PBS

Doc Talk: Racism and the Race to the White House

January 24, 2024
Posted in , ,

Two PBS documentaries paint a grim picture of the American soul.

Read More

Television Review: Ken Burns’s “Benjamin Franklin” — Gauzy Soft-Core Patriotism

April 8, 2022
Posted in , , ,

Corporate anti-racism – Bank of America is a major sponsor for the documentary – causes Ken Burns to pull his punches.

Read More

Television Review: “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood” — A Well-Stocked Emotional Toolbox

January 29, 2021
Posted in , ,

Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood has become one of our central gospels of child-rearing.

Read More

Television Review: “Beecham House” — A Steamy Passage to India

June 23, 2020
Posted in , ,

As a potentially thoughtful drama (hey, this is PBS) set during a revolutionary and colonialist era, Beecham House falls as flat as papadum.

Read More

WATCH CLOSELY: “Blood Sugar Rising” — Sweet Sorrow

April 21, 2020
Posted in , ,

Blood Sugar Rising deals with difficult subject matter, but steel yourself to view this engaging and educational look at a growing public health crisis.

Read More

Music Commentary: Ken Burns’ “Country Music” — Superb Cinematic Storytelling

September 22, 2019
Posted in , , , ,

Country Music digs into the rich, deep dirt of a music with a complicated past, a hybrid genre soaked in soulful suffering, twangy glory, and times both high and tough.

Read More

WATCH CLOSELY: PBS’ “Jamestown” — Glossy Heritage TV

June 21, 2019
Posted in , ,

Jamestown is a vividly timely reminder that anyone who calls themselves an “American” is actually descended from immigrants.

Read More

Dance Preview: “Black Ballerina” — Sparking Conversations about Dance and Race

October 17, 2016
Posted in , , , ,

“Tokenism also plays into this issue. Some companies are hiring one dancer of color and they think they’ve done diversity.”

Read More

Film Interview: Rory Kennedy defends “Last Days in Vietnam”

May 7, 2015
Posted in , ,

Not everybody loves the documentary Last Days in Vietnam. Director Rory Kennedy responds to some of the criticism.

Read More

Short Fuse News: “The African Americans: Many Rivers to Cross” — A PBS Series Not to be Missed

October 24, 2013
Posted in

In the first episode, Henry Louis Gates Jr. takes viewers back to Africa to talk, not as has been done before, with Africans whose forebears were lost to slavery but with descendants of Africans who grew rich on slave trade.

Read More

Recent Posts