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Rebels on Pointe (Sunday Documentary Channel, 9 p.m.) is a charming and shrewd take on the male ballerinas of the legendary Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo.

With the Olympics in full swing (men's curling, women's curling, two-man bobsled and ice dance are part of this weekend's schedule), certain issues are put in perspective.

On display are force and possibilities of physical contest and the meaning of the Olympic motto, "faster, higher, stronger." And in a now-notorious blog post, the executive editor of Fox News sarcastically wrote that the US Olympic Committee was trying to change that motto from "Faster, Higher, Stronger" to "Darker, Gayer, Different."

There are numerous LGBTQ athletes at the Games. American figure skater Adam Rippon is pretty much at war with the Trump administration via social media and Canadian Eric Radford – the Winter Olympics' first openly gay gold medalist – tweeted a photo of himself with Rippon, who also won a medal.

That context makes it an excellent time to savour a lovely documentary that is, essentially, about issues of skill and grace. It's about a group of guys who "use their masculinity to say something about femininity."

Rebels on Pointe (Sunday Documentary Channel, 9 p.m.) is a charming and shrewd take on the male ballerinas of the legendary Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo. It's part performance documentary and part portrait of the performers and the company. But filmmaker Bobbi Jo Hart's other task is to make it clear that this group of performers aren't a joke-act. One of the talking heads doing commentary is James Whiteside, principal dancer of the American Ballet Theatre. And he is, as a professional in classical ballet, rather in awe of what he calls "the Trocks."

The history of Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo is itself a remarkably enlightening reflection of change. The all-male drag ballet corps was founded in New York City in 1974. The idea of an all-male troupe parodying the formalities of romantic and classical ballet was outrageous back then. There was plenty of attention, though with an emphasis on the cuteness of the idea. The doc contains great footage of the guys performing with Shirley MacLaine during her TV special in 1977.

But there were dark days as the AIDS crisis struck the gay community and the Trocks were sometimes shunned while also acting as a refuge for many of its members. Today, there are three marriages in the troupe. Several of the current members are profiled in the doc and they have memorable, often deeply heart-warming stories about their lives. Dancer Chase Johnsey ruefully explains his hesitancy and panic about coming out to his mother. Eventually he just had to do it and he woke her up in the middle of the night to tell her. "You woke me up for this?" his outraged mom said, exasperated about being awakened to be told something she'd known for years.

Along with the personal stories there is smart, learned commentary too. Journalists who cover ballet explain exactly why there is both magic and true art in what these guys do and how they shine a light on ballet skills even when they are seemingly creating a comedy routine. They are funny, but also far more than that.

If you want a very different perspective and a peculiar kind of escapism right now, note that an important new comedy special just landed on Netflix. Chris Rock: Tamborine (streaming now) is Rock's first TV special since 2008. This is a very different kind of show, much smaller in scale than the elaborate appropriations of his arena spectacles done around the world. It's just Rock in a t-shirt and jeans in a small theatre with 800 people. He's older now, wiser, chastened and his mischief is more honed and self-aware.

His facility with language is as sharp as ever and his take on U.S. politics is lethally sardonic. After some material about American cops, young black men and the justice system – "The American justice system should be like Walmart. If you can find a lighter sentence, we'll match it" – his focus is on getting his kids ready for a white world. He has no sympathy for the idea that schools should not allow bullying. He says the country is now so unused to bullying, it's pathetic. "That's how Trump got elected. A real bully showed up and nobody knew how to handle him."

There follows a long and sometimes self-loathing take on the dissolution of his marriage and the ensuing and bitter court battles. Sometimes he's terrifyingly funny and sometimes he is terrifyingly, painfully honest. This is brutally frank, forthright comedy from a major comic at the next stage of his life.

At the European premiere actors including Lupita Nyong'o, Michael B Jordan and Chadwick Boseman talk about the importance of the Black Panther movie for young people.

Reuters

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