A new 'Masterpiece Classic,' and a Showtime fave returns

It's a banner week for fans of public broadcasting: A new installment of PBS's "Masterpiece Classic" premieres along with the TV return of public-radio favorite "This American Life" on Showtime.

"Cranford"

One doesn't often think of PBS's "Masterpiece Classic" generating great gales of guffaws, but "Cranford" (9 p.m. EDT Sunday) elicits abundant good cheer. While there are dark moments following the demise of several townsfolk, the premiere episode is generally upbeat and comical in this character study of the residents of Cranford.

Set in the 1840s in a small English village -- imagine "Gilmore Girls' " Stars Hollow in a 19th-century setting -- "Cranford" is based on the writings of Elizabeth Gaskell ("Wives & Daughters") and melds the class consciousness of Charles Dickens with the romance of Jane Austen, a win-win proposition.

The story begins as Mary Smith (Lisa Dillon) moves to Cranford to live with spinster friends Miss Deborah (Eileen Atkins) and Miss Matty (Judi Dench). Deborah, in particular, is a stickler for formalities and propriety. Matty informs Mary that Deborah considers sucking the juice from an orange to be "vulgar."

"My sister does not care for the expression 'suck,' " Matty informs Mary as Deborah blanches and then declares, "We will repair to our rooms and consume our fruit in solitude."

In Cranford, much import is given to what's appropriate. When young Dr. Harrison (Simon Woods, "Rome") arrives in town wearing a maroon jacket, the town's veteran doctor tells him to get a black coat.

"I wear black, our patients trust black!" he implores, explaining later, "This is Cranford, everything unchanging, perpetual, a society that knows itself, a place at peace."

Despite attempts to thwart change from the outside and within themselves, the residents of Cranford, including the imperious Lady Ludlow (Francesca Annis), do grow and change through the course of this lavish five-hour production that covers events over a one-year period.

Some of their attitudes soften and they make better choices as they evolve beyond set-in-their-ways stubbornness, even though it's that rigor that conjures giggles.

When a poor woman stumbles, a gentleman helps her up, much to Deborah's dismay.

"I don't object to his helping her," she says. "It was an act of Christian kindness. But to take her arm and offer to escort her home shows a revolting want of decorum!"

The performances are uniformly excellent. Both the veterans -- Atkins, Dench and Imelda Staunton as the town gossip, Mrs. Pole -- and the younger generation -- Dillon and Woods -- contribute to making "Cranford" a sublime TV experience.

A two-hour "Cranford" episode airs Sunday night and May 18 with a one-hour installment next Sunday.

"This American Life"

The TV edition of "This American Life" begins its second season on Showtime Sunday at 10 p.m. with host Ira Glass ditching the anchor desk he toted all over the country last season. In the season premiere, he simply introduces an episode on "Escape" while riding up an escalator in the New York subway.

Sunday night's episode contains just two stories of escape. The first is about urban cowboys in Philadelphia. The second story that takes up the bulk of the half-hour is an intimate portrait of Mike, a physically disabled 27-year-old who wants to live on his own even though he cannot walk and speaks only through a computer.

Mike's mother has cared for him for years, sheltering him from a world he longs to be part of despite suffering from spinal muscular atrophy.

"TAL" introduces viewers to other figures in Mike's life, and Glass doesn't shy away from asking difficult, personal questions. It's not always easy to watch, but "TAL" offers such a humane, respectful portrait that it's worth summoning the courage to tune in.

When Glass asks Mike whose voice he'd like to have if given the choice, he says Johnny Depp's. Moments later, Depp begins reading Mike's words and continues to do so throughout the episode. With that act of kindness and consideration, Glass and "TAL" display a level of sophisticated grace not often found in modern media.

(TV editor Rob Owen can be reached at rowen(at)post-gazette.com.)

(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)