SATURDAY
NOVEMBER 16
2019

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

 

Freeform, 8:00 p.m. ET

Disney’s Frozen 2 arrives in theaters next Thursday, a week after the company launched Disney+ and immediately amassed some 12 million subscribers to its brand new streaming service. (Not a bad month for Disney, or for anyone.) And even though Frozen 2 is an even surer bet as a major instant hit, Disney is sweetening the pot by using one of its cable entities, Freeform, to present a well-timed repeat showing of the original 2013 Frozen animated musical. If there’s a way to succeed, and to increase the odds of success, the folks at Disney will never, ever let it go.
 
  
 
 

TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET

Frank Pierson won an Oscar for his screenplay for this fact-based 1975 film, and deserved to – but he had help from two significant directions. Al Pacino, as hapless bank robber Sonny, improvised the film’s most famous scene, in which he excited and incited a crowd of onlookers by screaming “Attica!,” as director Sidney Lumet brilliantly captured the ensuing mayhem. Then there’s the real story itself, based on the magazine article by P.F. Kluge. It’s about a man so in love with his trans partner that he attempts a bank robbery in hopes of raising money for his lover’s sex-change operation – with escalatingly absurd and unpredictable results. No one would have written this story from scratch, and few people, other than Pacino, could have carried it off so dynamically. John Cazale plays Sonny’s sad-sack bank-robbery partner, and Chris Sarandon plays Sonny’s lover, Leon.
 
  
 
 

NBC, 11:29 p.m. ET

Tonight’s new episode is guaranteed to poke fun at the first week of House Impeachment proceedings – but otherwise, most of the show is likely to go in another direction. Make that One Direction, since a former member of that boy band, Harry Styles, is scheduled to show up tonight as both guest host and musical guest.
 
  
 
 

CNN, 11:30 p.m. ET

Yesterday on TVWW’s Best TV Tomorrow YouTube video short, I recommended this particular double feature as the evening’s best bet. It was partly, I admit, for the self-conscious irony of being on TV (okay, on YouTube), recommending myself on TV (okay, on CNN), as one of the on-camera interviewees talking about television in two different decades. All of CNN’s “Decades” documentary series to date, which span from The Sixties to the 2000s, begin with a scene-setting episode devoted to television. I’d recommend them even without my participation in them, and have decided to recommend them despite it. Tonight, CNN presents a double feature of two of the earlier entries. At 11:30 p.m. ET, there’s the “Television Gets Real” installment of The Seventies, which brings us the birth of cable TV and the rise of the television miniseries. Then, at 12:30 a.m. ET, there’s the “Raised on Television” episode of The Eighties, a decade that includes, among other things, the hugely popular finale of CBS's M*A*S*H. Oh, and by the way, when I recommended myself on Best TV Tomorrow, I was wrong. Maybe not about recommending myself on TV, but certainly about which decades were being covered. The ones I just described are the correct ones being shown tonight by CNN (unless, of course, breaking news wipes them off the rerun schedule). In the video, I identify the decades of TV being covered as The Eighties and The Nineties. Well, I was half right. That's what I get for not looking down at my note pad, which is just out of frame on my left leg. That's two mistakes this month on Best TV Tomorrow, and they're both my fault. Will I complete a hat trick before November runs out? I hope not. But the smart money bets in the other direction...
 
  
 
 
 
 
Read and add comments HERE for today's Best Bets!
 
 
 
 
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2692 Comments
 
 
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Jul 18, 2025   |  Reply
 
 
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Jul 13, 2025   |  Reply
 
Dave Bianculli
Thank you Mr. HTTPS sir!

please continue to subscribe to my RSS feed - it's the ONLY place where you can hear my words of wisdom. Well, except for my spectacular Fresh Air appearances, with the inscrutable Terry Gross! And of course if you're a student in my classes in College!!

ROTFLMBFFAO!!!

Sincerely,

Dave
Jul 14, 2025
 
 
 
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Jun 28, 2025   |  Reply
 
Dave Bianculli
What topic is that sweet-cheeks??

Love,

Dave
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Dave Bianculli
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Dave Bianculli
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Jun 15, 2025   |  Reply
 
Dave Bianculli
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Jun 16, 2025
 
 
 
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Jun 13, 2025   |  Reply
 
Dave Bianculli
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Dave
Jun 14, 2025
 
 
 
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Jun 13, 2025   |  Reply
 
 
 
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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.