Now in its 46th year, “The Kennedy Center Honors” (9 p.m., CBS, TV-PG) has long been associated with the cozy, lazy week between Christmas and New Year’s.
This year’s honorees continue the tradition of blending high art and pop culture. Look for an opera soprano (Renee Fleming), a comic actor (Billy Crystal) and three musicians, including the lone surviving Bee Gee, Barry Gibb, pop singer Dionne Warwick and Queen Latifah, who emerged from the world of rap to become a successful film and TV star.
While primarily associated with opera, Fleming is no stranger to popular culture, having performed on “Sesame Street.” She’s also very familiar with the Kennedy Center Honors. She performed at the induction of star Warren Beatty and musicians Andre Previn and Van Cliburn.
Having won Grammys, Emmys, Tonys and several Golden Globes, Billy Crystal is just an Oscar short of “EGOT” status, something that will probably be rectified with an honorary Oscar at some point. Few presenters were more associated with the Academy Awards than Crystal. He presided over nine ceremonies between 1990 and 2012. Not unlike Bob Hope, Crystal managed to be the quintessential Oscar host at the same time he was enjoying a successful film career with “When Harry Met Sally” and “City Slickers,” among others.
He is also remembered as a “Saturday Night Live” star of the mid-1980s, for his many HBO stand up specials and for his breakthrough role on the TV satire “Soap,” where his character, Jodie Dallas, was the first openly gay man in prime time.
Now appearing as the no-nonsense Robyn McCall on CBS’s reincarnation of “The Equalizer,” Queen Latifah starred on the Fox sitcom “Living Single,” which ran from 1993-98. She had her own daytime talk show from 1999 to 2001 and was nominated for a Primetime Emmy award for her starring role in the 2015 HBO Bessie Smith biopic “Bessie.”
Gibb is featured in the great 2020 documentary “The Bee Gees: How Can You Mend a Broken Heart,” surveying the enduring popularity of the band from the 1960s when they rivaled the Beatles, through the disco era, when their participation in the film “Saturday Night Fever” helped them dominate the music charts to such an extent that they suffered from the subsequent anti-disco backlash.
Warwick was also recently recalled in the 2021 documentary “Dionne Warwick: Don’t Make Me Over,” profiling her as the singular interpreter of the Burt Bacharach/Hal David songbook, an activist and AIDS fundraiser and an elder stateswoman in the music industry who invited gangsta rappers to her posh living room to tell them a thing or two about respecting women and toning down their misogynistic lyrics. Snoop Dogg recalls their encounter with a trepidation bordering on awe.
Following tradition, the honorees will be both roasted and serenaded by their friends and peers. With Queen Latifah’s inclusion, this event continues the yearlong celebration of the 50th anniversary of hip hop. Look for a raft of imminent Washingtonians in the audience.
— Netflix streams the 2023 documentary “Hell Camp: Teen Nightmare.” It recalls a special program from the 1980s that sent troubled kids to the Utah desert, where hard work and gruesome conditions were intended to wear them down until they were “good again.” What could go wrong?
TONIGHT’S OTHER HIGHLIGHTS
— “E! News Presents NBC’s Hot 10 of 2023” (8 p.m., NBC, TV-PG) picks out the nine trends and personalities that are not named Taylor Swift.
— Louisville takes on USC in the college football DirecTV Holiday Bowl (8 p.m., Fox).
— Claude Rains (“Casablanca”) plays a scientist whose secret serum helps him hide from view in the 1933 shocker “The Invisible Man” (8 p.m., TCM, TV-PG). Sequels, spoofs and knockoffs follow, including “Abbott and Costello Meet the Invisible Man” (9:30 p.m., TV-G).
— “The Year 2023” (9 p.m., ABC) glances back at the pivotal events of the past 12 months.
CULT CHOICE
Hired to tutor the son of a famous novelist (Richard E. Grant), a promising writer (Daryl McCormack) becomes embroiled in damaged family dynamics in the 2023 psychological thriller “The Lesson” (9:45 p.m., Showcase). Julie Delpy also stars.
SERIES NOTES
“Celebrity Wheel of Fortune” (8 p.m., ABC, r, TV-PG) … A friend falls for a financial swindler on “Magnum P.I.” (9 p.m., NBC, r, TV-14) … A storm engulfs the Windy City on “Chicago Med” (10 p.m., NBC, r, TV-14).
LATE NIGHT
Jimmy Fallon welcomes Jason Momoa, Elizabeth Debicki, Drew & Jonathan Scott and Thumpasaurus on “The Tonight Show” (11:35 p.m., NBC, r) … Bob Odenkirk, Marcello Hernandez and Aparna Nancherla sit down on “Late Night With Seth Meyers” (12:35 a.m., NBC, r).
