PBS Fall brings the arts, the culture and the fun to their line up. They will deliver George Gershwin to Barry Bonds, from the flying trapeze to the Cat in the Hat, from a white hot contemporary interpretation of Sherlock Holmes (Sherlock) to the intersection of God and democracy.
Sundays, October 24-November 7, 9:00 p.m. ET
A fast-paced, witty take on the legendary Sherlock Holmes crime novels, now set in present-day London, stars Benedict Cumberbatch (“The Last Enemy”) as the Baker Street sleuth and Martin Freeman (“The Office,” UK) as his loyal sidekick Doctor Watson.
PBS is competing for hearts and minds with the networks in a stellar array of premieres for fall 2010.
Here are just a few of the special programs and series scheduled to debut.
From PBS:
Tuesday and Wednesday, September 28-29, 2010, 8:00 p.m. ET
The Tenth Inning
Thousands of bats, three home run records and one “curse” have been broken since Ken Burns last explored the history of America’s national pastime with his landmark 1994 PBS series Baseball.
Now, Burns and co-director Lynn Novick continue the series with The Tenth Inning, two new episodes that celebrate this remarkable institution, its greatest stars and its enduring relevance. Beginning with a crippling strike that alienated millions of fans and brought the game to the brink, this new film tells the tumultuous story of our national pastime up to the present.
It celebrates baseball’s new Golden Age — an era of unprecedented home run totals, popularity and prosperity — and sheds light on one of the game’s darkest chapters — the steroid era.
The two-part, four-hour film examines the compelling stories of Joe Torre, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Pedro Martinez, Ichiro Suzuki, Cal Ripken Jr. and Barry Bonds and features insightful commentary from an eclectic lineup of writers, broadcasters, fans and all-stars.
Wednesdays, November 3-17, 2010, 9:00 p.m. ET
Circus
Ever wanted to run away and join the circus? Now you can as PBS hits the road with Circus — an unforgettable journey with the legendary Big Apple Circus.
From the big top to the “back lot” — where the real heart of the circus beats — explore a distinctive world with its own rules, lingo and no fixed address. Get involved with the diverse characters who make up the Big Apple family.
Share their fears and frustrations, triumphs and failures and find out what it really means to live life in the ring.
Monday-Wednesday, October 11-13, 2010, 9:00 p.m. ET
GOD IN AMERICA
This is a presentation of AMERICAN EXPERIENCE and FRONTLINE, examines the potent and complex interaction between religion and democracy, the origins of the American concept of religious liberty and the controversial evolution of that ideal in the nation’s courts and political arena.
The series considers the role religious ideas and institutions have played in social reform movements from abolition to civil rights, examining the impact of religious faith on conflicts from the American Revolution to the Cold War, and how guarantees of religious freedom created a competitive American religious marketplace.
It also explores the intersection of political struggle and spiritual experience in the lives of key American historical figures, including Franciscan friars and the Pueblo leader Po’pay, Puritan leader John Winthrop and dissident Anne Hutchinson, Catholic bishop John Hughes, abolitionist Frederick Douglass, Presidents Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln, reform rabbi Isaac Meyer Wise, Scopes trial combatants William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow, evangelist Billy Graham, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. and the Moral Majority’s Jerry Falwell. Campbell Scott narrates.
MICHAEL FEINSTEIN’S AMERICAN SONGBOOK
Wednesdays, October 6, 13 and 20, 2010, 8:00 p.m. ET MICHAEL FEINSTEIN'S AMERICAN SONGBOOK is a blend of cultural history, intimate biography and musical performance. The three part series is a dynamic, documentary-style road trip and cultural primer, with Michael Feinstein as the leader of an expedition through the glorious history of American popular song.
Viewers follow him both onstage and backstage, hear personal stories about the songwriters and entertainers he has known over a 30-year career, travel to flea markets, dig through dusty storage units and swap treasures with fellow collectors. Rare archival audio and film footage combine to reveal the social and historical forces behind the music that helped shape the style, attitude and self-image of America for more than a century.
Filled with generous portions of live performance, the series offers both an intimate portrait of a unique entertainer and a history of 20th-century pop culture.
“Wallander, Series II”
Sundays, October 3-17, 9:00 p.m. ET
Kenneth Branagh returns for a second season as detective Kurt Wallander. Based on the character created by best-selling author Henning Mankell, these three new episodes feature Wallander battling crimes — and his own demons — in the bucolic yet brutal seaside town of Ystad, Sweden.
“Sherlock”
Sundays, October 24-November 7, 9:00 p.m. ET
A fast-paced, witty take on the legendary Sherlock Holmes crime novels, now set in present-day London, stars Benedict Cumberbatch (“The Last Enemy”) as the Baker Street sleuth and Martin Freeman (“The Office,” UK) as his loyal sidekick Doctor Watson.
"John Lennon - New York City" (w.t.)
Monday, November 22, 2010, 9:00 pm ET In December 2010, John Lennon will have been dead for 30 years. Lennon’s story remains an open wound — an untimely death, an unfinished life for one of the most famous and influential artists of the 20th century. He was, to be sure, a Beatle — as Lennon-McCartney, part of the great songwriting team of our time.
But for the last decade of his life, he was an iconic solo artist, and the vast majority of his solo work was created in New York City. This is the story of how he found redemption not in the public adoration he had craved in his youth, but in the quiet, simple pleasures of fatherhood.
But, it is also an immigrant tale. Lennon came to New York City in 1971 seeking the same thing that every other immigrant to New York has: freedom. The freedom to be himself and not be “Beatle John Lennon,” the freedom to love who he wanted without public scorn, and, simply, the freedom to live a normal life.
This film opens in Double Fantasy studio with never-before-heard in studio recordings: Lennon working with producer Jack Douglas and musicians Earl Slick and Andy Newmark. After a rocking title sequence to the Lennon song “New York City,” the film settles in to Greenwich Village circa 1971 and follows Lennon and Yoko Ono's life in NYC — their commitment to peace and political activism, their struggles to remain in America and, of course, the music from that period: “Mind Games,” “Whatever Gets You Thru the Night,” “I'm Losing You,” and “Woman.” The film explores and celebrates the arc of Lennon's solo career, with unprecedented and exclusive cooperation from Yoko Ono, conversations with his closest people —Yoko, Elton John, and photographer Bob Gruen — and access to never-before-seen material including outtakes of John in concert and home movies that have only recently been transferred to video. To make sense of Lennon’s life and his impact on music the film turns to John’s son, Sean.
Sean Lennon has become a brilliant musician in his own right, as great a student of his father’s work as John was of early rock 'n' roll. It is with Sean's voice —uplifting, incisive, hopeful — that the film's journey ends.
THE CAT IN THE HAT KNOWS A LOT ABOUT THAT!
Premieres Monday, September 6, 2010 - New Series!
PBS KIDS and Random House join to support science learning for preschoolers nationwide with THE CAT IN THE HAT KNOWS A LOT ABOUT THAT! Voiced by award-winning actor Martin Short, Dr. Seuss’s The Cat in the Hat guides friends Sally and Nick — with a little help from the Fish, Thing 1 and Thing 2 — on fun-filled adventures where they make natural-science discoveries, from how bees make honey to why owls sleep during the day.
Filled with both adventure and silliness, THE CAT IN THE HAT KNOWS A LOT ABOUT THAT!, based on the acclaimed The Cat in the Hat’s Learning Library book series, will appeal to preschoolers’ natural curiosity, and engage them in the process of scientific exploration and discovery.
And the following PBS signature series will have their debuts this fall as below, in order of premiere date:
GREAT PERFORMANCES “Renée Fleming & Dmitri Hvorostovsky: A Musical Odyssey in St. Petersburg”
(w.t.) Wednesday, September 1, 2010, 8:00 p.m. ET - Season Premiere!
Reigning American soprano Renée Fleming travels to Russia for a special visit to St. Petersburg with her friend and frequent co-star, Russian baritone Dmitri Hvorostovky. There, in the “Venice of the North,” they explore and perform in some of the most spectacular locations of a city that was born in the remarkable mind and imagination of the young Czar Peter the Great (a city that he named not for himself, but for Saint Peter).
St. Petersburg is a city of palaces, and Fleming and Hvorostovsky take in three of the most memorable, all of them on the water. In each location, they sing arias and duets by Verdi and Tchaikovsky, as well as the Russian songs of Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff.
"Cachao: Uno Mas"
Monday, September 20, 2010, at 9:00 p.m. ET - Season Premiere!
Narrated and produced by actor Andy Garcia, AMERICAN MASTERS “Cachao: Uno Mas” is an in depth celebration of the legendary Father of the Mambo, Israel “Cachao” Lopez, who died March 2008 in Coral Gables, Florida. Cachao’s remarkable life from his childhood in Cuba, to his early career in America, to his resurgence in the 1990s, is told through performances and interviews with the maestro himself, Gloria and Emilio Estefan, Arturo Sandoval and many others.
NATURE "Cuba: The Accidental Eden"
Premieres Sunday, September 26, 2010, 8:00 p.m. ET - Season Premiere!
This small island's varied landscape, its location in the heart of the Caribbean and its longstanding place at the center of Cold War politics have all combined to preserve some of the richest and most unusual natural environments of the hemisphere. Now, Cuba's priceless treasures are about to face an onslaught.
Tourism is already on the rise and most experts predict tourism will double once the U.S. trade embargo ends. What will happen to Cuba's stunning biodiversity — an island filled with amphibians, reptiles and the most biologically diverse freshwater fish in the region?
NOVA "Building The Great Cathedrals"
Premieres Tuesday, October 19, 2010, 8:00 p.m. ET - Season Premiere!
Carved from a hundred million pounds of stone, soaring effortlessly atop a spider web of masonry, Gothic cathedrals are marvels of human achievement and artistry. But how did medieval builders reach such spectacular heights?
Consuming the labor of entire towns, sometimes taking a hundred years to build, these architectural marvels were crafted from just hand tools and stone. Many now teeter on the brink of catastrophic collapse.
To save them, an international team of engineers, architects, art historians and computer scientists searches the naves, bays and bell-towers for clues to how the dream of these heavenly temples on earth came true.
NOVA’s teams perform hands-on experiments to investigate and reveal the architectural secrets that the cathedral builders used to erect their soaring, glass-filled walls. On this dazzling journey, inside the jewels of Gothic architecture, the filmmakers of the award-winning NOVA documentary
“Secrets of the Parthenon” reveal the hidden formulas, drawn from the pages of the Bible itself, that drove medieval builders ever upward.
Premieres Tuesday, October 19, 2010, 9:00 p.m. ET - Season Premiere!
Since 1983, FRONTLINE has served as PBS' flagship public affairs series. FRONTLINE's stature is reaffirmed each week through incisive documentaries covering the scope and complexity of the human experience. Program details to be announced soon.
INDEPENDENT LENS
Premieres Tuesday, October 19, 10:00 p.m. ET - Season Premiere!
A new season of fascinating films that will inspire, delight, explore new worlds and introduce unforgettable characters. This season opens with Meghan Eckman's “The Parking Lot Movie,” a portrait of the over-educated attendants at the Corner Parking Lot in the university town of Charlottesville, Virginia, who use their gig at the lot as an emotional and philosophical way station in their personal American Dream.
The film follows the attendants through their daily rituals, ruminating on themes such as capitalism, anger, justice, spiritual awareness, class struggle, entitlement and the constant tiny frustrations felt by anyone who has ever worked in a service job.
On October 26, Doug Pray's “Art & Copy” will premiere, a film that goes behind-the-scenes into the world of the real Mad Men (and women), whose creative work in the advertising dream factory has had a profound impact on our culture.
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