Monthly Archives: August 2026

Aug 28 2026
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Books, DVDs, History, Movies, Music, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to Watch, and More! Week of Aug. 28 – Sept 3.

“The Whisper Man,” Rita Hayworth rocks & all about Billy the Kid

Robert De Niro, Adam Scott and Michelle Monaghan star in ‘The Whisper Man.’

FRIDAY, Aug. 28
The Whisper Man
When his eight-year-old son is abducted, a widowed crime writer looks to his estranged father, a retired former police detective, for help, only to discover a connection with the decades-old case of a convicted serial killer. Starring Robert De Niro, Adam Scott and Michelle Monaghan (Netflix).

Four Hands, Two Sonatas
South Korean drama about young high schoolers training to become concert pianists (Netflix).

SATURDAY, Aug. 29
Saluting Rita Hayworth
It’s a full day of flicks starring the glamorous redhead from Hollywood’s “golden age,” including “Only Angels Have Wings,” “Gilda,” “Cover Girl” (above) and “You’ll Never Get Rich” (TCM).

SUNDAY, Aug. 30
Robot Chicken Adult Swim Special
When every iconic animated character in Adult Swim’s history (from Aqua Teen Hunger Force to Smiling Friends and, of course, Robot Chicken) boards a cruise ship to celebrate a quarter century on the air, it can only end in a courtroom! (Midnight, Adult Swim).

MONDAY, Aug. 31
History’s Greatest Mysteries
Host Laurence Fishburn explores the wave of anthrax attacks in 2001 in the wake of 9/11, which caused widespread panic in the U.S. postal system and killed five people (9 p.m., History).

TUESDAY, Sept. 1
Billy the Kid
This “American Experience” doc tells the true story of Henry McCarty, the Wild West outlaw known as “Billy the Kid” who outfoxed jailers and captivated the nation with his string of nearly unbelievable escapes…until he met up with sheriff Pat Garrett (9 p.m., PBS).

9/11 United We Stand: 25 Years Later
Documentary about how sports, music, movies and comedy all helped heal the wounds of the devastating terrorist attack on America, with Pete Davidson, Derek Jeter, Billy Crystal, Matthew Broderick, Jon Bon Jovi and others (9 p.m., ABC).

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 2
Driven
Watch all three seasons of the steamy romantic series about a girl with a tragic past (Olivia Grace Applegate) who falls in love with a bad-boy race car driver (Casey Deidrick) (Netflix).

THURSDAY, Sept. 3
Chad Powers
Season two of the football comedy begins, with stars Glen Powell, Eli Manning and Steve Zahn (Hulu).

Arena Access with Mariah Rose
Sports content creator Mariah Rose takes viewers inside the arenas of major teams and sporting events, exploring the culture, food and community that make them shrines for fans (Tubi).


Clash of the Thundermans
New live-action kid-centric superhero comedy series (above) stars Maya Lee Clark as a young girl who suddenly discovers new and unpredictable powers (7 p.m., Nickelodeon).

BRING IT HOME

Put some vroooooom in the room with The Fast and the Furious: The 25th Anniversary Edition (Universal Pictures Home Entertainment). It’s a fresh remaster of the classic 2001 film (starring Vin Diesel, Paul Walker and Michelle Rodriguez) about street racing, muscle cars, heists and spies that laid the foundation for a franchise expansion into more movies, TV series, toys and games.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

Capturing a dramatic moment in history, Timothy W. Ryback’s 53 Days: How Hitler Dismantled a Democracy (Grove Atlantic) examines how dur furher used the German Constitution to turn a democratic republic into an authoritarian state, one that became Nazi Germany. Essential reading for WWII history buffs…and anyone interested in the contemporary parallels.

He’s a good boy! Young readers will lap up Dragon Dog (Random House Studio), about a fierce pooch cross-wired with a dragon who befriends a little lost lamb. The takeaway: Strength and softness can coexist.

Behind every successful music maker is a person behind the scenes: the producer. In Making Music (Akishic), Tape Op magazine founder Larry Crane shines the spotlight on the studio whizzes who’ve manned the control boards for the Beatles, Taylor Swift, Willie Nelson, David Bowie and many more acts, talking about the ins and outs and highs and lows of recording.

David Campany’s Walker Evans (Thames & Hudson) is an insightful study of one of the most quintessential American photographers. Evans, born in 1903, was both a pioneer and a precursor for the many ways photography could communicate. He was best known for his work documenting the effects of the Great Depression. 

Fine art lovers, here you go: Color Unbound: Matisse 1941-1954 (Thames & Hudson) collects artwork from the famed French artist’s final years, at home and in his studio.

Take a deep dive into the jungle with The Foundations of Tarzan (McFarland), Jon C. Scott’s in-depth analysis of the King of the Jungle—created by author Edgar Rice Burroughs—his vine-swinging roots in myth and other literature, and his many later incarnations.

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Classic rock fans, dig these new Blu-ray audio re-mix releases of ‘70s superstar albums. There’s the smooth balladry of singer-songwriter James Taylor (Gorilla), the mellow tones of former Bread frontman David Gates (his first two solo albums First and Never Let Her Go), the guitar-driven rock of The James Gang (Miami) and the pop jazz of flautist Herbie Mann (Hold On, I’m Coming). Available separately or in a set at rhino.com.

Aug 26 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Idiots”

Is this unhinged road-trip “slob comedy” destined to become a cult-movie classic?

Idiots
Starring Dave Franco, O’Shea Jackson Jr. & Mason Thames
Directed by Macon Blair
Rated R

In theaters Friday, Aug. 28

The movie genre of “slob comedy,” celebrating lazy, anti-social, disruptive or juvenile behavior, became a thing in the ‘70s in the wake of flicks like National Lampoon’s Animal House and Porky’s.

Idiots mines a similar comedic vein, with a pair of mismatched underachievers trying to make a good impression in their new job for a low-budget transportation company. Their first gig: Teaming up to drive a rich, troubled teen to a rehab treatment facility. Simple, right? But that simple assignment derails into a colossal comedic pileup of drugs, danger and situational insanity.

Mark (Dave Franco) and Davis (O’Shea Jackson) are the “transport professionals,” and Sheridan (Mason Thames) the passenger. Mark’s a doper, Davis holds on to his deep Presbyterian roots, and Sheridan’s a spoiled-rotten uber-rich trust-fund kid whose obnoxiously bad behavior has made him a social-media superstar.

What could possibly go wrong?

Well, it all starts with a flat tire, and unspools from there. There’s projectile diarrhea, soda spiked with horse tranquilizers, and a blue-collar motel stripper (Mad Men’s Kiernan Shipka) and her mom (Lynn Wanlass), who turns out to be surprisingly handy brandishing a big blade. There’s a pint-size bounty hunter (Game of Thrones’ Peter Dinklage) with a big machine gun, a punk-rock rapper who calls himself Pricka Bush da Werewolf (Succession’s Nicholas Braun), and a close call with a hatchet. Bullets fly, blood is spattered, someone gets shot in the eye, someone else in the foot, and a parking lot full of guys in their undies try to chase down a pickup truck.

But as crazy as it might sound, it’s all in good fun—maybe not good clean fun, but fun regardless. Some parts are laugh-out-loud comical, others subversively whimsical, and much is unexpectedly uproarious. But all the yukkery has a soft center, with messages about not judging others too harshly, about getting along, about coming together for a shared cause in adverse circumstances, about doing the best you can do in any situation, and about how all the money in the world can’t make you into a more likable person—or keep you from being held hostage by a guy in a werewolf mask.

Director Macon Blair—whose other films include Gold (2016) with Matthew McConaughey, and Green Room (2015) about a rock band running into real trouble at a skinhead club—capably juggles all the wildness, the weirdness, the wide cast of supporting players and the constantly-on-the-move, road-trippery ruckus. It’s a manic movie on the go, and you never know what’s around its next curve.  

Idiots won’t be for everybody. But if you’re looking for a smaller, scrappier indie flick as a palette cleanser for big-budget IMAX blockbusters, come along for the wild ride with this unhinged “slob” comedy. It may become a new cult classic. It’s an Odyssey in its own grungy way, and on its own freaky terms.

—Neil Pond

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Aug 21 2026
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Books, DVDs, Movies, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to Watch, and More! Week of Aug. 21 – Aug. 27

Monsters mash, NFL’ers nosh & a sneak peek at the new ‘Grand Theft Auto’

King Kong, a mega shark and dinos do the monster mash on TBS.

FRIDAY, Aug. 21
9/11: Reunited
Survivors of one of modern history’s darkest days tell their stories and reflect on their unlikely bond (9 a.m., National Geographic).

Monster Movie Marathon
Buckle up for the outsized monster-mash thrills and chills of Jurassic World: Dominion, Kong: Skull Island and Meg 2: The Trench (8 p.m., TBS).

SATURDAY, Aug. 22
The Las Vegas Songwriters Festival
More than 100 hitmaking country and Americana tunesmiths—including Bob DiPiero, Dean Dillon, Billy Montana and Keith Stegall—come to the Glitter City to spin their musical tales in this showcase event (check listings, The Heartland Network).

The Run for a Million
Fast-paced equestrian competition where 16 riders guide horses through a precise pattern of circles, spins and stops in pursuit of reining’s highest honor—and $1 million prize (8 p.m., CBS).

SUNDAY, Aug. 23
Celebrating Katherine Hepburn
Spend all day and most of the night with a slate of classic films, including Little Women (1933), Bringing Up Baby (1938), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner (1967), Rooster Cogburn (1975) and more (begins 8 a.m, TCM).

MONDAY, Aug. 24
Revival
New supernatural horror series—based on a comic book about the dead coming back to life in a small town—stars Melanie Scrofano, Romy Weltman and David James Elliott (Netflix).


NFL Hometown Eats
Celebrity superfans Eva Longoria, Joel McCale and Rebel Wilson, above, huddle with NFL players to explore the best restaurants around their home stadiums (Roku Channel).

TUESDAY, Aug. 25
Jeopardy! Masters
Former champs of the brainy game show return in a tournament to see who’ll bring home the grand prize of half a million dollars (8 p.m., Hulu).

Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World
American Masters doc about the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet, with readings of her work by Helena Bonham Carter, Stephen Colbert, Steve Buscemi and Oprah Winfrey (9 p.m., PBS).

The Deb
Actress Rebel Wilson makes her directorial debut and stars in this  musical comedy. above, about a pair of cousins hoping to attend a debutante ball in a small Australian town (available on demand).

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 26
The Last Sunrise
A college student with a chronic illness finds romance with a young man on a summer vacation before her condition suddenly worsens and everything begins to unravel. Starring Maia Reficco, Eva Longoria and Fernando Lindez (Prime Video).

THURSDAY, Aug. 27
Grand Theft Auto VI: An Extended Look
Gamers can get a sneak peak of the features, storylines and characters of the newest edition of the hit videogame ahead of its on-sale date of Nov. 19 (Netflix).

The Undeclared War
Tonight begins season two of the British thriller starring Simon Pegg, about a counterintelligence team dealing with the devastating aftermath of a Russian cyber-attack (Peacock).

The Adults
Season two of the comedy series about 20-somethings in New York trying to navigate friendship, jobs, love, work and family (9 p.m., FX).

READ ALL ABOUT IT


It’s here today. But will it be gone tomorrow? Historian James Crawford’s The Vanishing Earth (Bloomsbury) examines how humanity has taken more from the planet than this ol’ globe could ever give back, exacting an enormous toll on resources like rock, metal, sand, water…and even our thoughts. What’s been the cause of our insatiable appetites, and can we possibly save our relationship with nature?

BRING IT HOME

The Sheep Detectives (Alliance Home Entertainment) is a heartwarming whodunnit—about sheep who become detectives, duh!—starring Hugh Jackman and Emma Thompson. Find out why this all-ages charmer was a critically hailed success all over the world.

Paul Rudd and Nick Jonas star in Power Ballad (Lionsgate Home Entertainment), about a past-his-prime wedding singer and a fading boy-band star, and what happens when they have a hit song. It’s a toe-tapping, feel-good buddy comedy.

Saddle up with Marshals (Alliance Home Entertainment), season one of the hit CBS series starring Luke Grimes—a long way away from his previous roles in two Fifty Shades movies—as a former U.S. Navy SEAL now in a special group of U.S. Marshals in Montana.

Season three of Reacher (Alliance Entertainment), based on the popular novels by Lee Childs, stars Alan Ritchson as former military police officer Jack Reacher, now living as a drifter and confronting more bad guys, corruption and conspiracies. With Sonya Cassidy and Anthony Michael Hall.

Now available on Blu-ray, filmmaker Ken Burns’ sprawling, 12-hour, six-part PBS series on The American Revolution fleshes out the roots, and the revolutionaries, of the rebellion that led to the United States of America. And if you’re watching (and listening) closely, you’ll catch the celebrity character voices of Adam Arkin, Ethan Hawke, Kenneth Branaugh, Samuel L. Jackson, Michael Keaton and more. Buy it HERE

For the first time, 1998’s Practical Magic (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment) is available of super-hi-definition 4K. The romantic fantasy stars Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman as sisters descended from a long line of witches, now schooled in “practical magic.” But will their modern witch-y know-how come in handy when an evil spirit takes over one of their boyfriends?

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Ready to rock and roll all night? KISS Destroys Anahem ’76 is a new sonic souvenir of the band’s fan-packed California show in their heyday, wowin’ the crowd with “Detroit Rock City,” “Strutter,” “Shout It Out Loud,” “Rock and Roll All Night” (of course) and many more blasts from the past.

Aug 19 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Insidious: Out of The Further”

Why the sixth installment in the fright-flick franchise is running out of ghost gas and coasting on dental fumes

Insidious: Out of the Further
Starring Ameila Eve, Brandon Perea, Maisie Richardson-Sellers & Lin Shaye
Directed by Jocob Chase
Rated PG-13

In theaters Friday, Aug. 21, 2026

The sixth in the horror/supernatural franchise that began back in 2010 is yet another venture into the spooky realm of ghosts and demons. And these spirits are restless, hungry to walk among us.

In the latest excursion, a young mom, Gemma (Amelia Eve, from Netflix’s The Haunting of Bly Manor), finds that she’s become a portal to “the Further,” a purgatory-like void just beyond the land of the living. And the ghouls want to use her as a conduit to get out of the Further and back into the real world.

Gemma (Amelia Eve) gets lost in a labyrinth made of couch cushions—literally.

If you haven’t kept up with the past Insidious films, you may be a little lost. This isn’t a movie for newbies. It’s made for fans of the franchise who dig the jolts, the grim intensity, the undead menagerie and the return trips into a spooky realm beyond our own.

But these ghouls seem like they’re running out of gas. Not only have we seen many of them before, but the premise itself is getting a little dusty and musty. Horror-flick scream queen Lin Shaye (A Nightmare on Elm Street, Maniacs, Ouija, The Grudge) keeps her track record—of appearing in every Insidious movie—intact, returning (from the dead!) once more as Elise, a helpful spiritual guide from beyond now trying to close the “red door,” the gateway, before the undead start pouring through like a horde of Black Friday shoppers into Wal-Mart.

Oh, there’s a new undead ringleader, Cyrus (Sam Spuell), who looks like a dead ringer for rocker Marilyn Manson. And there’s a new subplot about mothers and daughters, memories, childhood trauma, the terrors of aging, things you inherit—including some things you don’t necessarily want—and an unsettling reminder about how a trip to the dentist can a real nightmare.

This may be the first movie, in fact, to really drill down (sorry) into the terrors of dentistry. There are recurring appearances by a “tooth” plushy, Gemma works in a dental office, and she finds something highly unsettling in one particularly nasty mouth. Another undead character, who’s wearing a dental cheek-retractor device, crawls around as a torso, missing his lower body, smoldering below the waist. And most of the other undead are constantly grinning. It’s meant to be unsettling, but more often comes off as horror-cliché goofy. Maybe they’re just showing off their gleaming white choppers after a trip to the Further’s dental clinic. Look ma, no cavities!

The plot gets a bit confusing, especially for anyone who’s late to the Insidious game. So much so that a crucial plan unfolds using grapefruits to represent various characters, what they’re supposed to do and where they’re supposed to go. Yes, seriously. Or should I say, citrus-ly.

Young Island Austin (yes, that’s her name) does a commendable job in the role of Gemma’s daughter, menaced alongside her mother. Teen actress Charli Penton plays little Gemma in flashbacks. Brandon Perea is Gemma’s squeeze, a local cop who never learned about battling the undead in police academy. Maisie Richardson-Sellers is an entrancing tattoo artist.

But the scares aren’t very scarifying, the terror isn’t really terrifying, the goblins not so horrifying. Maybe, after 17 years and half a dozen movies, it’s finally time to say a fright-night farewell to this beyond-the-grave saga.

Thanks for the monstrous memories, and don’t forget to get your teeth cleaned.

—Neil Pond

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Aug 18 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Tony”

Dig into the dirty dishes that launched the lauded career of Anthony Bourdain

Chef (Antonio Banderas) and young Anthony Bourdain (Dominique Sessa) suit up in the kitchen.

Tony
Starring Dominique Sessa, Antonio Banderas & Emilia Jones
Directed by Matt Johnson
Rated R

In theaters Friday, Aug. 21

How did Anthony Bourdain become a renowned celebrity chef, TV personality and globetrotting documentarian of international life and cuisine? This biopic shows you the unlikely, unsteady roots of the culinary superstar.

Dominique Sessa plays young Bourdain, 19 years old in 1975 and fresh out of Vassar College in New York. He pompously drops big words (like “insouciant,” “valediction” and “providential”) and aspires to be a serious writer, like George Orwell or Jack Kerouac. He’s also a bit of a truth-stretcher. As Bourdain himself says in the words that open the film—taken from his 2010 memoir— he was a “spoiled, miserable, narcissistic, self-destructive young lout, and badly in need of a good ass-kicking.”

The ass-kicking comes, sure enough—along with a course-setting direction for his life—when he takes a job washing dishes in the kitchen of a small seafood restaurant in Providence, R.I. That’s where he goes, after swiping money out of his father’s wallet, to track down his old high-school crush, Nancy Putkoski (Emilia Jones, from Netflix’s Locke & Key and HBO’s Task).

A lot of the course-setting (and the ass-kicking) come courtesy of Antonio Banderas as “Chef,” the Portuguese seafood-restaurant owner who hires him—after throwing his drunk, punk and pugnacious ass out onto the street.  

Director Matt Johnson—whose previous films include the conspiracy thriller Operation Avalanche and the cult-hit mockumentary TV series Nirvana the Band Show—has a deft touch behind the camera, bringing us into Bourdain’s formative world with seasonings of wit and warmth. Sessa, so good as a waylaid college student in The Holdovers (2023), grounds everything as Bourdain, unsure of where he’s headed but always laid-back and observing, absorbing and processing, taking it all in. We can practically see the wheels turning in his head. Sessa is particularly well-cast; tall, gangly and bushy-headed, he physically resembles Bourdain at that age, and that stage.

Emilia Jones plays Tony’s crush.

Director Johnson captures the essence of the ’70s in every detail, from wire-rim glasses, hairstyles and bell bottoms to music, with well-placed needle drops on Kool & the Gang (“Hollywood Swinging”), the Brothers Johnson (“Strawberry Letter 23”) and Walter Murphy (“A Fifth of Beethoven”). And the movie effectively conveys the crackling chaos and zesty chemistry of the noisy restaurant kitchen, with workers joshing each other, tossing around profanities, sniffing coke, shelling mussels, making lobster thermidor—and gathering around a table to share a pot of squid stew after hours.

Banderas’ Chef takes Bourdain under his wing, giving him a place to sleep and becoming his mentor, tutoring him on catching, prepping and cooking seafood. The supporting cast—particularly Leo Woodall from HBO’s The White Lotus, and comedian Stavris Halkias, both playing coworkers—provides a crackling camaraderie that further bonds Bourdain to the high spirits and competitive spunk of the restaurant kitchen.

But this isn’t a movie about food, per se. It’s about how a young, self-absorbed kid found a direction for his life he didn’t know he wanted or needed. Bourdain longed to be a writer, and he eventually did, penning the best-seller Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly. It’s about his incubation in that underbelly, before he became a chef in a prestigious Manhattan restaurant and later a media personality on the Food Network, the Travel Channel and CNN.

The movie doesn’t show how Mary—whom Anthony attempts to woo by cracking open an oyster for her at a party—later becomes Bourdain’s wife, or that Bourdain’s life would end tragically in 2018, by suicide when he was 61. But one scene does point to a sobering endpoint, when Bourdain asks about a painting of François Vatel, a 17th century chef, and is told he took his own life when a delivery of fish didn’t show up. Vatel’s life was built on food, as Bourdain’s was about to become.

Tony is a sweet, savory and sometimes spicy snapshot of Bourdain beginning the journey to find his mojo, learning about pots and pans and people, and about how dirty dishes directed him to a passion for all things culinary, and beyond.

—Neil Pond

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Aug 14 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “The Rivals of Amziah King”

Matthew McConaughey stars in pulpy bee-centric crime drama

The Rivals of Amziah King
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Angelina LookingGlass, Kurt Russell & Cole Sprause
Directed by Andrew Patterson
Rated R
In theaters Friday, Aug. 14, 2026

Mix beehives, honey heists, murder, bloody pulp, church potlucks and downhome pickin’ and grinnin’ and you get this overcooked Southern gumbo of a movie starring Matthew McConaughey as a good-ol’-boy Oklahoma beekeeper.

He’s Amziah King, and as the title suggests, he’s got some rivals. The Okie beekeeping business, it seems, is rife with theft and crookery. Amziah’s little rural community, he notes, “is not full of kind people.”  

Director Andrew Patterson stirs a lot in the honeypot, overlapping bucolic small-town Southern vibes with a tense crime yarn, orchestrated by interludes of Amziah playing bluegrass with local musicians. Kinda like Pulp Fiction crossed with O Brother Where Art Thou.

And there are lots of bees. Lots of bees. The movie is practically a crash course in beekeeping, and it works hard to show us how bees are not only essential to life, they’re a lot like people, a community of drones and workers dedicated to serving and protecting their leader, their queen. And they’ll strike back when they get agitated, threatened or riled.

Angelina LookingGlass, a young Native America actress making her movie debut, plays Amziah’s former foster daughter, Kateri, now coming back into his life—and deep into the story in a major plot shift midway through the movie. But does she have what it will take to become a queen bee? Kurt Russell is a slick-and-shady business honcho. Cole Sprouse (a now-grown-up former Disney star from The Suite Life of Zack and Cody) is a restaurant worker who knows how to do more than serve hamburgers.  

And McConaughey is pure McConaughey, coasting through it all with a wink, a grin and a drawl and back-porch homilies—and showing off the new skill he learned for the movie, playing a mandolin. To add to its Southern bona fides, some of the music is performed by the Avett Brothers and supervised by producer T. Bone Burnette.  

But the film can’t quite seem to wrangle all the colorful characters, its wild-ride storylines, the picking-parlor sunshine and bee metaphors into a coherent plot. It’s a jerky yarn that veers wildly all over the place, from Biblical references (the name of McConaughy’s character is a Hebrew word meaning “Yahweh is strong”) to gritty drama and wisecracking humor. And there are some incongruous filmmaking choices, like jerkily freeze-framing random shots or showing repeated closeups of LookingGlass looking silent and saintly.

It plays it for laughs when one character gets scalped by an industrial honey extractor, or when a woman who’s losing her eyesight collides repeatedly with storefront doors. Ain’t small-town life a real stitch!

Bees, Amziah tells his daughter, can live in harmony, or they can hurt you. They’re “not all bad,” he says, “or all good.” Just like this bee-centric, honey-glazed flick, flowing with music and eccentricity, buzzing back and forth between sweet father-daughter mojo and rancorous vice.

—Neil Pond

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Aug 14 2026
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Books, Movies, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to Watch, and More! Week of Aug. 14 – 20

Blake Lively swims with sharks! Gypsy Rose Lee takes it off! A real-life Lion King! A lot of Robert Redford! Superhero sexism! And more!

Robert Redford and Paul Newman star in ‘The Sting,’
one of several flicks included in TCM’s all-day salute.

FRIDAY, Aug. 14
Hellcat
A woman (Dakota Gorman) wakes in a moving camper trailer with a horrifying wound, warned by the driver that they have one hour to get to a doctor. As the pain sets in and reality begins to fray, who should really be afraid? (Shudder).

Whitmer Thomas: Terminal Crew of Dudes
Standup comedy special from the comedian-musician-actor, best known for his voice role on the FXX comedy series Quackers (9 p.m., HBO Max).

SATURDAY, Aug. 15
Honest Renovations
Get the tool belt ready for another season of Jessia Alba and Lizzy Mathis, above, doing home makeovers and telling families about the realities of parenting (Roku Channel).

The Shallows
Blake Lively, below, stars in this 2016 Jaws-esque adventure as a young swimmer trapped alone on a rock by a great white shark. Fun fact: She was pregnant with her second child while filming! (Netflix).


SUNDAY, Aug. 16
Lanterns
New series follows intergalactic cops (Kyle Chandler and Aaron Pierre) drawn into a dark mystery as they investigate a murder in the American heartland (HBO).

Bergerac
Re-imaging of the late ‘80s TV series stars Damien Molony as a broken detective, battling his demons after the death of his wife (3 a.m., PBS).

MONDAY, Aug. 17
Donkey Hodie
New season of the animated kids’ show (with a title that grownups might recognized as a pun on Don Quixote) about animals working together to find solutions to everyday problems (PBS Kids).

Gypsy
1962 musical comedy-drama about famed stripper Gypsy Rose Lee, starring Rosalind Russell, Natalie Wood (above) and Carl Malden (9:30 p.m., TCM)

TUESDAY, Aug. 18
Take a Hike!
Unscripted reality series features Korean singer Car the Garden (yes, that’s his name!) as he balances his weight-loss meds with the grueling demands of mountain hiking (Netflix).

Celebrating Robert Redford
Enjoy a full day and night of classic and fan-favorite films starring Redford, starting with 1966’s The Chase, followed by The Great Waldo Pepper, The Candidate, The Electric Horseman, The Sting, Out of Africa and more (begins 7:30 a.m., TCM).

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 19
Lion
Coming-of-age documentary of a young lion, filmed over four years, as he grows up to become leader of his pride—a real-life lion king! (National Geographic).

Swiss Army Man
If you missed it in theaters back in 2016, catch it now on TV. It’s a wild tale of a shipwreck survivor and a flatulent corpse (yes, you read that correctly), starring Paul Dano (who never met a crazy role he couldn’t sink his teeth into), Daniel Radcliff (eons away from Harry Potter) and Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Netflix).

THURSDAY, Aug. 19
Disney Worldbuilders
Meet directors and writers who reflect on the memories, moments and creative breakthroughs that shaped their movies and turned them into Disney franchises (Disney+).

NOVAK DJOKOVIC: The Wolf in Winter
Documentary about the tennis star who became the most accomplished champion player in the sport’s history (Prime Video).

READ ALL ABOUT IT

Football endures! In Strike Season (Simon & Schuster), author Michael Eck tells the true underdog tale of his high school football team, the Mt. Lebanon (Pittsburgh) Blue Devils, that continued their playing schedule after their coaches left in a 1979 teacher’s strike.

How much is AI affecting our lives? A lot, says Pope Leo IX in his new book Magnifica Humanitas (Melville House), a word of warning about the destructive power of artificial intelligence—and his advice for maintaining our humanity in the rising tide of a tech shows no signs of abating.

History buffs will dig into The Story of the Bayeux Tapestry (Thames & Hudson), an examination of a piece of linen displaying pivotal episodes in English history, including the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and the Norman conquest of Britain, that scholars believe is a thousand years old. The book is being released in paperback to time with an exhibition of the Tapestry, for the first time since it was made.

Do superhero movies stereotype female characters? Author Jeannette H. Ronson answers with a resounding yes in Superhero Sexism (McFarland), an examination of how movies and television often present females through a misogynistic, racist lens, representing them as gender non-conforming, sexually threatening, deceptive, hysterical or inherently evil.

BRING IT HOME

Director Tim Burton’s campy classic Mars Attacks! (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment) gets a 30th anniversary spiff-up with new bonus content and behind-the-scenes goodies. Plus, you’ll get to see the all-star cast of Jack Nicholson, Jack Black, Glenn Close, Annette Bening and Lisa Marie (yes, Elvis’ daughter!) fighting aliens in all their 1990s glory.



Aug 07 2026
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Books, DVDs, Movies, Music, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more! Week of Aug. 7 – Aug. 13

A Batman trio, exploring age-gap love, and Bear Gryllis goes Biblical.

The late Heath Ledger left an indelible impression as The Joker in “The Dark Knight,” airing this week as part of a trilogy of director Christopher Nolan’s fan-favorite flicks about the caped crusader.

FRIDAY, Aug. 7
Alley Cats
Funnyman Ricky Gervais directs and provides the main voice for this animated kid-centric tale about the lives of a group of feral felines (Netflix).

The Last House
Greta Lee leads the cast of this sci-fi thriller about a family of four, below, who are suddenly sealed inside their home with no way out (Netflix).

Age Inappropriate
New unscripted series explore the real lives of modern age-gap relationships (9 p.m., We TV).

SATURDAY, Aug. 8
She Stole My Son’s Heart
Detectives search for a missing woman (Taylor Hickson) with a failing transplanted heart (8 p.m., Lifetime).

Batman Trilogy
Watch all three of director Christoper Nolan’s critically hailed and fan-favorite movies about the caped crusader: Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and The Dark Night Rises (2 p.m., TBS).

SUNDAY, Aug. 9
The Chosen in the Wild with Bear Grylls
The TV survivalist leads the cast from the Biblical series The Chosen to take on challenges across forests, deserts, and canyons (Prime Video).


While You Were Sleeping
1995 romcom about a hospital misunderstanding that leads to hilarious romantic deception, starring Peter Gallagher and Sandra Bullock (8:33 p.m., ABC).

MONDAY, Aug. 10
Michael
Big-screen 2026 biopic of superstar-in-the-making Michael Jackson comes to the small screen, with the late singer’s own nephew, Jaafar Jackson, in the title role and Colman Domingo as the Jackson’s domineering dad (Starz).

TUESDAY, Aug. 11
Coroner to the Stars
Learn about the extraordinary journey of Dr. Thomas Noguchi (above), the former Los Angeles medical examiner and corner whose groundbreaking autopsies became a part of American culture (streaming on demand).

Hard Knocks: Training Camp with the Seattle Seahawks
Join the Seahawks at their training camp in Renton, Wash., as head coach Mike Macdonald puts them through their paces in hopes of a new season of NFL glory (9 p.m., HBO Max).

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 12
Women in Blue (Las Azules)
Second season begins of the Spanish-language drama about female police recruits in the 1970s, this time pulled into a student-massacre investigation (Apple TV).

Reacher
Season five begins of the hit action-drama-conspiracy series starring Alan Richman and based on the fan-favorite books by author Lee Childs (Prime Video).

THURSDAY, Aug. 13
MLB Field of Dreams
Just like in the movie, but in real life! The Minnesota Twins take on the Philadelphia Phillies on the fabled “cornfield” diamond where Kevin Costner had a most memorable game of catch back in the ‘90s (Netflix).

A Child of My Own
In this documentary, the profound desire to become a mother and the constant pressure from her surroundings drive a young woman to fake a pregnancy (Netflix).

BRING IT HOME

If you’re ready for an acclaimed mind-bending horror flick, check out Exit 8 (Decal Neon). Critics raved about this tale, loosely based on a popular videogame, about a man caught in a looping subway, who must figure his way out. Extras include an interview with the director, Genki Kawamura.

Hungry (Decal Partners) is a British survival horror film about vacationers on a Louisiana bayou…and one rampaging hippo with a voracious appetite. Starring Madison Davenport, Samantha Couglan and Joaquin de Almeida.

Adam Scott stars in Hokum (Decal Neon), about a novelist on a retreat to scatter the ashes of his dead parents in Ireland, becoming entangled in local folktales about witches. Good stuff for a “summerween” movie night!

Ryan Gosling stars in Project Hail Mary (Alliance Home Entertainment), a dose of dire out-of-this-world sci-fi with an often-humorous twist. He plays a reluctant astronaut on a last-ditch mission to save the stars—including our sun—from extinction. Then he meets a fellow traveler on the same mission…and he’s not human.

Jackie Chan and a CGI panda cub stumble into a magical land and a mysterious primitive tribe in the kid-friendly Panda Plan: The Magical Tribe (Well Go USA).

Rock like it’s the ’80s again with L.A. Guns: Live at the Guild Theater (MVD Entertainment), a live-in-concert catch from last year of the heavy-metal Sunset Strip headbangers (who would eventually merge with Guns N’ Roses) reunited and performing in Menlo Park, Calif., performing banging tunes like “Sex Action,” “Rip and Tear” and “Lucky Motherf*cker.”

READ ALL ABOUT IT

How do you write a newspaper obituary? In Are They Dead Yet: The Art of the Obit (Bloomsbury), author Sam Roberts (a decade-long veteran of New York newspaper obituary writing) dives into the almost forgotten art, and the unique experiences, of distilling life into a few paragraphs.

Art is more than the Mona Lisa or a Rembrandt painting. In Depraved: The Story of Dangerous Art (Viking), Daisy Dixon takes a deep, long look at the history of art meant not meant to beautify or sooth, but rather to disturb, rattle and provoke, with side trips into censorship, obscenity and the eternal debate over right and wrong.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

California has almost 900 miles of coastline, much of it breathtaking in its beauty. But offshore, west past the surfers and cargo ships, is the California Current, a swath of 1,900 miles of some of the most productive waters on the planet. In Tin Can Coast (Bloomsbury), author Joseph Ogilvy shows how the rich resources of the Current became fodder for the processed tuna industry, a catalyst for Cannery Row fat cats, and literary muses for author John Steinbeck and filmmaker Fritz Lang.

Aug 05 2026
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “One Night Only”

What’s so funny about a world in which extramarital sex is illegal? This wild-night romcom explores the horny ha-ha’s

One Night Only
Starring Callum Turner & Monica Barbaro
Directed by Will Gluck
Rated R

In theaters Friday, Aug. 7, 2026

A “sex comedy” with some stinging societal undertones, One Night Only is set in a dystopian alternative reality where it’s illegal to have sexual relations outside of marriage. Except for one night only, a 24-hour period set aside each year when hot-to-trot, love-starved singles are free to mingle.

Callum Turner plays Owen, a pizza maker on the prowl when his girlfriend (Maya Hawke) tells him she has other plans—with another guy—for the evening. Ouch! Monica Barbaro is Allie, a commercial jingle singer hoping to hit a high note or two with a sexy hookup.

Owen and Allie don’t know each other, but we watch them meet, intersect throughout the night and eventually…well, you’ll have to see the movie to find out. In between, you’ll see a slew of familiar faces in comedic cameos and supporting roles, including Molly Ringwald, Levar Burton, Bobby Canivale, Succession‘s Nicholas Braun, indie singer King Princess, SNL’s Pete Davidson and Ben Marshall, and Este Haim of the musical sister trio Haim (who also composed the film’s soundtrack).

But Turner (who starred in last year’s afterlife comedy Eternity with Elisabeth Olsen and Miles Teller) and Barbaro (so impressive as Joan Baez alongside Timothée Chalamet’s Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown) are the real workhorses here. We’re along for the ride as their characters run a gauntlet of wild-night situations, in a hospital emergency room, a police station, a recording studio, a crashed party and up, down and all across the teeming streets of New York City.

I particularly enjoyed how a jingle Allie records—for a product to combat plaque psoriasis—becomes a much bigger recurring punchline. And how the subject of a book she remembers from her childhood, about the little red lighthouse under the George Washington Bridge, sets the stage, literally, for the movie’s finale.

Director Will Gluck knows how to put a uniquely funny spin on movie romcoms, as he did with Easy A and Anyone But You. Here he relishes the clever details of a “world” in which unmarried sex is taboo, and people are branded with wrist biosensors to monitor their bed behavior. As you might expect, the “chastity mandate” is hugely unpopular; we see graffiti expressing the wide malcontent, and infographics showing “acceptable” and “unacceptable” displays of affection.

When the sun goes down and the “one night” begins, there’s a mad rush on condoms (surge-priced, of course), and costumed vendors dressed as oversized tubes of KY Jelly hawk their lubricant to sidewalk passersby.

It’s like a merry mashup of George Orwell, The Handmaid’s Tale and When Harry Met Sally, with more sex jokes—a lot more. But it’s also a movie with a lot more than sex on its mind. There’s a gravity to all the sexy light-heartedness, a somber sense that its reality—of government intrusion into who we can love, and when—isn’t so far-fetched. Like when we see a newscaster reporting on the “purity” of America. And it’s not just a throwaway line when characters talk about the “crazy time” they’re living in, on the “most unromantic night of the year.” Or a policewoman (Michelle Hurd, from TV’s Law & Order: Special Victims Unit) is chided for “being on the wrong side of history” when she talks about a repeat offender arrested multiple times for his extramarital crimes of passion.

It’s never raunchy, but always zingy, a movie about surging hormones allowed out of the box for a nocturnal buffet of sensual splurging. But there’s a sweetness too, a sense that sex is but one part of a healthy romantic relationship.

“Maybe we shouldn’t overthink this,” Owen says at one point. Indeed. One Night Only is a zippy, zany satire of a world gone crazy, in more ways than one—a world that looks, and feels, very familiar. And very funny, at least until you start thinking about how close to reality it might really be.

—Neil Pond