TONIGHT'S MUST-SEE

"Monty Python's Flying Circus," 7 and 8:40 p.m.; BBC America/KHON digital, 341. Comedy reached a peak in 1974, when "Python" premiered. Here were young Englishmen with a wondrous touch for nonsense. They could leap in and out of sketches, always finding humans at their silliest. Now the 45 episodes have been digitally re-mastered and will be shown chronologically on Fridays, starting today.

OF NOTE

"Forrest Gump" (1994, TNT), 5 p.m.; "Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl" (2003, USA Network); "Chicken Little" (2005, Disney Channel) or "Mean Girls" (2004, ABC Family); all 8 p.m. It's a movie night for families. "Gump" is an Oscar-winning fable; "Pirates" is a light swashbuckler with great work from Johnny Depp; "Chicken" is animated; "Mean Girls" is a Lindsay Lohan/Tina Fey comedy.

"Ghost Whisperer," 7 p.m., CBS. A spirit wants his body moved to the correct grave. Melinda doesn't like the guy, because he reminds her of the dad who abandoned her.

"National Spelling Bee," 7 p.m., ABC. Here are finals, with young people (ages 8-15) spelling impossible words.

"Little Black Book" (2004), 7 p.m., Fox. Brittany Murphy plays a woman who spies on her boyfriend's life, contacting the women listed in his electronic organizer.

"That Mitchell and Webb Look," 8:20 p.m., BBC America, KHON, digital 341. Between the "Python" reruns, try some more British humor.

"Doctor Who," 9 and 11 p.m., Sci Fi Channel. Here's a British show to tape and watch after "Python." In the first episode, the Sontarans are altering the Earth's atmosphere; in the second, war breaks out in 1913.