This week on WGCU TV — Cable channel 3

RAIN: The Beatles Experience - Saturday, Dec. 27, at 11 p.m.

For the past two decades, RAIN's live stage performances have flawlessly captured the full range of The Beatles musical legacy. They represent the Fab Four from their first "Ed Sullivan Show" appearance through the Abbey Road album, through the psychedelic '60s and the band's hardrocking rooftop days. RAIN: The Beatles Experience will be at the Barbara B. Mann Performing Arts Hall Jan. 13-18.

Masterpiece Mystery! "The Ruby in the Smoke" - Sunday, Dec. 28, at 9 p.m.

Scrappy teen Sally Lockhart has a mind for numbers and for sleuthing. In Phillip Pullman's quartet of novels, she's put through the paces of Victorian melodrama and mystery. In this vivid adaptation of the first book in the quartet, Sally is orphaned, but armed with a pearl-handled pistol and a keen mind. She uncovers the secrets of her father's death and faces England's deadliest villains with bold courage. Also starring Julie Waters.

Richard Tucker Music Foundation: An Opera Celebration - Sunday, Dec. 28, at 4:30 p.m.

The Richard Tucker Opera Gala concert at Lincoln Center features celebrated stars such as Renee Fleming, Joyce DiDonato, Simon Keenlyside and Diana Dam- rau singing popular pieces by Mozart, Verdi, Rossini, Wagner and Bernstein. Maestro Asher Fisch conducts The Metropolitan Opera Orchestra and the New York Choral Society.

Great Performances at The Met, "Doctor Atomic" - Monday, Dec. 29, at 9 p.m.

John Adams' contemporary masterpiece explores a momentous episode in modern history: the creation of the atomic bomb. Movie director Penny Woolcock makes her Met debut with this production. Baritone Gerald Finley plays J. Robert Oppenheimer, the title character, in this gripping adaptation of a story that changed the course of world history.

NOVA Premiere!, Is There Life on Mars? - Tuesday, Dec. 30, at 8 p.m.

More than four years after landing on Mars, NASA's twin robot explorers, Spirit and Opportunity, have lasted 16 times longer than expected. They've endured Martian storms and survived near-fatal software glitches, and hair-raising climbs and descents on steep slopes. Since May 25, 2008, they've had new company: NASA's Phoenix probe. The rovers and Phoenix are poised to reveal provocative new clues in the search for life on the Red Planet.

Live from Lincoln Center; New York Philharmonic New Year's Eve Gala Concert - Wednesday, Dec. 31, at 8 p.m.

The New York Philharmonic ushers in 2009 with tenor Rolando Villazon.