What to Watch Friday: ‘Dateline’ puts spotlight on a wrongful murder conviction
Icon: Music Through the Lens (9 p.m., PBS NC) - This music photography series finishes out the season with two new episodes. At 9, the transition of music photography from a niche pastime to a highly collectable and valuable art form is examined through conversations with industry insiders. At 10, a look at where music photography sits in the contemporary, popular culture landscape, and whether music photography still has a role to play.
Dateline NBC (10 p.m., NBC) - Lester Holt reports on the murder of four-year-old Barbara Jean Horn, and how the investigation into her death revealed decades of misconduct across Philadelphia’s criminal justice system and raised questions of whether police had caught the right man. The man once convicted and sentenced to death for Barbara Jean’s murder, Walter Ogrod, speaks out in his first network television interview about being wrongfully convicted and spending 28 years in prison, including 23 years on death row. He was released from prison on June 5, 2020. The episode also features an exclusive national broadcast interview with Barbara Jean’s parents and an interview with journalist Tom Lowenstein, who investigated Barbara Jean’s murder for decades. Additionally, Holt speaks with Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner about plans to restore trust in the city’s criminal justice system and correct decades of misconduct. This report is part of NBC News’ weeklong “Justice For All” series on wrongful convictions.
CODA (Apple TV+) - This Sundance Award-winning film follows 17-year-old Ruby (Emilia Jones), who is the sole hearing member of a deaf family – a CODA, child of deaf adults. The film description from Apple: “Her life revolves around acting as interpreter for her parents (Marlee Matlin, Troy Kotsur) and working on the family’s struggling fishing boat every day before school with her father and older brother (Daniel Durant). But when Ruby joins her high school’s choir club, she discovers a gift for singing and soon finds herself drawn to her duet partner Miles (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo). Encouraged by her enthusiastic, tough-love choirmaster (Eugenio Derbez) to apply to a prestigious music school, Ruby finds herself torn between the obligations she feels to her family and the pursuit of her own dreams.”
Beckett (Netflix) - In this new original film, an American tourist vacationing in Greece becomes the target of a manhunt after a devastating accident. Forced to run for his life and desperate to get across the country to the American embassy to clear his name, tensions escalate as the authorities close in, political unrest mounts, and Beckett (John David Washington) falls even deeper into a dangerous web of conspiracy.
Schmigadoon (Apple TV+) - In the Season 1 finale, Mildred (Kristin Chenoweth) relentlessly ramps up her election campaign, and Josh (Keegan-Michael Key) and Melissa (Cecily Strong) face their true feelings for each other.
Some programming descriptions are provided by networks.
