Prime time's prom night—the Emmys on Fox (Sun., Sept. 10, 8 p.m. ET)—promises to be no less provocative, judging by some of the baffling nominations. For example, Murphy Brown's Candice Bergen is once again up for Outstanding Actress in a Comedy Series, a category she has already won four of the past six years. Emmy voters have traditionally displayed a preference for familiarity, but enough is enough. The class act in the category this year is clearly Helen Hunt. Her subtle performance on Mad About You makes Bergen's comedic style look like mugging. The Emmys will be cohosted by Jason Alexander and Cybill Shepherd, a tandem that prompted David Letterman to quip in a recent monologue: "Cohost, ha! I don't need a cohost to screw up an awards show. I can do it all by myself."
HBO (Sat, Sept. 9, 8 p.m. ET)
A-
The reputation of our 33rd President gets another refurbishing in this reverential film portrait. Gary Sinise (Forrest Gump's Lieutenant Dan) is outstanding as the farmer, World War I soldier, failed haberdasher and peppery, plainspoken Missouri Democrat whose political career has repeatedly been described as a "wild accident of history."
Consider: Harry S. Truman was a regional party boss's grudging fourth choice to run for the U.S. Senate in 1934. Truman himself only reluctantly agreed to serve as FDR's Vice President in 1944. Then, just 82 days after being sworn in, he succeeded the late President in the Oval Office. In 1948, he won the Presidency on his own, defeating New York's governor, Thomas Dewey, in a stunning upset.
Sinise plays Truman as a man of unshakable integrity or, as one exasperated pol (Pat Hingle) puts it: "a stubborn son of a bitch.... He don't even like money."
The film begins slowly but catches fire once Truman reaches the Senate and his forceful personality begins to assert itself. Truman's major flaw is the short shrift it gives to a remarkably resonant performance by James Gammon as House Speaker Sam Rayburn. Considering how well this political drama turned out, maybe HBO's next one could be Rayburn.
The WB (Sundays, 8:30 p.m. ET)
B-
Two dissimilar brothers (Harland Williams and Jason Bateman) move into a dilapidated apartment in Harlem and start looking for work. Williams, as Simon, is a simpleton who likes to sit in a bubble bath with a rubber duck. His idea of complimenting a woman: "Did anyone ever tell you you look like Marilyn Munster?" Bateman, as Carl, a dapper MBA, dismisses Simon's chances in the job market: "All you do is sit around all day and watch television." Miraculously, Williams, a boob-tube savant, winds up as the programming veep at Vintage Television (think Nick at Nite). Meanwhile, Bateman can't even get the security guard in the lobby to read his résumé.
A stand-up comic who's a cross between John Cusack and Lyle Lovett, Williams is the most appealing prime-time goof since Gomer Pyle. And sitcom veteran Bateman (The Hogan Family) is quite good as the dry straight man. Together they have viable comic chemistry. Unfortunately the writing is sporadic, and Simon's TV workplace is, as far as humor goes, a vast wasteland.
Fox (Tues., Sept. 12, 8 p.m. ET)
C+
The future looks rosy for the scion of a wealthy Texas family (Michael Hayden) as he graduates from college. Then, in short order, a car wreck leaves him crippled and a slatternly siren (Melrose Place's Laura Leighton) has him hooked. The relationship puts him at loggerheads with his domineering grandpappy (Richard Crenna), who thinks she's trash. After things get bad, they get worse.
The film, inspired by actual events, is overheated and herky-jerky, but the cast makes more of this material than it deserves. The strange thing is, we've already seen similar fact-based TV movies set in the Lone Star State, starring Susan Dey (Bed of Lies) and Heather Locklear (Texas Justice) as low-rent, high-octane hell-raisers. Can't those well-to-do Texas boys stick with the country-club set?
CBS (Tues., Sept. 12, 9 p.m. ET)
C
Mel Harris plays a stockbroker reentering the workforce years after a traumatic incident. In her new job, she attracts the attention of one of the office staff (L.A. Law's Sheila Kelley). As a secretary, Kelley proves indispensable. But she is also vindictive, manipulative and completely unhinged, all of which she brings to bear on Harris. Then Kelley makes the mistake of messing with Harris's most prized possession—not her overseas portfolio, her family.
The thriller starts spookily but grows increasingly implausible as bodies begin to drop like the Dow Jones average in a severe market crash. Kelley's psycho steno illustrates two things: a) good help is hard to find and b) so are good TV movies.
>TUBE: Gary Sinise gives 'em heck as Harry Truman; Harland Williams shows Gumption in the sitcom Simon; Home Improvement owes the military a debt of tanks
SCREEN: Beyond Rangoon star Patricia Arquette survives a close shave in Burma; a boy and his dad wrestle mammals and emotions in The Amazing Panda Adventure 20
SONG: Faith Hill declares It Matters to Me; D'Angelo stirs up R&B; Heart tries a softer beat 23
PAGES: John Nance keeps the suspense ticking in Pandora's Clock; Philip Roth puts on a show in Sabbath's Theater; Elsa Walsh spotlights notable women in Divided Lives 30
>TIM GETS TANKED
THEY'RE GOING TO HAVE TO INVENT A new tax bracket for Tim Allen. Sure, he's a successful comic, movie star and bestselling author. But this week he begins clocking the really big bucks as his Home Improvement goes into syndication Mondays through Fridays (check local listings). The sitcom enters rerun heaven in unprecedented style: with a fresh episode (Mon., Sept. 11). Tim and Jill leave the boys with Al for the weekend so they can travel to a military base and race each other in M1A1 tanks (Club Med, one assumes, was booked). Though Tim boasts that he's in his element ("machines, Marines, latrines, and...beans"), he's about as comfortable driving the big machine as Michael Dukakis appeared in that famous photo from his '88 presidential race.
VANISHED WITHOUT A TRACE
Heartbreak & Hope
After Jaycee Dugard's rescue, a look at the cases of six young people who went missing in 2009
