Even the biggest events in the world need to be sold with a little white lie. While “Primetime in Paris: The Olympics” (7:30 p.m., NBC) suggests live coverage, it will actually present activities from this afternoon, including the Olympics Opening Ceremony, which takes place at 1 p.m.
Having already endured a dramatic election, hosted the Tour de France and celebrated Bastille Day, hundreds of thousands of French spectators and visitors will attend the parade of athletes from around the world and a thematic show with an accent on the glories of French history and culture.
The city of Paris will be central to the spectacle, with the River Seine itself a venue for swimming events.
NBC’s “Primetime in Paris” coverage will continue over the course of the Games and can also be streamed on Peacock. Peacock will also stream “The Gold Zone” from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day through Aug. 10, helping viewers navigate their many viewing options in an Olympics where up to 40 events can be happening simultaneously at any given moment.
Peacock will also stream “Watch With Alex Cooper,” affording viewers picture-within-picture commentary on events from podcaster Cooper and her many guests.
— A contemporary blend of drawing-room farce, family melodrama and post-apocalyptic environmental dread, the 2024 horror film “Humane” streams on Shudder. After an environmental disaster drastically limits the planet’s resources, a global government mandates a blend of voluntary and forced euthanasia.
A game cast including Jay Baruchel (“How to Train Your Dragon”), Emily Hampshire (“Boy Meets Girl”), Peter Gallagher (“The OC,” “American Beauty”), Enrico Colantoni (“Veronica Mars,” “Just Shoot Me,” “Galaxy Quest”) portrays members of a privileged, talented and highly neurotic family reacting to the news and their place in a grim new world order.
The directorial debut of Caitlin Cronenberg, daughter of David Cronenberg (“Scanners,” “The Fly”), the film received generally positive reviews. The Chicago Sun-Times described it as a contemporary take on Poe’s “Fall of the House of Usher.”
— Russell Crowe stars in the 2024 drama “Sleeping Dogs,” streaming today on Hulu. He portrays Roy Freeman, a former homicide detective slipping into dementia who undergoes an experimental treatment. He’s approached by a lawyer for a Death Row inmate who insists that Freeman’s partner pressured his client into a confession and hopes he might provide some exonerating evidence or insight. Something complicated by the fact that Freeman’s memories have become entirely suspect.
Based on the novel “The Book of Mirrors” by E.O. Chirovici, “Dogs” was released to middling reviews in March of this year.
TONIGHT’S OTHER HIGHLIGHTS
— An overscheduled woman shares a hectic flight with a country music star in the 2018 holiday romance “Time for Me to Come Home for Christmas” (7 p.m., Hallmark, TV-G). Followed by “Time for Him to Come Home for Christmas” (9 p.m., TV-G), about a woman trying to decipher a mysterious phone message from a voice claiming to be the love of her life.
— Blindsided by a midlife divorce, a mom (Melissa McCarthy) enrolls in college, much to the chagrin of her coed daughter (Molly Gordon) in the 2018 comedy “Life of the Party” (8 p.m., AMC).
— Danny and Gormley reach out to pull a dedicated colleague back from the brink on “Blue Bloods” (10 p.m., CBS, r, TV-14).
CULT CHOICE
Robby Benson (“Beauty and the Beast”) stars in the 1976 period drama “Ode to Billy Joe” (10 p.m., TCM, TV-PG). An attempt to “explain” the mysteries embedded in the 1967 hit song of the same name by Bobbie Gentry, the film was met with poor reviews. But it was a box-office hit, earning many times its $1 million budget. Directed by Max Baer Jr., better known as Jethro on “The Beverly Hillbillies.” Typecast by that outlandish character, Baer’s time behind the camera resulted in some spectacularly profitable films. He wrote, produced and starred in 1974’s “Macon County Line,” which cost $200,000 and earned $30 million, setting a record for return on investment that lasted until “The Blair Witch Project” arrived in 1999.
SERIES NOTES
“Lingo” (8 p.m., CBS, TV-PG) … “WWE Friday Night SmackDown” (8 p.m., Fox, TV-PG) … “Jeopardy! Masters” (8 p.m., ABC, r, TV-PG) … A mission goes south on “S.W.A.T.” (9 p.m., CBS, r, TV-14) … “20/20” (9 p.m., ABC).
LATE NIGHT
Jimmy Fallon welcomes Nick Jonas, Sue Bird, Megan Rapinoe, Ice Spice and Central Cee on “The Tonight Show” (11:35 p.m., NBC) … Olympic coverage pre-empts “Late Night With Seth Meyers” (12:35 a.m., NBC) … Taylor Tomlinson hosts Sasheer Zamata, Joe Lo Truglio and Aparna Nancherla on “After Midnight” (12:35 a.m., CBS, r).
