Staying Fit
What’s on this week? Whether it’s playing on cable, streaming on Prime Video or Netflix or opening at your local movie theater, we’ve got your must-watch list. Start with TV, and scroll down for movies. It’s all right here.
On TV this week …
Oprah and The Color Purple Journey (Max)
In this documentary, Oprah Winfrey, 69, who got an Oscar nomination in 1985’s The Color Purple, gives you a behind-the-scenes inside lowdown on the 2023 musical version she coproduced with Steven Spielberg, 77, which is a front-runner for two Oscars and a longer shot for about 10 more. “For someone who is about to turn 70,” she told the Daily News, “this is the sweetest, sweetest of moments.”
Watch it: Oprah and the Color Purple Journey, Dec. 28 on Max
Don’t miss this: Oprah’s New Attitude as She Approaches 70: ‘I’m Done With the Shaming’
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M*A*S*H: The Comedy That Changed Television (Fox)
“The thing that I loved about M*A*S*H,” says Alan Alda, 87, in this new two-hour documentary about the show whose finale was the highest-rated in TV history, “is that it could be very funny and very serious at the same time, and we could work in every conceivable style — burlesque, drama, melodrama, satire — sometimes all in the same episode.” Filmmaker John Scheinfeld, who made superb recent docs on Elvis, John Lennon and Blood, Sweat & Tears, got highly personal, never-before-seen interviews with the cast and creators, and the clips of classic M*A*S*H moments will crack you up and fill you with nostalgia.
Watch it: M*A*S*H: The Comedy That Changed Television, 8 p.m. Jan. 1 on Fox, streaming on Hulu and Tubi Jan. 2
2023 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony (ABC)
See performance highlights and standout moments from the musical event honoring Kate Bush, 65; Sheryl Crow, 61; Missy Elliott, 52; Rage Against the Machine; the Spinners; Chaka Khan, 70; Blood, Sweat & Tears founder and Dylan sideman Al Kooper, 79; the late George Michael; Willie Nelson, 90; and more.
Don’t miss this: The Most Memorable Moments of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony 2023
Finding Your Roots (PBS)
Henry Louis Gates Jr. and his DNA sleuths reveal the hidden family pasts of singers Alanis Morissette and Ciara, among others. (AARP is a corporate sponsor of Season 10.)
Watch it: Finding Your Roots, 8 p.m. ET Jan. 2 on PBS
Don’t miss this: 8 Great Holiday TV Music Specials for 2023
And don’t miss this: It’s Hallmark Christmas Movie Season! Here Are the Best New Movies to Watch.
The Floor (Hulu)
Rob Lowe, 59, hosts a new Hulu game show that pits contestants in a battle that resembles a hybrid of Trivial Pursuit and chess — OK, maybe checkers — as the cutthroat hopefuls stand on a massive LED grid floor that tracks their progress in hopes of winning a $250,000 cash prize.
Watch it: The Floor, Jan. 3 on Hulu
Your Prime Video watch of the week is here!
Thursday Night Football
Catch the Dec. 28 NFL New York Jets vs. Cleveland Browns game with cool new Amazon Prime Video features: If you join the game in progress, Rapid Recap lets you catch what you missed before you jump into the livestream, and Field Goal Target Zones overlays multiple lines on the field that show the statistical likelihood that a kicker will make a field goal. Amazon’s new AI identifies pivotal situations, letting fans read the play and track open receivers in real time, and guide viewers on how fourth-down decisions are made. Football was never so techie!
Watch it: Thursday Night Football on Prime Video
Don’t miss this: The Best Things Coming to Prime Video in January
Your Netflix watch of the week is here!
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Maestro, R
As West Side Story composer Leonard Bernstein, Bradley Cooper captures his incandescent musical gift, joie de vivre, reckless prankishness, inwardness and performative ebullience, his bisexual seductiveness and utter selfishness. As his Broadway star wife, Felicia Montealegre, Carey Mulligan is even better. We feel her radiant intelligence and big heart, the spark between them and her exasperation when he courts handsome youths at their legendary posh parties. —Tim Appelo (T.A.)
Watch it: Maestro on Netflix
Don’t miss this: Just How Accurate Is the Leonard Bernstein Movie ‘Maestro’?
And don’t miss this: The Best Things Coming to Netflix in January
What’s new at the movies …
⭐⭐⭐☆☆ The Color Purple, PG-13
The Pulitzer Prize–winning 1982 novel by Alice Walker, 79, is strong medicine. The Color Purple Broadway musical version has been adapted for the screen, following the 1985 drama from Steven Spielberg, 77. The movie musical about Celie — an abused orphan in the Deep South suffering repeated abominations until she finally gets out from under and finds redemption — boasts an unbeatable cast: Fantasia Barrino as the put-upon heroine; a vibrant Taraji P. Henson, 53, as Shug Avery, the singer who escaped their hometown; and Rustin’s Colman Domingo, 54, as the meanest, orneriest, downright evil Mister. The costumes, vocal talent and energetic production numbers are first-rate. Yet the story’s pile-on of horrors — incest, rape, baby theft, physical abuse, soul-crushing incarceration — make for a discordant mix of the feel-good and the feel-worse. —Thelma M. Adams (T.M.A.)
Watch it: The Color Purple, in theaters
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