What to watch
SUNDAY
May 23, 2021
All times Central. Start times can vary based on cable/satellite provider. Confirm times on your on-screen guide.
Master of None
Netflix ■ Season Premiere
The Emmy-winning series returns for a third season, chronicling the relationship of Denise (Lena Waithe) and her partner, Alicia (Naomi Ackie). Netflix says this new season, directed by series co-creator Aziz Ansari, and scripted by Ansari and Waithe, remains tethered to previous seasons while breaking new storytelling ground of its own. Season 3 is a modern love story that intimately illustrates the ups and downs of marriage, fertility struggles and personal growth both together and apart. Fleeting romantic highs meet crushing personal losses while existential questions of love and living are raised.
NASCAR Cup Series: EchoPark Texas Grand Prix
FS1, 1:30 p.m. Live
Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, hosts its first ever NASCAR Cup Series race on its 3.41-mile, 20-turn road course.
American Idol
ABC, 7 p.m. Season Finale
The winner of the 19th season is crowned tonight in the three-hour season finale.
The Equalizer
CBS, 7 p.m. ■ Season Finale
In the Season 1 finale episode “Reckoning,” McCall’s (Queen Latifah) personal and professional lives collide when Delilah (Laya DeLeon Hayes) and her friends are threatened by a European crime syndicate for being eyewitnesses to the outfit’s execution of a drug cartel boss.
2021 Billboard Music Awards
NBC, 7 p.m. Live
This annual live broadcast showcases spectacular performances, unexpected collaborations, buzzworthy pop-culture moments and more as it celebrates the past year’s greatest achievements in music. Billboard Music Awards nominees and winners are based on key fan interactions with music, including album and digital song sales, streaming, radio airplay, touring and social engagement, tracked by Billboard and its data partners. The Weeknd leads the nominees with 16 nods.
The Story of Late Night
CNN, 8 p.m.
In “Letterman v. Leno,” Carson’s 1992 retirement touches a nation — and touches off an epic late-night war between Jay
Leno and David Letterman. But it’s network newcomers Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Kimmel — and the comic inspirations of cable upstart Jon Stewart — that introduce hilarious new comedy perspectives that could change late night’s sense of humor forever.
In Treatment
HBO, 8 p.m. ■ New Series
It’s been over 10 years since we eavesdropped on therapy sessions in this drama’s original 2008-10 run starring Gabriel Byrne as Dr. Paul Weston. When Emmy winner Uzo Aduba takes over as Dr. Brooke Taylor, one of Weston’s mentees, her practice is just as gripping. “What I found exciting is who she is with each patient is not the same,” Aduba says of the intuitive Los Angeles-based psychologist, who treats three clients in her house and online due to the pandemic. That adds another layer to the give-and-take: “These patients are getting a wealth of information on who she is.” Tonight’s back-to-back episodes introduce two of those clients, heartfelt Eladio (Anthony Ramos), a home health aide with insomnia, and fiery Colin (John Benjamin Hickey), a millionaire turned white-collar criminal trying to maintain his early release from prison. In Monday’s installments (four air weekly), we meet third patient Laila (Quintessa Swindell), an entitled teen skirting questions about her sexuality, then get to know the doc off-the-clock. Brooke struggles with issues raised by her father’s death and her desire to reconnect with an ex, Adam (Joel Kinnaman). Says Aduba,
“It’s the classic case of people who care well for others but take the least care of themselves.”