Friday, January 22, 2016

Around the Tubes: 1/22/16



I have gotten a plethora of cool press releases have been flooding my inbox recently that you may find interesting. This post will include blurbs on Triumph's Election Special 2016, The Open Mind, The Great Human Race, Challenger Disaster: Lost Tapes, From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series, Major League Legends, The Story of God with Morgan Freeman, Comedy Knockout, Genius by Stephan Hawking, A Year in Space, and Hamilton's America.

- Hulu will be the exclusive streaming home to Triumph's Election Special 2016, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog’s one-hour election extravaganza from Funny Or Die. The Hulu Special will become available to stream through Hulu’s No Commercials and Limited Commercial subscription plans beginning early February. In Triumph's Election Special 2016, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog hits the 2016 presidential campaign trail. Viewers will be taken from Iowa to New Hampshire to South Carolina in a tenacious news-gathering journey in the heat of the primary election season. Triumph has already visited a Democratic Debate, a Tea Party Convention, and followed a string of Ted Cruz bus appearances. In addition to crashing campaign events and mocking the press for their thirst for controversy, Triumph will take on hard-hitting issues of concern to voters on each side of the spectrum. “A quote? I don’t have time for this (expletive deleted),” said Triumph.

- This weekend airs a rare interview with The Co-Chairs on the Commission of Presidential Debates: Michael McCurry & Frank Fahrenkopf discuss the General Election 2016 debates on the upcoming episode of the PBS TV series The Open Mind, hosted by Alexander Heffner: thirteen.org/openmind. The Open Mind series encourages thoughtful discourse and provocative exchanges -- hosting an eclectic mix of guests, from Independent senator and Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders to producer Jill Soloway to bestselling novelist Salman Rushdie and comedian J.B. Smoove.

- The human race is resilient. For millions of years, our species has fought for survival. We transformed rocks into tools, sticks into weapons and friction into fire — enabling us to spread across the continents and endure the planet’s harshest terrains. Now, National Geographic Channel (NGC) embarks on that journey across the globe in an epic new series, The Great Human Race, premiering in the U.S. on Monday, Feb. 1, at 10:00 and globally later this year in 171 countries and 44 languages.

- Certain images are permanently etched into our national memory, and the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion is one of them. On Jan. 28, 1986, with the eyes of the world watching, the space shuttle abruptly burst into flames during a live television broadcast. All seven crewmembers died, including a social studies teacher who was supposed to be the first American civilian in space. The heartbreaking tragedy instantly became a defining moment in American history. To mark the 30th anniversary of the Challenger disaster, the National Geographic Channel combed through long-forgotten news footage, radio reports, audio recordings and rarely seen NASA footage to retell the events leading up to, during and immediately after that fateful day. Challenger Disaster: Lost Tapes, premiering Monday, Jan. 25, at 9:00, takes viewers behind the scenes of this compelling and historic story in a way never before seen. Produced by the Peabody-award winning producers of “MLK: The Assassination Tapes,” the one-hour special includes no narration and no commentators, instead unfolding the story solely through the reports of journalists covering the story at the time, extensive audio and video recordings from NASA and archived interviews with the flight crew and others who were part of the one-of-a-kind mission.

- Spun off from Robert Rodriguez's cult classic film franchise, Season One of Miramax/El Rey Network's From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series centered on bank robber Seth Gecko (D.J. Cotrona) and his violent, unpredictable brother Richard "Richie" Gecko (Zane Holtz). On the lam to Mexico, they encountered former pastor Jacob Fuller (Robert Patrick) and his family, whom they took hostage in the family RV. Following an ill-advised detour to the culebra-infested Titty Twister, they were forced to fight until dawn to get out alive. Across 10 explosive, SFX-filled episodes in From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series - The Complete Season Two (Street Date: February 2, 2016), core relationships deepen and become more complicated as everyone tries to put their lives back on track after one very insane day. Santánico and Richie are now partners in crime, resembling a more modern version of Bonnie and Clyde; Seth and Kate are scraping by as small time criminals south of the border; and Freddie Gonzalez has an almost obsessive focus on protecting his wife and young daughter in the suburbs. Carlos Madrigal and Scott Fuller emerge from the Titty Twister, changed men. They will all come together once again - this time facing off against an even bigger threat.

- Smithsonian Channel and Major League Baseball have teamed up to tell the stories of four players who transcended the National Pastime and left legacies as true American icons: Hank Aaron, who surmounted racism in the Deep South and became baseball’s home run king; Babe Ruth, who emerged from a troubled youth to become America’s first superstar celebrity; Lou Gehrig, the embodiment of integrity who achieved immortality for his bravery in facing a terrible disease that now bears his name; and Ted Williams, who aspired to be the greatest hitter ever and inspired generations with his quest for perfection. Major League Legends will premiere over four consecutive Monday nights beginning February 29 at 8:00 with a special Black History Month presentation of Major League Legends: Hank Aaron.

- Who is God? Where did we come from? Why does evil happen? What happens when we die? Every human being on earth has asked themselves these questions at some point, and most likely each person has found a different answer. This spring, National Geographic Channel and Revelation Entertainment’s epic series The Story of God with Morgan Freeman, produced by Freeman, Lori McCreary and James Younger, will take viewers on a trip around the world to explore different cultures and religions on the ultimate quest to uncover the meaning of life, God and all these big questions in between. The Story of God with Morgan Freeman premieres Sunday, April 3 at 9:00 on the National Geographic Channel.

- truTV this week announced a greenlight for the new comedic competition series Comedy Knockout which pits comedians against each other in a series of fast paced challenges with the audience having sole discretion to decide who is the funniest person in the room. In each episode, host Damien Lemon (Guy Code) sends three comics into a battle of high stakes comedic gameplay. With points doled out based on the audience’s applause, it’s all about one-upmanship as competitors attempt to landj massive comedy blows and whip the rowdy crowd into a frenzy of raucous laughter. The whole time, the comedians throw roast-like, rapid-fire jabs at each other to knock their opponents off balance. Each show ends with one comedian crowned Champion, one eliminated, and one ultimately forced to face the crowd and apologize for going down in shameful defeat. Comedy Knockout will premiere on truTV in April 2016 with 10 half-hour episodes.

- PBS President and CEO Paula A. Kerger announced this week at the PBS portion of the Television Critics Association Press Tour that PBS, with National Geographic as its international broadcast partner, has commissioned a new six-part science series. Genius by Stephen Hawking, from production company Bigger Bang, will be presented and narrated by renowned theoretical physicist Prof. Stephen Hawking. In each episode, a different group of ordinary people will be challenged to think like the greatest scientific minds in history in order to solve some of humanity’s most enduring questions. GENIUS will air on PBS in the U.S. in 2016, and internationally on National Geographic Channel.

- President and CEO Paula A. Kerger announced this week at the Television Critics Association Press Tour that PBS has commissioned the two-part series A Year in Space, adapted from TIME’s original digital video series about astronaut Scott Kelly, whose current 12-month stay on the International Space Station (ISS) is testing human limits for space travel and laying the groundwork for a manned mission to Mars. The first installment of A Year in Space, which tracks Scott Kelly’s mission from training and launch, through his 12 months aboard the International Space Station, right up through his descent and landing is scheduled to air on PBS on Wednesday, March 2 from 8:00-9:00 p.m. ET (check local listings), timed within a day of Scott’s planned return to Earth. The second installment is scheduled to air in 2017.

- PBS President and CEO Paula Kerger announced today at the Television Critics Association Press Tour that it will air Hamilton's America, a feature film documentary providing intimate access to Lin-Manuel Miranda and his colleagues during the two years leading up to the Broadway opening of the musical Hamilton. A contemporary perspective of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s revolutionary musical based on the life of United States Founding Father Alexander Hamilton, Hamilton's America will come to Great Performances in the fall 2016, and will be a highlight of PBS’s Arts programming.

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