¨ April 2004 Program Highlights ¨

Sunday, April 18 from 9-11pm EXXONMOBIL MASTERPIECE THEATRE “Prime Suspect 6: The Last Witness”--Helen Mirren (Calendar Girls, Gosford Park) stars as Inspector Jane Tennison. It’s been seven years since Tennison put the handcuffs on a psychotic killer in the last episode. Now, amid pressure to retire, she faces a death squad that has unleashed the horrors of the Balkan civil war on London. Episode 1 (4/18, 4/28) --Detective Superintendent Jane Tennison (Helen Mirren) is ripe for retirement in the eyes of her boss at the London Metropolitan Police. But it’s the farthest thing from her mind as she brazenly takes over a high-profile murder case from her underling DCI Simon Finch (Ben Miles). The victim: a Bosnian Muslim woman named Samira. Injuries: torture followed by strangulation. Motive: none. Police turn up a suspect with a strange connection to the victim: Bosnian Serb Duscan Zigic (Velibor Topic), who during the Bosnian civil war spared Samira’s life when ordered to kill her and her sister, Jasmina (Ingeborga Dapkunaite). Suspecting that someone gave orders for Zigic to correct this lapse, Tennison begins looking for the mastermind, worried that Jasmina might be next. Episode 2 (4/25, 4/29) --Tennison’s investigation takes her to Bosnia with her old flame, Robert West (Liam Cunningham), a journalist with wide experience in the region. There, she makes a crucial breakthrough. But on her return she is dismayed to learn that her prime suspect is in an international witness protection program. Inspired by her father’s (Frank Finlay) reminiscence of liberating a World War II concentration camp, Tennison makes her move anyway, resulting in her dismissal from the case. Justice for the killer now hinges on the cooperation of the cop whose judgment Tennison spurned at the outset: DCI Finch.

Monday, April 19 from 8-9pm Since its debut in 1988, AMERICAN EXPERIENCE has brought to life the incredible characters and epic stories that helped form this nation. “Patriots Day”--More than two centuries later, they’re still fighting. This program looks behind the scenes at the everyday Americans who annually re-create the famous Revolutionary battle of Lexington and Concord, then return to their lives as engineers, dentists, bankers.

 

Tuesday, April 20 from 7-9pm NOVA “World in the Balance”--It took all of history until the year 1804 for human population to reach its first billion. Now a billion new people are added every dozen years. In the industrialized world — Japan, Europe and the United States — birth rates are falling steeply while the senior citizen population is booming. NOVA explores these and other trends in the relationship between people and the planet in “World in the Balance.” With moving personal stories from India, Japan, Kenya and China, the program provides an up-to-date global snapshot of today’s human family, now numbering 6.3 billion and likely to increase to nearly 9 billion by 2050.

Wednesday, April 21 from 9-11pm P.O.V. "Love & Diane" This is a frank and intimate real-life drama of a mother and daughter desperate for love and forgiveness, but caught in a devastating cycle. During the 1980s, a crack cocaine epidemic ravaged many impoverished inner city neighborhoods. As parents like Diane succumbed to addiction, a generation of children like Love entered the foster care system. Shot over 10 years, the film centers on Love and Diane after the family is reunited and is struggling to reconnect. Now 18 and a mother herself, Love must reconcile her anger and confront the ways in which her mother's past mistakes haunt her life. Diane, in turn, makes new choices for herself, seeking to break free from the treadmill of addiction and poverty. Powerful and immediate, this film shatters stereotypes and offers hope amidst seemingly impossible odds.

 

Thursday, April 22 from 8-9pm FRONTLINE Growing up in the 1990s, Abdurahman Khadr's playmates were the children of his father's longtime friend, Osama bin Laden.  How Khadr was raised to be an Al Qaeda terrorist-and how he ultimately decided to become a U.S. informant in the war on terror is the focus of the FRONTLINE report "Son of Al Qaeda." Through interviews with Khadr as well as his mother and siblings, the one-hour documentary recounts his incredible journey from terrorist trainee to informant, offering a revealing glimpse inside the world-and mindset-of Al Qaeda followers. "I want to show people that I'm a person...that was raised to become an Al Qaeda, was raised to become a suicide bomber," twenty-one-year-old Khadr tells Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) correspondent Terence McKenna.  "I decided on my own that I do not want to do that."

Monday, April 26 from 8-9pm Since its debut in 1988, AMERICAN EXPERIENCE has brought to life the incredible characters and epic stories that helped form this nation. “Remember the Alamo”--This program offers a new perspective on a familiar story: the role Tejanos played in winning Texas’ independence from Mexico. Produced, directed and written by Joseph Tovares; narrated by Hector Elizondo.

 

Tuesday, April 27 from 9-10:30pm INDEPENDENT LENS “The Weather Underground”--During the late 1960s and early 1970s, several hundred young women and men tried to spark a socialist revolution. The Weathermen waged a low-level war against the U.S. government: bombing the Capitol building, breaking Timothy Leary out of prison and evading one of the largest FBI manhunts in history. Former members look back on this notorious movement, speaking candidly about their experiences. Lili Taylor narrates.

Wednesday, April 28 from 8-9:30pm “Henry Luce and Time-Life’s America: A Vision of Empire”--American masters tells the story of Henry Luce, who co-founded Time, Inc. in 1923 and presided over the company through the 1960s, making an indelible mark on publishing. Visual icons from the archives of Time, Inc. and its unparalleled collection of 20th-century photographs and news footage, along with readings from Time, Inc.’s groundbreaking essays and firsthand accounts from those who knew Luce best, provide insight into his life, work and influence on America.

Thursday, April 29 from 7-8pm LIVE FROM LINCOLN CENTER makes the world’s greatest artists accessible to home viewers in virtually every corner of the United States. It remains the only series of regularly scheduled live broadcast performances on American television today. Producer: Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Inc. “Haydn, Vivaldi and Yo-Yo Ma”--Grammy-winning cellist Yo-Yo Ma revives his successful partnership with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, led by Ton Koopman. Their brilliant collaborations were first captured on the top-selling releases Simply Baroque in 1999 and Simply Baroque II in 2000, for which Ma’s own 1712 Stradivarius cello was configured as a baroque instrument. This broadcast marks their first televised performance together, as well as Ma’s fifth appearance on LIVE FROM LINCOLN CENTER.

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