ESPN profiles Lance Armstrong
“30 for 30” (9 p.m. Sunday, ESPN, TV-MA) offers “Lance,” a two-part series (concluding Sunday, May 31) profile that offers frank interviews with disgraced Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong. The makers of “Lance” get right down to business, asking Armstrong and his colleagues when they began illegal doping, and pinning Armstrong down on the details of his settlement of a lawsuit with the post office, one of many entities that felt defrauded by his cheating.
While the details of his rise and fall are relatively well known, “Lance” is best appreciated as an examination of the kind of personality that emerges from early sports stardom. Not good at traditional sports, Armstrong quickly excelled at swimming and then triathlons before focusing on cycling.
Is the single-minded focus required to become an elite athlete at odds with the aims of becoming a well-rounded individual? One person after another comes forward in “Lance” to extol the subject’s excellence and at the same time describe his selfish obnoxiousness. During his interviews, he comes across as frank and often charming. Journalists interviewed here warn viewers from the get-go that he will do anything to bend the narrative in his favor.
An interesting subplot emerges when young Lance becomes an international competitor in what is largely considered a European sport. There’s something amusing about watching his brash young team relocate from Texas to Italy’s Lake Como, a posh resort for the wellheeled.
Cycling experts offer an interesting analysis of how each European country produces champions that reflect national traits, from the methodical discipline of the Germans to the stylish hauteur of the French. Americans, and not just Armstrong, are simply considered “weird” for having rejected such “American” sports as football and basketball to compete on a European field.
Lance Armstrong is not easy to like, but “Lance” delivers. It’s a character study that lives up to its billing.
› ABC repeats the first two installments of the
ESPN documentary miniseries “The Last Dance” (Saturday 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., TV-14), recalling the drama of the Chicago Bulls 1997-98 season as the team attempted to win a sixth NBA title in the span of eight years. The series recalls how much Michael Jordan dominated coverage of the game and his place in society and pop culture, and profiles the supporting “cast” of players, including the durable Scottie Pippen, the “colorful” Dennis Rodman and coach Phil Jackson, whose description of the season gives the series its title.
Given the absence of live competition, “The Last Dance” has become more of an item for the sports pages than a mere television column.
› The 2019 horror satire “Ready or Not” (8 p.m. Saturday, HBO) turns the Hallmark movie on its head. A pretty bride (Samara Weaving) marries into a wealthy family who appear to be living the dream.
Only this Cinderella discovers one weird catch: The family follows a tradition of hunting down one member of the wedding party with medieval weaponry. And she’s drawn the wrong card.
A critical hit that earned many times its modest budget, “Ready” was hailed as a horrific take on the wealthy at their worst.
With so many real examples of greed and inequality, why manufacture something so monumentally contrived?
The same could be said of “Snowpiercer.”