What’s on TV Thursday: ‘Long Shot’ and ‘I Am Big Bird’

What’s on TV Thursday: ‘Long Shot’ and ‘I Am Big Bird’

12/12/2019

What’s on TV

LONG SHOT (2019) 10:10 p.m. on HBO. Love blooms in the din of an underground bomb shelter in this romantic comedy, which stars Charlize Theron as a United States secretary of state running for president and Seth Rogen as a journalist who becomes her beau. The “long shot” in the title refers to both the presidential bid and the unlikely romance that the pair develops: Charlotte (Theron) used to babysit Fred (Rogen). Their meet-cute adult reunion happens at a lavish charity event, where Fred (the only neon windbreaker in a sea of suits) manages to trip down a staircase in front of an assembly of distinguished guests. The rest of the story involves Charlotte hiring Fred as a speechwriter and a journey abroad that lands the pair in that snug bomb shelter. “Much of what happens isn’t surprising,” Manohla Dargis wrote in her review for The New York Times, “but Dan Sterling and Liz Hannah’s script is consistently, genially funny, filled with patter and nonsense, and spiked with sincerity and a few gross-out flourishes.” The movie was directed by Jonathan Levine, who also directed Rogen in “50/50” and “The Night Before.”

MLB NETWORK PRESENTS: THE COBRA AT TWILIGHT 8 p.m. on MLB Network. “All this attention,” the baseball player Dave Parker told The Times in 1979, “it’s interfering with my work. But what can you do?” At the time, Parker was a star right fielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates — he was named the National League’s Most Valuable Player in 1978. The latest entry in the sports documentary series “MLB Network Presents” revisits Parker’s career, which subsequently involved more highs (World Series victories, All-Star games) and lows (a cocaine scandal). The documentary, narrated by the rapper Chuck D, also covers Parker’s ongoing fight against Parkinson’s disease.

OLAF’S FROZEN ADVENTURE (2017) 8 p.m. on ABC. The comic-relief snowman voiced by Josh Gad in the “Frozen” movies got his own wintry tale in this animated short, which also includes appearances from the rest of the full-length movies’ main characters. Some families who went to see “Frozen 2” may find this a fitting digestif. Families who have had enough of Olaf and the gang may opt instead for the Disney-Pixar short TOY STORY THAT TIME FORGOT (2014), which will air at 8:30 p.m. on ABC.

What’s Streaming

I AM BIG BIRD (2015) Stream on Topic; rent on Amazon, Google Play, iTunes, Vudu and YouTube. Caroll Spinney, the puppeteer who for decades gave life to Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch on “Sesame Street,” died on Sunday. This documentary delves into the performer’s career largely through his own words, telling the story of how a childhood passion for puppeteering ultimately landed an adult Spinney in the big yellow suit. The movie “gets a little syrupy at times,” Neil Genzlinger wrote in his review for The Times, but Genzlinger added that Spinney is “forthright and engaging throughout,” and that the film ultimately “reminds us that even the most omnipresent cultural phenomena were created by someone, usually through a combination of hard work and happenstance.”

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