Between network, cable and streaming, the modern television landscape is a vast one. Here are some of the shows, specials and movies coming to TV this week, May 30-June 3. Details and times are subject to change.
Monday
JULIA (2021) 8 p.m. on CNN. In this documentary, the filmmakers Julie Cohen and Betsy West — who were nominated for a Academy Award in the best documentary feature category for their work on “RBG” (2018) — tell the story of the cookbook author Julia Child and her upheaval of the male-dominated culinary and television worlds. The documentary uses archival footage, personal photos and first-person narratives to follow Child’s path to publishing “Mastering the Art of French Cooking,” a book with an enduring influence: It topped the New York Times best-seller list in 2009, 48 years after it debuted, around the release of the film “Julie and Julia.”
Tuesday
ORIGINS OF HIP-HOP 10 p.m. on A&E. This documentary series comes from Mass Appeal, a media company known for its production of “Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men” (2019) — which the Times critic Jon Caramanica called an “intimate” look at “how individuals use art as a lifeline.” The new show will tell the stories of hip-hop stars, including Busta Rhymes, Eve, Ice-T and Ja Rule. Narrated by the rapper Nas, each of the eight one-hour episodes explores the artists’ journeys to stardom. The series premieres with an episode on Fat Joe, one of the genre’s Latino stars.
Wednesday
THE REAL HOUSEWIVES OF DUBAI 9 p.m. on Bravo. As the 11th entry in the franchise, “The Real Housewives of Dubai” premieres in a desert oasis following an opulent group of women — including Caroline Stanbury, a former Miss Jamaica — as they navigate a highly exclusive social scene. Teasers show metallic gowns in windy deserts and valleys of camels in the extravagant City of Gold. But after announcing the location, Bravo was hit with backlash on social media for overlooking the United Arab Emirates’ treatment of women and L.G.B.T.Q. people. The series has also been criticized in the past for featuring racially homogeneous casts. (In a 2019 article for The Times, the writer Tracie Egan Morrissey wrote that the show “shined its light on a certain type of woman: rich, opinionated and white”). But the women who make up the Dubai cast are among of the most racially diverse groups on the show to date.
Thursday
SCRIPPS NATIONAL SPELLING BEE FINALS 8 p.m. on Ion. “Murraya.” This was the word that determined the best speller in the nation in last year’s tournament. Hosted by LeVar Burton, this year’s competition will include spellers from across the United States (and from four other countries) competing for a chance to be the 94th Scripps National Spelling Bee champion. Last year, a 14-year-old, Zaila Avant-garde, made history as the first Black American to win the Bee.
N.B.A. FINALS 9 p.m. on ABC. The Golden State Warriors will play the winner of the Eastern Conference finals between the Miami Heat and the Boston Celtics in the first game of the National Basketball Association finals. Golden State returns to the finals for the first time since 2019 after defeating the Dallas Mavericks in the Western Conference finals last Thursday. It has been a long road rife with injuries and misfortune for many of Golden State’s key players, but the team’s celebrated core “is together again and playing some of its best basketball,” The Times’s Tania Ganguli and Scott Cacciola wrote in a recent article. Catch the second game on Sunday.
Friday
AMERICAN MASTERS: JOE PAPP IN FIVE ACTS 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). Ahead of the 60th anniversary season of Shakespeare in the Park in Central Park, “American Masters” will air “Joe Papp in Five Acts,” a documentary that tells the story of Joseph Papp, the founder of the Public Theater and Shakespeare in the Park, and a producer of plays including “Hair” and “A Chorus Line.”
BABES IN ARMS (1939) 8 p.m. on TCM. Directed by Busby Berkeley and starring Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland, “Babes in Arms” is the film version of the 1937 coming-of-age Broadway musical of the same title. In a 1939 Times review, the writer Frank S. Nugent praised Rooney: “‘Babes In Arms’ — to express it in two words — is Mickey Rooney,” he wrote. The film is followed by BABES ON BROADWAY (1941) at 10 p.m. on TCM, another Berkeley musical that stars Rooney and Garland.
Saturday
STAGE FRIGHT (1950) 8 p.m. on TCM. In “Stage Fright,” a suspenseful British film noir from Alfred Hitchcock, an acting student (Marlene Dietrich) goes undercover to prove that a singing star killed her husband. Though the movie has become known as a Hitchcock classic, the Times review in 1950 wasn’t exactly favorable. The critic Bosley Crowther called it a “rambling story,” one “without any real anxiety,” but praised the cast of “fine actors.”
Sunday
MTV MOVIE & TV AWARDS 8 p.m. on MTV. Vanessa Hudgens returns as host of the 2022 MTV Movie & TV Awards, where fans vote for their favorite films, shows and performances, and where Jack Black will receive this year’s Comedic Genius award. The ceremony will be followed by “MTV Movie & TV Awards: Unscripted,” which recognizes the best competition series, best reality romance, best music documentary, best reality star and other similar categories. The most-nominated reality programs are “RuPaul’s Drag Race,” “Selling Sunset” and “Summer House.”
