THE BAND WAGON
TCM, 8:00 p.m. ET
Maybe it’s not quite so classic as another insider Hollywood satire, Gene Kelly’s Singin’ in the Rain, but this 1953 Fred Astaire musical comes awfully close. He plays a fading film star who tries to recapture fame on Broadway in a musical – but it’s overrun, and rewritten, by its director into an absurd updating of Faust. Cyd Charisse plays the ballerina hired to star opposite Astaire – and she’s not only all woman, she’s all leg. Both Band Wagon and Singin’ in the Rain, by the way, were written by Betty Comden and Adolph Green.