What to Watch Friday: New ‘League of Their Own’ series + new FX documentary
Here’s what to watch tonight.
Children of the Underground (8 p.m., FX)
This new FX documentary series tells the tangled true story of the very complicated vigilante Faye Yager, who built an underground network that hid hundreds of mothers and children, saving them from the alleged abuse of husbands and fathers when a broken court system would not. From FX: “Stepping out into the spotlight of daytime TV talk shows to raise awareness for the cause, Yager placed herself in the crosshairs of the FBI, setting off a highly publicized trial that raised the specter of a dark side to the movement. When she helped the ex-wife and children of the wealthy banker who pioneered the ATM disappear, Yager finally met her match and a loud public reckoning was at hand. Was Faye Yager actually the saint so many people made her out to be?”
Directed by Gabriela Cowperthwaite (“Blackfish”), the series is from the production house Story Syndicate, which produced “I’ll Be Gone in the Dark,” “Britney Vs. Spears” and “Nuclear Family.”
How to watch: There are five episodes and all five air tonight on FX, back-to-back from 8 p.m. until 1:35 a.m. You can also stream starting tomorrow on Hulu.
The Great American Recipe (9 p.m., PBS NC) -
Sadly, North Carolina cook Bambi Daniels was eliminated from this public television competition series in Episode 3, but other chefs have carried on. And tonight the three finalists — Robin Daumit, Foo Nguyen and Silvia Martinez — compete for the top spot. The challenge tonight is to prepare a full dinner with dessert, but some unexpected help is on the way when family members surprise them on the show.
A League of Their Own (Amazon Prime)
The classic Penny Marshall film gets new life in this Amazon Prime series co-created by and starring “Broad City” star Abbi Jacobson.
The series is seen as both an reboot and expansion of Marshall’s 1992 film about the Rockford Peaches, a team from the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which formed in the 1940s to keep baseball alive while the nation’s men fought overseas in World War II.
D’Arcy Carden (“The Good Place”), Chante Adams and Roberta Colindrez co-star with Jacobson as players, and Nick Offerman (“Parks and Recreation”) plays the coach (a role played in the movie by Tom Hanks). Rosie O’Donnell, who starred in the original movie, appears in one episode, playing the owner of a gay bar.
Maybelle Blair, an original player from the 1940s league, was a consultant on the series. Penny Marshall was also consulted on the series before her death in 2018, reported Entertainment Weekly.
In multiple interviews, Jacobson has talked about how the series will explore some themes not fully explored in the 1992 film, such as how Black women were not allowed to play in the All-American Girls Baseball League, and the number of queer woman playing in the league.
There are eight episodes in the series and all will drop today.
Some programming descriptions are provided by networks.
