Television

Actor Neil Patrick Harris is starring in the new CBS sitcom How I Met Your Mother -- but most people know him as a teenage doctor in the early 1990s TV series Doogie Howser, MD, which is now available on DVD. Harris also played a parody of himself in the film Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle.

On the upcoming live episode of NBC's The West Wing, Congressman Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits) and Senator Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda) will meet in a one-hour presidential debate. Sunday evening, their conflict will be aired live.

Henry Winkler plays a doctor on the new CBS sitcom Out of Practice, which premiered last month and can be seen Mondays at 9:30 p.m. Winkler also spent two seasons playing a lawyer on the TV series Arrested Development.

In several ways, the age of "infotainment" is foretold in Good Night, and Good Luck, set in the 1950s. The film tells of newsman Edward R. Murrow's fight against Sen. Joe McCarthy -- but it also details "the inherent debasement of mass news in a commercial culture."

Critic at large John Powers considers the films of Alfred Hitchcock as a new DVD survey of his work is coming out: Alfred Hitchcock: The Masterpiece Collection.

The major networks and several cable units are offering up new seasons in September. A new HBO comedy, Extras, stars Ricky Gervais, who remains best known for starring in and helping to create the original British version of The Office.

Since 1999, Mariska Hargitay has played a police detective specializing in sex crimes on the NBC drama, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit.

Since 1999, Mariska Hargitay has played a police detective specializing in sex crimes on the NBC drama, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. Earlier this year, she won the Golden Globe for best actress in a dramatic series.

TV critic David Bianculli reviews the premiere of the new season of Lost. The ABC series about a group of castaways on an island is going into its second season.

Host and Fresh Air TV critic David Bianculli comments on television programming in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina.

TV critic David Bianculli reviews a new DVD box set of The Dick Cavett Show: Rock Icons. It's a compilation of interviews and performances on the late-night talk show by some of the leading musicians of the 1960s and '70s, including Mick Jagger, Janis Joplin and Stevie Wonder.

Six Feet Under, rest in peace. The HBO series, which aired its final episode Sunday, followed the Fisher family and its funeral home business for five seasons. It received two Golden Globe awards and six Emmys. Alan Ball, creator and executive producer, reflects on his show about death.

Television critic David Bianculli reviews the HBO series Six Feet Under. The series finale will air Sunday. Bianculli will talk about the show, which premiered on the cable network in 2001.

Bill Maher, host of HBO's Real Time With Bill Maher, has a new book, New Rules: Polite Musings of a Timid Observer. It's a compilation of satiric segments from the show, in which he takes aim at everything from cell phones and fast food to politics.

Television critic David Bianculli reviews the final episode of NYPD Blue and previews Deadwood the HBO Western which begins a second season this weekend. Both shows were created by David Milch.

TV critic David Bianculli reviews Over There, the new Stephen Bochco series about a U.S. Army unit arriving in Iraq for its first tour of duty. It premieres Wednesday night on the FX network.

Steven Bochco is co-creator and executive producer of Over There, the new FX drama about U.S. soldiers in Iraq. Bochco has won 10 Emmy awards for creating and producing Hill Street Blues, L.A. Law and NYPD Blue.

Actress Lauren Ambrose plays daughter Claire Fisher on the HBO drama series Six Feet Under. Her other roles include a teen introvert turned popular surfer chick with multiple personality disorder in the film Psycho Beach Party and a star student of Kevin Kline's in the film In and Out. Also a classically trained opera singer, Ambrose appeared on stage last year in the Sam Shepard play Buried Child at London's National Theatre.

Lisa Kudrow (Friends) stars in and executive producer Michael Patrick King (Sex and the City) created the new HBO comedy series The Comeback. It's a mock reality show that follows the career of a celebrity desperate to return to the spotlight.