Remember Joe Rogan? The former comedian/actor appeared on “NewsRadio” and then had his career upended by a stint on “Fear Factor” that lasted longer than anyone — including Rogan and the show’s producers — had any right to expect. He now hosts the new hidden-camera series “Game Show in My Head” (today, 7 p.m. and 7:30 p.m., CBS).

Contestants in search of big money wear an earpiece as they walk around a city followed by Rogan and a hidden-camera team. At various intervals, Rogan will instruct the players to do wild, crazy and inappropriate things in public places. As long as the contestants dance to Rogan’s tune, they are in the hunt for the grand prize.

If they fail to perform one task they will forfeit their winnings and go home empty-handed. Unseen by this reviewer, “Head” sounds like an unholy alliance of candid-camera gimmickry and shock-jock humiliation. Help yourself.

• Acclaimed for her many stage and movie roles and her award-winning turn as Abigail Adams in last year’s HBO miniseries “John Adams,” Laura Linney takes over the hosting duties on “Masterpiece Classic” (8 p.m., Sunday, PBS).

Linney introduces the four-hour miniseries adaptation of Thomas Hardy’s “Tess of the D’Urbervilles” and reminds us of the difficulties that the author had getting the book published in 1891. A tale of a virtuous young woman violated and abandoned by a cad scandalized Hardy’s London publisher. Hardy returned his advance rather than submit to censorship, and he railed against the limitations of “being published in English” at a time when continental authors were taking greater liberties.

Any new “Tess” is going to be compared to director Roman Polanski’s lush 1979 version starring Nastassja Kinski. Gemma Arterton (“Quantum of Solace”), who stars in the title role, does not have the exotic beauty of the young Kinski, but she does a good job of conveying her character’s stubborn pride and innate sense of honor.

A tale of a woman trapped by circumstances, rigid class barriers, religious hypocrisy and the weakness of the men who woo and then ruin her, “Tess” may be difficult for contemporary American audiences to swallow. If Hollywood teaches us anything, it’s that obstacles can be overcome and that the lowborn (even those, like Tess, with a buried noble pedigree) can rise to the top with grit and gumption.

Like Hardy’s novel, this handsome production of “Tess” makes much of the manicured British countryside, a backdrop of pastoral beauty that is both a spiritual inspiration and a prison for our doomed heroine.

Today’s highlights

• Vanessa Marcil (“90210” and “Las Vegas”) takes on a domestic role in the made-for-TV romance “The Nanny Express” (8 p.m., Saturday, Hallmark, 8 p.m., Central), co-starring Stacy Keach and Dean Stockwell.

• A trip to a pageant becomes a family ordeal in the quirky 2006 comedy “Little Miss Sunshine” (8 p.m., USA).

Sunday’s highlights

• Scheduled on “60 Minutes” (6 p.m., CBS): harsh sentences for drunken driving that can exceed those for homicide; mind-reading techniques; an innovative college-football coach.

• Catch seven hours of “Planet Earth” (7 p.m. through 2 a.m., Discovery).