PASADENA, Calif. — Pittsburgh native Michael Keaton will host PBS’s 50th anniversary “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” retrospective, “Mister Rogers: It’s You I Like” (8 p.m. March 6, WQED-TV).
Mr. Keaton, who worked as a stagehand and occasionally appeared on the “Neighborhood” in the early 1970s, previously hosted a Rick Sebak-produced Mister Rogers retrospective, 2003’s “Fred Rogers: America’s Favorite Neighbor.”
The new program, produced by Pittsburgh’s The Fred Rogers Co. and airing as a pledge special, features reactions of celebrities (Sarah Silverman, John Lithgow, Judd Apatow, Whoopi Goldberg, etc.) re-watching clips from “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” and the memories of those who were on set, including David Newell, who played Speedy Deliveryman Mr. McFeely, Joe Negri, Yo-Yo Ma and others.
“Fred said attitudes are caught, not taught,” said Mr. Newell, who traveled from Pittsburgh to be part of a press conference panel on behalf of the program during PBS’s portion of the Television Critics Association winter 2018 press tour. “He would show places and topics and let [the children watching] catch it. He never spelled it out. It was sort of caught. That was very unique. He was the real thing, I can tell you that.”
“Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” debuted nationally on Feb. 19, 1968 and ran for 900 episodes, airing its final original episode on PBS in 2001. Mr. Rogers, a Latrobe native, died of stomach cancer in 2003.
Nicholas Ma, son of cellist Yo-Yo Ma, appeared as a child on the “Neighborhood” with his father and is featured in the retrospective.
“His message to children that you are special was about saying you are unique as well,” Mr. Ma said. “Bring the best of who you are to this world and that is enough.”
“It’s You I Like” runs an hour but will air over 90 minutes with pledge breaks inserted.
As part of the anniversary celebration, PBS will air a week of “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood” episodes paired with similarly themed episodes of “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” Feb. 26-March 2 (a new “Daniel” episode on his goldfish’s death gets paired with a “MRN” episode about Mister Rogers’ dead goldfish). This will mark the first time “MRN” has aired on weekdays nationally since 2008 when PBS removed the program from its weekday program service; some PBS stations continue to carry one episode of “MRN” per week on weekends.
In addition to this retrospective, a feature film documentary, “Won’t You be my Neighbor?,” premieres at the Sundance Film Festival Friday and is scheduled for theatrical release on June 8 before it will likely air on PBS’s “Independent Lens,” a co-producer on the film. (Mr. Ma is one of producers of “Won’t You be my Neighbor?”)
Here’s a clip from the Focus Features-produced “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?”, which premieres Friday at the Sundance Film Festival:
“It’s the first time any filmmaker has had full access to Fred’s story,” said Lois Vossen, “Independent Lens” executive producer, following a PBS “Lens” press conference Tuesday. “The Rogers family fully cooperated and gave [the filmmakers] unlimited access to all of his letters and scripts from the program.”
Ms. Vossen said there’s only a small amount of overlap between the PBS retrospective airing in March and the feature documentary.
“They were very focused on wanting to illuminate the show and we knew right away we wanted to tell this much larger picture story about his whole life,” she said, “and how he came to be the Fred Rogers we know.”
Pittsburgh Foundation president Maxwell King has written a biography, “The Good Neighbor, the Life and Work of Fred Rogers” ($28, Abrams Press), set to be published on Sept. 11.
The United States Postal Service will issue a Fred Rogers stamp this year and a new batch of “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood” episodes, “Neighborhood Friends Collection” ($14.99, PBS Distribution), will be released on Jan. 23.
Nellie Bly movie on Lifetime
Christina Ricci (“Pan Am”) will star in “Nellie Bly,” a Lifetime psychological thriller about the feminist journalist and Armstrong County native who went undercover in the lunatic asylum on New York's Blackwell's island.
The film chronicles Bly’s mission to expose the asylum’s deplorable conditions by feigning mental illness so she could report from the inside. Judith Light (“Transparent”) co-stars as torturous head nurse Matron Grady and Josh Bowman (“Revenge”) plays the more sympathetic Dr. Josiah.
Lifetime head of programming Liz Gately said “Nellie Bly,” which filmed late last year in Winnipeg, will air this fall.
“It starts with her going into the hospital and it’s very dark,” she said. “It’s period, it actually happened, so we have to stay true to what actually happened. But the film accurately portrays the horror that was happening to women. … What’s also interesting is her personal journey of thinking, ‘Am I crazy?’ and trying to get out and convincing the doctors she was actually well.”
PBS explores #MeToo
The #MeToo movement will be explored in a five-part, half-hour PBS series, “#METOO, Now What?” (8:30 p.m. Feb. 2, WQED-TV), hosted by Zainab Salbi, founder of Women for Women International.
With sexual harassment occupying a prominent place in today’s national conversation, the program aims to engage women and men from all generations with each episode focused on a different aspect of sexual harassment. Topics include the impact of pop culture on women in the workplace, how race and class factor into the discussion and the social costs of pay inequity.
PBS president Paula Kerger said the program will be recorded just a few days before air to keep it current given the fast-moving nature of the story.
“We’ve observed in the situation thus far lots of discussion around Hollywood and stories that mushroom out, but it’s a much bigger problem that crosses every economic level and every industry,” Ms. Kerger said. “There isn’t a place I’ve seen yet to begin a conversation. I’m not suggesting a five-part series on public broadcasting is going to solve a problem but I think if we can begin talking to one another and do that in real time as the story is unfolding, we will do a great service.”
Syfy slots ‘Krypton’
Set 200 years before the destruction of Superman’s home planet, the 10-episode “Krypton” (March 21, Syfy) focuses on Superman's grandfather, Seg-El (Cameron Cuffe), who faces a difficult choice: Save his home planet or let it be destroyed to restore the fate of his future grandson. Time traveler Adam Strange (Shaun Sipos) arrives from the present to give Seg-El the news about the importance of his descendant to the future.
“A lot of people know Krypton blows up and that's what causes Superman to come to Earth,” said executive producer David S. Goyer (“DaVinci's Demons”). “This is really an untold story and time travel is involved so the ending of history could be changed. What happens in this show could be very different than the back story most people know.”
A portion of this column originally appeared online. Post-Gazette TV writer Rob Owen is attending the Television Critics Association winter press tour. Follow RobOwenTV at Twitter or Facebook. You can reach him at 412-263-2582 or rowen@post-gazette.com.
First Published: January 17, 2018, 7:15 p.m.
