THURSDAY

7:30 (2) Basic Black: A Conversation with Mel Miller. Bay State Banner publisher Miller talks about his new book, How To Get Rich When You Ain’t Got Nothing. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Frontline: Medicating Kids. In the old days, nannies were known to hold their charges’ heads in gas ovens to lull them to sleep. And our ancestors fed kids all sorts of patent-medicine elixirs containing alcohol and/or laudanum. So it’s hardly news that children are easier to handle if they’re well doped up. But now we have prescription psychoactive drugs being pushed on kids whom parents and teachers don’t like. Ritalin was just the thin edge of the wedge. Today we have so many tots and teens strung out on Prozac, Paxil, and Zoloft that it’s impossible to believe they all need it. A look at this crisis and the adult stresses behind it. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Frontline: Muslims. A look at Islam, its basic beliefs, and its current resurgence. To be repeated tonight at 3:30 a.m. (Until 11 p.m.)

FRIDAY

8:00 (4) Home for the Holidays. That’s as in finding homes for orphans and such. Celebs gather to promote the idea and interview kids in need of permanent residence. Faith Hill and Melissa Etheridge sing, as does Bible-thumping vocalist Steven Curtis Chapman. Martin Sheen, Ellen DeGeneres, and Sela Ward also help out. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (7) Providence. At last. The series finale. What outlandish mix of veterinary medicine and romance is in store? (Until 10 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Coupling: " Dressed. " Jane turns up undressed at what she thinks was going to be a romantic dinner for two, and it isn’t. Also, Susan pretends to be Patrick’s wife for an evening, and that provokes Steve to propose. (Until 8:30 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Now with Bill Moyers. A person whose name we believe was Marty Ostrow left us a phone message saying unreasonably nice things about this column and then praising the series from Bill Moyers as intelligent, sophisticated, informed, and a lot of other things that television usually is not. The implication was that we should list it. So we did. Unfortunately, WGBH helps maintain this program’s low profile by not telling anyone what it’s going to be about. Bill has themes and guests, but we don’t know what or who. But on the strength of that phone call, we bring Now to your attention. It might be great. (Until 10 p.m.)

SATURDAY

1:30 (4) Football. The Minnesota Vikings versus the Miami Dolphins.

4:00 (7) Ray Charles Tribute on Ice. The tasteless jokes here are so obvious. Make them yourselves. We presume Brian Boitano, Jamie Salé and David Pelletier, and many more stars will be skating to Brother Ray’s music. (Until 6 p.m.)

5:00 (4) Basketball. Indiana versus Kentucky.

5:00 (25) Football. The San Francisco 49ers versus the Arizona Cardinals.

6:00 (2) Rocks with Wings. A story about a championship basketball team from a Navajo girls’ school in New Mexico, and about their African-American coach. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Glenn Miller’s Last Flight. On December 15, 1944, the world’s most famous big-band leader went down in the English Channel during a flight to Paris, where he was to perform for the troops. It seems he may have been the victim of friendly fire. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (5) Saturday Night Fever (movie). John Travolta was young and slim and didn’t have a problem complexion when he wowed the nation with his fancy footwork in this 1977 tale of a fresh-faced kid from Brooklyn who dances his way out of the old neighborhood — sort of — with Karen Lynn Gorney in tow. The usually annoying Bee Gees are in top form providing the definitely-not-black soundtrack, and despite its foray into self-parody, the movie’s got spunk — sort of a Rocky for lightweights. (Until 11 p.m.)

8:00 (7) Fat Albert Christmas Special. Fat Albert discovers the TMOC (True Meaning of Christmas). (Until 8:30 p.m.)

8:30 (7) Freezerburn Holiday Special. Claymation works are usually more sophisticated than typical holiday cartoons, so this story about how Freezerburn and Anna and their pet penguin stop evildoers from grounding Santa’s reindeer might not be as thoroughly stupid as it sounds. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (2) America in the ’40s. Charles Durning hosts this massage for the Greatest Generation, looking at everything from rationing to the Andrews Sisters. (Until midnight.)

9:00 (7) Faith Hill: When the Lights Go Down. Faith cries, kisses, and breathes via selections from her Cry CD and the Pearl Harbor soundtrack. (Until 10 p.m.)

SUNDAY

1:00 (4) Football. The Buffalo Bills versus the Green Bay Packers.

1:00 (25) Football. The New York Giants versus the Indianapolis Colts.

4:00 (4) Football. The Denver Broncos versus the Oakland Raiders.

4:00 (7) Kristi Yamaguchi’s Salute to Gold. Kristi hosts Alexei Yagudin and pair skaters Jamie Sale and David Pelletier and Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze. (Until 6 p.m.)

5:00 (2) The Main Stream. Repeated from last week. Humorist/etc. Roy Blount Jr. travels down the Mississippi River to meet the menagerie of Americans who flank its waters, and in the end he decides that it’s the insulars and eccentrics that hold our nation together. (Until 7 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Christmas in Connecticut (movie). A 1945 comedy centered on businesswoman Barbara Stanwyck’s domestic incompetence during a holiday in the country with her boss and a war hero. Dennis Morgan and Sydney Greenstreet help out. (Until 9:45 p.m.)

8:00 (5) Football. The Pats versus the New York Jets.

9:00 (2) Masterpiece Theatre: Wives and Daughters, part two. Molly and Cynthia become best buds, only to have Roger fall for Cynthia. And by the way, for several years, we’ve studiously avoided plugging the oil multinational that funds this show, refusing to include its name (ExxonMobil) in the series title. Turns out we were right. The slippery fuel corp has withdrawn its support, presumably finding better use for the money in Washington’s lobbies. To be repeated tonight at 1 and 4 a.m. on Channel 44. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

9:45 (44) That’s Entertainment 3 (movie). By 1994, the public’s appetite for clips from MGM musicals had waned, but not as much as the supply of good clips had. Hosted by June Allyson, Cyd Charisse, Lena Norne, Gene Kelly, and more. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

MONDAY

9:00 (2) Ken Burns’s American Stories: The Shakers: Hands to Work, Hearts to God. The world’s nine surviving Shakers add their perspective to this documentary about America’s inventive and industrious celibate cult. To be repeated tonight at 1 and 4 a.m. on Channel 44, and on Christmas Eve at 2:30 a.m. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (5) Football. The Pittsburgh Steelers versus the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

9:00 (44) Indie Select: A Stranger in the Kingdom. Martin Sheen and Ernie Hudson star in a 1998 effort by Vermont filmmaker Jay Craven about a black minister who arrives in a small Green Mountain town in 1950, only to be welcomed with racism and false accusations. (Until 11 p.m.)

10:00 (2) The Magic Never Ends: The Life and Work of C.S. Lewis. Ben Kingsley narrates this bio-doc about the Northern Irish–raised scholar (Oxford and Cambridge) whose religious conversion (atheist to Christian) begat The Chronicles of Narnia and other (adult) classics. To be repeated on Christmas Eve at 3:30 a.m. (Until 11 p.m.)

CHRISTMAS EVE

7:30 (2) La Plaza: Caetano in Bahia. A film by Juan Mandelbaum following singer-songwriter Caetano Veloso through Brazil. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Great Performances: The Nutcracker from the Royal Ballet. Sir Peter Wright’s production of the Tchaikovsky annual, from Covent Garden. To be repeated tonight at 3 a.m. on Channel 44. (Until 10 p.m.)

8:00 (7) It’s a Wonderful Life (movie). Can you stand it again? (Until 11 p.m.)

8:00 (44) The Canterville Ghost. Ian Richardson takes the title role in this adaptation of Oscar Wilde’s yarn about an American family who move into a haunted English mansion. (Until 9:30 p.m.)

9:30 (44) A Christmas Carol. Ross Kemp plays Scrooge in this modern-day version of Dickens’s holiday favorite. (Which of course ignores the obvious fact that most of the appeal of ACC lies in its period setting.) (Until 11 p.m.)

10:00 (2) The Utah Symphony and the Mormon Tabernacle Choir: The Gift of Music. The Pops’ Keith Lockhart signs on with the Mormons to lead those two Salt Lake ensembles through a program of Christmas hits — including the " Hallelujah " Chorus from Beethoven’s Christ on the Mount of Olives. To be repeated tonight at 1 a.m. on Channel 44. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

11:35 (4) Christmas Eve Service. From the Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Luke’s, in Chicago. (Until 12:30 a.m.)

11:35 (7) Christmas Eve at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. No cracks about chaperoning the boys’ choir this year. (Until 1:05 a.m.)

CHRISTMAS DAY

9:00 a.m. (5) Christmas at Washington Cathedral. Live from the nation’s capital. (Until 10 p.m.)

4:00 (7) Charlotte Church on Ice. Or something. She sings while Olympic champs skate. (Until 6 p.m.)

6:00 (5) Basketball. The Celts versus the New Jersey Nets.

8:00 (2) St. Olaf Christmas Festival. The 500-student ensemble of St. Olaf College runs through an ambitious selection of hymns, choral works, carols, and orchestral pieces. To be repeated tonight at 1 a.m. on Channel 44. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:30 (5) Basketball. The Sacramento Kings versus the Los Angeles Lakers.

9:00 (2) Great Performances: The Merry Widow from the San Francisco Opera. Pulitzer-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein added the dialogue to this English-language adaptation of Franz Lehár’s musical saga of happy widowhood. With Yvonne Kenny, Bo Skovhus, Angelika Kirchschlager, and Gregory Turay. To be repeated on St. Stephen’s Day at 12:30 a.m. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

9:00 (44) Discovering the Real World of Harry Potter. We get an interview with Potter author J.K. Rowling, plus a tour of the " real-life places, people, and historical and religious practices " that allegedly served as her sources. To be repeated on St. Stephen’s Day at 3 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 9:50 p.m.)

9:50 (44) J.R.R. Tolkien. While we’re in the mood for hyping holiday movie releases on public television, we’ll also mention this bio-doc of Frodo’s creator, which features interviews with John Ronald Reuel himself. (Until 11 p.m.)

St. STEPHEN’S DAY

7:30 (2) Basic Black: A Conversation with Bill Russell. Forbearing to ask about the air quality up there, host Darren Duarte chats with the former Celtic, who helped change the racial complexion of NBA basketball. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Ken Burns’s American Stories: Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio. They went to a lot of trouble just to provide Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern with a platform, but it was worth it at the time. Radio communication changed the shape and size of the world. Burns chronicles the medium’s early days. (Until 10 p.m.)

10:00 (2) Ken Burns’s American Stories: Thomas Hart Benton. The American painter’s turbulent career. (Until 11:30 p.m.)