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andrew ryan: weekend tv

Cinema Verite Saturday, HBO Canada, 9 p.m.

Before the Real Housewives, the Kardashians and the general pox that is reality television, there was An American Family. Launched on PBS in 1973, the unscripted series introduced viewers to the Louds, seemingly your typical middle-class American family living the good life in Santa Barbara, Calif. The show tore the family apart, according to this new HBO movie. In unflinching manner, Cinema Verite details the strain the series put on Loud patriarch, Bill (Tim Robbins), and wife, Pat (Diane Lane), whose marriage unravelled over the course of the 10-part series. The show likewise took a toll on their five children, most notably teen son Lance (Thomas Dekker), in effect one of the first gay people to ever come out on American television. There's probably too much time given to the agenda of producer Craig Gilbert, played by ex-Sopranos star James Gandolfini in an outrageous hairpiece, who forced the crew to keep filming during the family's intimate moments, but Cinema Verite is still a searing indictment of the casualties that occur when normal people became famous.

Inside the Actors Studio Sunday, Bravo!, 5 p.m.

Still hosted by the ever-gushy James Lipton, the show remains one of the most entertaining interview programs on U.S. cable, and is always most watchable when it features a celebrity guest that actually warrants the treatment. (Still no explanation why the show interviewed the voice cast of Family Guy.) This Sunday's episode first aired last fall, and it's a corker, as red-hot octogenarian Betty White sits down for a lively chat with Lipton. In her typically unfiltered way, White, 88 at the time of the taping, opens up on a wide range of topics, including her seventies stint on The Mary Tyler Moore Show and her marriage to former game-show host Allen Ludden, who died in 1981. In the course of the interview, White also delivers touching anecdotes involving her former Golden Girls co-stars, and charmingly fields queries and compliments from the acting students in the audience. In short, she's simply Betty White and she has a grand old time, particularly when Lipton asks her his standard question: "What's your favourite curse word?" Better sit down for it.

Hookers: Saved on the Strip Sunday, Investigation Discovery, 7 p.m.

The world's oldest profession still elicits the world's saddest stories. This new series documents the ongoing efforts of former prostitute Annie Lobert to help women escape the sex industry. The program follows Lobert and her faith-based group through the seediest parts of Las Vegas, apparently the prostitution capital of North America. Each episode tells the story of a prostitute; none of those tales are pretty. The series debuts with three episodes. The first show profiles Dessire, a 19-year-old who claims she was tricked into the sex trade by her cousin. The second show focuses on Audrey, hiding out from pimps she believes want her dead. The third, and most heartbreaking, tells the story of Regina, a young woman pimped out by her boyfriend while both served in the U.S. Navy. In each instance, Lobert convinces the women to shake off their pasts by moving into Destiny House, a home offering ex-prostitutes counselling and a new start on life - and more importantly, self-respect. A powerful program.

Beyond the Blackboard Sunday, CBS, 9 p.m.

Remember when Sunday was TV-movie night? CBS seems to be the only U.S. network attempting to revive the tradition with these feel-good Hallmark movies. This effort is better than most, and places likeable young actress Emily VanCamp, formerly of Brothers & Sisters, into the real-life role of Stacey Bess, a young woman whose lifelong ambition was to become a school teacher. Stacey's wide-eyed dreams are shaken with her first teaching position at a rundown makeshift school in Salt Lake City, where she's expected to teach homeless kids from grades one through six in the same classroom. Perhaps understandably, the children are unruly and rambunctious, and often malnourished. But this is a Hallmark movie, so Stacey is undaunted as she begins the slow process of fixing up the school. She receives some assistance from a sympathetic superintendent, played by Treat Williams; but mostly she does it all by herself, one bookshelf and piano lesson at a time. Sure, the movie is predictable and a tad sappy, but it's a nice alternative to the usual Sunday-night options of Desperate Housewives and Celebrity Apprentice.

Check local listings.

John Doyle returns on Monday.

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