Tonight's TV Hot List: Wednesday, Aug. 12, 2009

Top Chef Masters
10/9c Bravo
The culinary contest turns on the heat as we start dipping into the last course. (The season finale airs next week.) All eyes are on the remaining four food fighters — Rick Bayless, Michael Chiarello, Hubert Keller and Anita Lo — when they whip up meals while blindfolded. Afterward, the chefs must cater a large event, but the challenge comes with a catch: They are forbidden to handle the food, and must instead tap into their teaching and leadership skills. Assisting them are erstwhile Top Chef contestants, including the fiery Dale Talde, who evidently gets into a dishin'-and-dissin' duel with Chiarello. — Dean Maurer
Live From Lincoln Center
8/7c PBS
Acclaimed violinist Joshua Bell joins the Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival Orchestra, under the baton of Louis Langrée, for an evening of classical delights. Included are Haydn's London Symphony, Mendelssohn's Hebrides Overture and Violin Concerto in E minor and, of course, some Mozart, in this case Adagio for Violin and Orchestra in E major and Rondo for Violin and Orchestra in C major. Alan Alda hosts. — Jeff Gemmill
The Philanthropist
10/9c NBC
As Teddy Rist's first season of do-gooding comes to an end, the focus shifts to his best friend and business partner Philip (Jesse L. Martin) and we see the intense impact that helping others has when the situation hits close to home. The friends travel to Haiti, Philip's birthplace, to help with a food shortage, but find that their biggest obstacle is Philip's brother, island senator Jean Beauvais, who has a different take on helping one's own. There's nothing like sibling rivalry to put a hiccup into plans to do good...even to feed the hungry. — Rhoda Charles
Make My Day
10:30/9:30c TV Land
If you caught last week's premiere, you already know that this reality show is like a bubble machine that spouts smiley faces. Wasn't the joy and surprise experienced by that music-store owner in Staten Island priceless? Well, there's bound to be more goodwill generated tonight when the series trains its hidden cameras on a happy-go-lucky dad from New Jersey who loves rapper Lil Jon and comic Earthquake, and gives him a day he'll likely never forget. — Joe Friedrich
Criss Angel: Mindfreak
10/9c A&E
There's "buried alive"...and then there's buried alive! Criss Angel always takes it to the extreme, so guess which route he chooses. He goes that extra mile on his fifth-season opener in which he's, you guessed it, buried alive. But he's also shackled before he's placed in the coffin, and he's surrounded by ice and snow just to make things more interesting. Add to this the fact that his coffin is transparent, and it should be a revealing episode in many thrilling and chilling ways. — Bill Ecklund