Despite its name, Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol rarely has inspired a lot of song. Ebenezer Scrooge's grumpy demeanor prompts feelings of melodrama, not melody...

2015

Nov

WITH 'MERCY STREET,' PBS MOUNTS FIRST HOME-MADE DRAMA IN 13 YEARS By Tom Brinkmoeller

Once it seemed that any drama on PBS came with a British accent, including the recent notables Downton Abbey and Call the Midwife....

2015

Oct

PAIR OF PBS PRODUCERS PRESERVES THE MAGIC OF PAST TV THAT'S STILL WORTH WATCHING By Tom Brinkmoeller

More than being enjoyable viewing for people who remember pre-thousands-of-choices television, programs like Mary Tyler Moore: A Celebration are important because they pull examples of important television from out of today's video haystack...

2015

Sep

A MASTERFUL 'AMERICAN MASTERS': ENGAGING PORTRAITS OF 15 FASCINATING PEOPLE IN AN HOUR By Tom Brinkmoeller

TV watchers who can look over the following list and discover at least one person about whom they would like to know more owe themselves an hour of top-notch viewing Sept. 25...

2015

Sep

PBS WALT DISNEY TV SALUTE FOUR TIMES AS LONG AS JIM HENSON'S, BUT NOT FOUR TIMES AS GOOD By Tom Brinkmoeller

Perhaps some day an episode of Nova will explain how the brains of PBS schedulers work...

2015

Sep

BRIAN WILLIAMS RETURNING TO THE AIR? By Tom Brinkmoeller

Brian Williams has been released from the network's penalty box, according to numerous news articles...

2015

Sep

PROFILE OF POPE FRANCIS: IFFY MIX OF WHITE SMOKE, SOME MIRRORS By Tom Brinkmoeller

Despite some pretty authoritative advice to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, for many people in the world today, religion is politics. This point of view is abundantly apparent in an upcoming public television documentary, Pope Francis -- The Sinner...

2015

Aug

HOW SWEET IT IS: BACK-TO-BACK SEBAK SPECIALS ABOUT PIES AND BAKERIES By Tom Brinkmoeller

Public television's Rick Sebak generates as much excitement among many PBS followers as J.K. Rowling or Steve Jobs ever did on the mass-market field...

2015

Aug

THE GLARE OF WAR OBSCURED MANY JOHNSON MILESTONES By Tom Brinkmoeller

New U.S. presidents almost always are immediate heirs, inheriting big problems, and -- if lucky -- some of the glow. There was a lot of the former and only bits of the latter when Lyndon Johnson took over the presidency after the Kennedy assassination...

2015

Jul

EXPLAINING THE HIGHS AND LOWS OF SUMMERTIME 'ROADSHOW' REAPPRAISALS By Tom Brinkmoeller

For anyone who ever has guessed the exact number of jellybeans in a jar, correctly picked a 40-to-one long shot to win a horse race or accurately predicted what Donald Trump would say next, Antiques Roadshow's summer reruns should be a natural viewing choice...

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Tom Brinkmoeller

I wrote about television for a daily newspaper (The Cincinnati Enquirer) in the '80s, but what drew me to covering it was how good this young medium so often was. So much of what was good then came from MTM Enterprises and its alumni. When I left the beat, MTM was still setting high standards with drama series like St. Elsewhere and comedies like Newhart. Because general TV standards have dropped a great distance since then, it's no reason to capitulate. My role here is to find and spotlight programming that still honors high standards.

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