What are we supposed to watch until the season premieres air in October? My fellow TV addicts, there are alternatives to watching reruns. You don't have to sink into the couch and sulk. Summer is an excellent time to explore what's on those other 400 channels on your cable or satellite system.
Check out an ultra-cool documentary.
Take in an A&E "Biography." The channel shows brand-spanking new docs this summer on fascinating people, like Prince William, Joe Louis and Mary Magdalene. The quality of "Biography," with its vintage file footage and excellent interviews, rivals that of any top documentary.
And A&E isn't the only network that has poured millions of dollars into the making of a good doc. Check out Discovery Channel, one of the first to make quality nature films. There ain't nothing like following the life of a giant, bus-sized squid.
There's also a new breed of docu-drama airing nightly on VH-1 and E1x. If you haven't seen an episode of "Behind the Music," or "True Hollywood Story" you must have been living on a deserted island. (Sorry, I just had to throw the "Survivor" reference in here somewhere.) Here's what you've been missing. Not only do we learn about some of the country's most infamous and famous celebrities and rock legends, we hear first-hand accounts from loved ones and sometimes (if he/she hasn't already died from the obligatory overdose) the subject, him/herself.
For all those girly girls, tune into Lifetime's "Intimate Portrait," a fitting title for the series which approaches the lives of history's most notable women through soft lighting, focus and words.
Some 24-hour news channels don't want to be left out of the earnings from these ratings busters, so they too have a variation of the docu-drama. MSNBC's "Headliners and Legends" and "Once and Again," take a hard-edged approach to some of the worlds' most captivating newsmakers.
A & B Movies
Although movies on cable, like "Bloodsport 2" or "Liar, Liar, Father and Daughter" one might label as B-movies or guilty pleasures, hey--that's what people used to call TV back in the day, when it was supposedly bad for you. There are plenty of B's airing nightly on TNT, TBS, USA, Lifetime, and Comedy Central.
For the guys' guy in you, check out "Macho Movie Nights" on TNT. Gotta love the James Bond and Clint Eastwood classics.
Speaking of classics, A-Movies on AMC and TCM are dedicated to movie-buff in all of us. Here's where to find the Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly, Cary Grant and Jimmy Stewart gems, nightly.
Sports Fans. . .
Yep, there's a lotta baseball on, but that's not what I'm talking about. . . Dah Deh Dada dum dum dum, Da dadada dadadada da. . . that's that Olympic theme song.
Very soon NBC and MSNBC will combine coverage of the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, Australia. They won't be shown live, which is actually a good thing. With the 15-hour-plus time difference between Sydney and the U.S, viewers may find out the results of the competitions before they air. But who wants to stay up until 3 a.m. to watch girls gymnastics? The Olympics have always been more about the stories than the results anyway.
You don't have cable or satellite TV?
Don't pout. Take in a nightly edition of "Dateline NBC," "20/20" on ABC or CBS's "48 Hours." Every one of these network newsmagazine shows broadcast fascinating stories about extraordinary people. (Or to use the network cliché. . . Ordinary people in extraordinary circumstances.)
Now, I don't want to hear anyone whine, "There's nothing on TV tonight." Got it? Good.
