TV: Five shows worth watching tonight: January 1
A select viewing guide for Tuesday, January 1
COMEDY Betty White’s Off Their Rockers (NBC, 8 p.m.) Back next week for a second season, this hidden-camera prank series hosted by 90-year-old Betty White is the low-budget success story of American television. Launched last season, the show ranks among NBC’s highest-rated programs with a weekly audience of nearly seven-million U.S. viewers, or roughly double the audience of Community and 30 Rock combined. Tonight’s mini-marathon begins with clips of a senior stealing groceries from other people’s shopping carts and another old codger pretending to fall asleep while operating an electric scooter.
REALITY Totally T-Boz (TLC, 8 p.m.) It’s your turn in the spotlight, Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins. The sassy vocalist is best known for being part of the nineties-era girl group known as TLC, which sort of fell apart following the tragic death of singer Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes in 2002. T-Boz herself has barely survived a life-threatening brain tumour, but she’s determined to relaunch her music career with a little help from her brother Kayo, cousins Barb and Chris and bestie pal Tae Tae (real name). Tonight’s opener follows T-Boz making the big move to Los Angeles and trying to land meetings with record label executives. And did we mention she’s the mother of a young daughter? You go, girl.
REALITY The Sisterhood (TLC, 9 p.m.) If you thought Here Comes Honey Boo Boo was a ratings magnet for TLC, wait until you see the numbers for this show. In the vein of Real Housewives, the new series takes viewers into the terribly fascinating lives of five Atlanta women–Delana, Christina, Ivy, Tara and Domonique–who all happened to be married to semi-famous preachers. As befits the tenets of modern reality television, these ladies are pretty tough sisters with no reservations expressing their views on sex, drugs and other topics normally taboo in the Bible belt. Why, in the first show, one of them gets a tattoo! Heaven help us.
DOCUMENTARY Superstorm 2012: Hell and High Water (CBC News Network, 10 p.m.) If you thought the last year was fraught with natural disasters, buckle up for 2013. According to this British documentary, the recent freakish storm known as Hurricane Sandy is the new normal and meteorologists are already predicting similar storms in the near future. The program takes viewers inside the creation of a “superstorm” and offers mankind several helpful tips on preparing to deal with future disasters.
MOVIE Catch Me If You Can (Bravo!, 9 p.m.) Directed by Steven Spielberg, this 2002 drama casts Leonardo DiCaprio in the real-life role of Frank Abagnale, Jr., one of the most successful con men in American history. Set in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the film follows the young Abagnale’s first leanings to criminal behaviour, which began when his father, Frank Sr. (Christopher Walken, in an Oscar-nominated performance), was rejected by both his wife and his local bank for a business loan. To appease the old man, Abagnale Jr. begins writing bad cheques and begins a bizarrely peripatetic lifestyle that includes impersonating an airline pilot, a doctor and a lawyer, among other vocations. Along the way, Abagnale is pursued by FBI agent Carl Hanratty, played by Tom Hanks in sixties-era horn-rims and fedora.