. The Atlanta Falcons versus the Indianapolis Colts.

4:00 (25) Football. The Green Bay Packers versus the Tennessee Titans.

4:20 (44) His Girl Friday (movie). With no commercials, it’s worth spending the time with Cary Grant and Rosalind Russell in this 1940 Howard Hawks remake of The Front Page. The best newspaper movie ever (and that includes All the President’s Men and Between the Lines). (Until 6 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Carmen Jones (movie). More interesting than excellent, but not bad. A 1954 Bizet adaptation by Oscar Hammerstein II done with an all-black cast. Starring Dorothy Dandridge, Harry Belafonte, Pearl Bailey, and Diahann Carroll. (Until 9:45 p.m.)

9:00 (2) The American Experience: Secrets of a Master Builder. A profile of James Buchanan Eads, the 19th-century engineer who built the triple-arch bridge that connects the St. Louises across the Mississippi. To be repeated on Tuesday at midnight. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (4) A Town Without Christmas (movie). At least that’s the threat. We predict another victory for the TMOC (True Meaning of Christmas). With Patricia Heaton and Peter Falk. (Until 11 p.m.)

9:45 (44) Out of the Past (movie). We have only future left. A 1947 murderous tangle with Robert Mitchum drawn back into his criminal background by Kirk Douglas and Jane Greer. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

10:00 (2) American Masters: Merce Cunningham: A Lifetime of Dance. The life of the innovative choreographer — founder (in 1953) of the Cunningham dance studio and step-father of more than 150 works. (Marcia B. Siegel’s review is on page 13.) To be repeated tonight at 1 and 4 a.m. on Channels 2 and 44. (Until 11 p.m.)

1:00 a.m. and 4:00 a.m. (2, 44) American Masters: Merce Cunningham: A Lifetime of Dance. Repeated from this evening at 10 p.m.

2:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. (2, 44) Rediscovering Dave Brubeck. An early airing of a Hedrick Smith encounter with the now 80-year-old pianist who brought cool jazz into white living rooms and provided a gateway for millions into the more traditional stuff. To be repeated tonight at 5 a.m. on Channel 2 and 44 and, finally, in prime time on Wednesday at 8 p.m. (Until 3 a.m.)

MONDAY

1:00 (44) J.R.R. Tolkien. Repeated from Thursday at 8 p.m.

8:00 (44) Hanukkah at Bubbe’s. A kid’s holiday special with puppets. (Until 8:30 p.m.)

8:30 (44) A Taste of Hanukkah. Theodore Bikel hosts a holiday special featuring music from the New England Conservatory and the Boston Community Gospel Choir and a recipe for potato latkes. (Until 9:30 p.m.)

9:00 (5) Football. The St. Louis Rams versus the New Orleans Saints.

9:30 (2) A Christmas Carol. Not real excited about this modern-day rendition of the admittedly tired Dickens story. Ross Kemp stars as Eddie Scrooge, a loan shark spreading gloom over a multicultural urban setting. Guys, it’s the Victorian iconography, not the message, that gives this yarn legs. (Until 11 p.m.)

TUESDAY

2:00 (44) The Nutcracker from the Royal Ballet. The Royal Ballet revives the Tchaikovsky classic under Sir Anthony Dowell. In this edition, which goes back to the original E.T.A. Hoffmann story for its inspiration, the Mouse Queen turns Drosselmeyer’s nephew into the title character. Clara (an adult, played by Alina Cojocaru) and Dross execute the rescue. (Until 4 p.m.)

7:30 (2) La Plaza: Anything for Dance. A profile of Boston Ballet principal dancer Adriana Su‡rez. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Nova: The Methuselah Tree. Repeated from last week. A trip to California’s White Mountains to visit some 5000-year-old bristlecone pines. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (44) 42 Up. Michael Apted’s 1998 update on the lives of the 14 subjects he’s been documenting at seven-year intervals since they were seven years old (Seven Up, 1963-’64). (Until 10:30 p.m.)

10:30 (44) Christmas at San Xavier. Holiday music from a restored mission in Tucson, featuring the Tucson Boy’s Chorus and the Sons of Orpheus Men’s Choir. (Until 11 p.m.)

Midnight (2) The American Experience: Secrets of a Master Builder. Repeated from Sunday at 9 p.m.

WEDNESDAY

8:00 (2) Rediscovering Dave Brubeck. Repeated from Sunday at 2 a.m.

8:00 (4) The Children’s Hospital Telethon. Yeah, like you have extra money to give this year. (Until 11 p.m.)

8:00 (44) J.R.R. Tolkien. Repeated from Thursday at 8 p.m.

9:00 (2) Live from Lincoln Center: Nutcracker Swings. The New York Philharmonic (under Kurt Masur) and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra (under Wynton Marsalis) perform the Tchaikovsky score interspersed with parallel passages from the Duke Ellington/Billy Strayhorn arrangement. (Until 11 p.m.)

9:00 (44) Indie Select: Julio y Su çngel. Trite heartwarming plot — orphan seeks guardian angel, finds grumpy old man — with a Latin setting in a film from Penelope Cervera. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

10:00 (7) People Magazine’s Most Intriguing People of 2001. He probably emerged too late in the year to qualify, but we vote for the fathead kid from California who joined the Taliban. (Until 11 p.m.)

THURSDAY

7:30 (2) Basic Black: A Conversation with Iyanla Vanzant. The bestselling author discusses her In the Meantime. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) She Says: Women in the News. A send-up for female broadcast journalism luminaries — CNN’s Judy Woodruff, ABC’s Carole Simpson, NPR’s Nina Totenberg, and American Experience creator Judy Crichton. (Until 9 p.m.)

10:00 (2) Lady Bird. Letters, interviews, and secretly taped White House chat reveal Lyndon Johnson’s first lady. (Until 11 p.m.)

10:00 (44) A Blackadder Christmas Carol. Rowan Atkinson plays England’s kindest man, who’s visited by spirits who persuade him to turn sour. (Until 11 p.m.)

The 525th line. Nothing makes us dive for and fumble with the remote faster than a PBS pledge break or a loud commercial. No force on earth can stop those pledge breaks; that genie is permanently at large. But the loud commercials can be dealt with if we, the viewing public, just train the advertisers by avoiding the products that try to get our attention with shrill shills. Recently added to our list of Loud People We Hate is the woman who does the voiceover for Applebee’s ads. Now Applebee’s is one of those generic middle-American, middle-ground, generally middlin’ steak-house places where everything tastes like salt and we wouldn’t go there often anyway, but screaming at us isn’t going to convince us. God, she’s loud. And the artificial Southern-black accent doesn’t help. What’s the point of that anyway? Are white people supposed to say, ÒI want to go to Applebee’s because Aunt Jemima eats thereÓ? Or is the race pitch aimed at blacks who are supposed to head for Applebee’s in droves because they’ve been invited by someone who sounds like their crazy Aunt Ida? We suppose it’s progress that TV has managed to create ads that annoy and offend people of all races.

On the positive side of commercialization, thanks and compliments to the Gap’s agency for creating an obsessively catchy campaign around Supertramp Roger Hodgson’s ÒGive a Little Bit,Ó from 1977’s Even in the Quietest Moments. We know Gap commercials are controversial — because they appropriate beloved pop songs for hucksterism and because of that sweatshop issue — but product aside, these spots bespeak genius in terms of marrying art and commerce. The song choice alone is sheer brilliance — something just familiar enough that the Gap’s target demographic (who mostly weren’t born when ÒGive a Little BitÓ was current) know it’s supposed to be timeless. And the way the song borders on lyrical incoherence is, we suspect, actually calculated. (The male-vocalist versions of the ads sidestep the especially embarrassingly Hallmarkian couplets, such as ÒThere’s so much that we need to share/So send a smile and show you care.Ó) Having (again, just familiar enough) artists deliver acoustic snippets of the song in deadpan/ironic fashion imparts a religiosity to the doggerel that’s downright entrancing. It’s commercialized hip, but undeniably some kind of hip. We enjoy the ads. Now if we could just get that stupid song out of our heads.

On the other hand, we’re not so sure how Joni Mitchell feels about having a male cover of ÒRiverÓ used behind a sentimental spot urging homefronters to support current US military operations; will ÒRiverÓ replace ÒI’ll Be Home for ChristmasÓ in the 21st century? It certainly captures all the requisite loneliness, fear, and escape fantasy. But you’d think it would be a little too realistic for the propaganda machine to digest.

Issue Date: December 13 - 20, 2001

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