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The Best Episodes of Great Performances Season 53

Every episode of Great Performances Season 53 ranked from best to worst. Discover the Best Episodes of Great Performances Season 53!

Binge this in 21h 25m•Peaking at 10.0/10

The best in the performing arts from across America and around the world including a diverse programming portfolio of classical music, opera, popular song, musical theater, dance, drama, and performance documentaries.

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Episode Rankings

  1. #1 Fan Favorite
    Great Performances Season 53 Episode 1 - The Magic of Grace Bumbry
    8.1/10(9 votes)

    #1 - The Magic of Grace Bumbry

    S53:E1

    Discover Grace Bumbry’s inspiring rise to global opera fame. Spotlighting her historic performances, the film explores the racial barriers she overcame to triumph in her 1966 performance as "Carmen."

    Director:Dag Freyer
    Writer:Unknown

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  2. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 2 - Great Performances at the Met: Il Barbiere di Siviglia
    10.0/10(1 votes)

    #2 - Great Performances at the Met: Il Barbiere di Siviglia

    S53:E2

    Rossini’s effervescent comedy retakes the stage in Bartlett Sher’s madcap production. Aigul Akhmetshina headlines a winning ensemble as the feisty heroine, Rosina, alongside Jack Swanson, in his Met debut, as her secret beloved, Count Almaviva. Andrey Zhilikhovsky stars as Figaro, the infamous barber of Seville, with Peter Kálmán as Dr. Bartolo and Alexander Vinogradov as Don Basilio.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  3. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 3 - Tiler Peck: Suspending Time
    10.0/10(1 votes)

    #3 - Tiler Peck: Suspending Time

    S53:E3

    Follow acclaimed ballerina Tiler Peck as she overcomes injury to reclaim her place on stage and debut her own choreography with New York City Ballet, revealing the resilience and artistry behind a modern-day prima ballerina.

    Director:Alex Ramsey
    Writer:Unknown

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  4. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 4 - Twelfth Night
    7.8/10(72 votes)

    #4 - Twelfth Night

    S53:E4

    The Shakespearean comedy of mistaken identity tells the romantic misadventures of twins Sebastian and Viola after they survive a shipwreck, including revenge plots and tricks of love. Recorded this summer at the newly renovated Delacorte Theater in Central Park, the production is directed by Tony Award nominee Saheem Ali.

    Directors:Matthew Diamond, Saheem Ali
    Writer:Unknown

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  5. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 5 - Nutcracker from English National Ballet
    7.5/10(10 votes)

    #5 - Nutcracker from English National Ballet

    S53:E5

    Experience the holiday classic in a new light, featuring over 100 dancers and musicians performing at the London Coliseum.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  6. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 6 - From Vienna: The New Year’s Celebration 2026
    8.4/10(10 votes)

    #6 - From Vienna: The New Year’s Celebration 2026

    S53:E6

    The famed Vienna Philharmonic rings in the New Year with its annual concert from Vienna's Musikverein conducted for the first time by Yannick Nézet-Séguin with performances by the Vienna State Ballet and location segments hosted by Hugh Bonneville.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  7. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 7 - Movies for Grownups® Awards 2026 with AARP The Magazine
    6.6/10(8 votes)

    #7 - Movies for Grownups® Awards 2026 with AARP The Magazine

    S53:E7

    Iconic and beloved screen and stage performer Alan Cumming returns as host for this awards show in which Adam Sandler receives the Career Achievement Award.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  8. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 8 - Samara Joy at Royal Albert Hall
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #8 - Samara Joy at Royal Albert Hall

    S53:E8

    A number one album and a double Grammy-win in 2023 put jazz vocalist Samara Joy on the map, officially establishing the Bronx native as the next jazz sensation and a legend in the making, with frequent comparisons to Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan. Fresh from another double win at the 2025 Grammys, Joy makes her much-anticipated debut at London’s legendary Royal Albert Hall.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  9. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 9 - Great Performances at the Met: La Bohème
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #9 - Great Performances at the Met: La Bohème

    S53:E9

    Experience Zeffirelli’s beloved production set in 19th-century Paris telling the story of Puccini’s young artists and lovers that share joy, passion, and heartbreak featuring Juliana Grigoryan as Mimì and Freddie De Tommaso as Rodolfo.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  10. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 10 - Great Performances at the Met: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #10 - Great Performances at the Met: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay

    S53:E10

    In this new adaptation of Michael Chabon’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel set shortly before the outbreak of World War II, two Jewish cousins invent an anti-fascist superhero and launch their own comic-book series, hoping to recruit America into the fight against Nazism.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  11. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 11 - Now Hear This – “Brahms: Free But Alone”
    8.2/10(5 votes)

    #11 - Now Hear This – “Brahms: Free But Alone”

    S53:E11

    Johannes Brahms was a quiet, private person, but he lived a full life, bearing a responsibility he didn’t want, a woman he couldn’t be with, and a legacy he couldn’t live up to. Scott Yoo journeys across Germany with pianist Elisabeth Brauss and cellists Johannes Moser and Max Hornung to find a window into Brahms’ inner life.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  12. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 12 - Great Performances at the Met: La Sonnambula
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #12 - Great Performances at the Met: La Sonnambula

    S53:E12

    Nadine Sierra stars as Amina in Bellini’s tale of love lost and found. This new production by Rolando Villazón—the tenor who has embarked on a second career as a director—retains the opera’s original setting in the Swiss Alps but uses its plot to explore the emotional and psychological valleys of the mind.

    Director:Rolando Villazón
    Writer:Unknown

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  13. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 13 - Now Hear This – “Everyone Loves Joplin”
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #13 - Now Hear This – “Everyone Loves Joplin”

    S53:E13

    Scott Joplin was the king of ragtime, a new kind music for the turn of the 20th century. Rick Benjamin’s Paragon Ragtime Orchestra takes Scott Yoo back in time to experience the music, movies and style of that era.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  14. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 15 - Now Hear This – “The Call of Istanbul”
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #14 - Now Hear This – “The Call of Istanbul”

    S53:E15

    Istanbul sits at the crossroads of Asia and Europe, a melting pot of diverse peoples, languages and ideas. With star Turkish pianist Fazil Say, conductor Çem Mansur, and a host of Anatolian folk and Turkish jazz musicians, Scott Yoo and his wife, flutist Alice Dade, explore the city.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  15. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 16 - Now Hear This – “The Iceland Sound”
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #15 - Now Hear This – “The Iceland Sound”

    S53:E16

    Fewer people live in Iceland than in Wichita, Kansas, yet it produces some of the best musicians in the world. To find out how, Scott Yoo crosses this sunlit, rainy, volcanic land of extremes to meet composers Anna Thorvaldsdottir and Daniel Bjarnason, popular musician JFDR, instrument makers, music historians, and one of Iceland’s most famous chefs.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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  16. Great Performances Season 53 Episode 17 - Suffs
    0.0/10(0 votes)

    #16 - Suffs

    S53:E17

    Created by Tony Award winner Shaina Taub, this musical recorded from Broadway tells the story of the American suffragist movement and the remarkable friendships, heartbreak, and action that brought women together—or, in some cases, tore them apart.

    Director:Unknown
    Writer:Unknown

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Season 53 Ratings Summary

"The Magic of Grace Bumbry" is the best rated episode of "Great Performances" season 53. It scored 8.1/10 based on 9 votes. Directed by Dag Freyer and written by Unknown, it aired on 10/3/2025. This episode is rated 1.9 points higher than the second-best, "Great Performances at the Met: Il Barbiere di Siviglia".