“Top Chef Masters” (9 p.m., Bravo) offers a tip of the toque to “Iron Chef,” pitting 24 world-famous chefs against each other in weekly competitions. The culinary masters play for prestige and prize money, but mostly for the chance to bestow their favorite charities with $500,000. The winner of each week’s contest will compete in a final round that will determine who becomes the top master of the top masters, or something suitably superlative.

I’m not entirely sure how “Top Chef” fans will feel about this celebrity version. For starters, half the “fun” of the series is to see fledgling chefs flail under pressure. These guys (and in the first round, they are all guys) tend to be cool under pressure. And since they’ve all received professional accolades and run successful businesses, they don’t need to prove anything. In short, they behave like gentlemen and don’t play games or shout at each other or try to sabotage the competition. They aren’t even passive-aggressive.

Reality television, from “The Hills” to “John & Kate” and “The Real Housewives,” puts the emphasis on self-destructive, delusional and obnoxious behavior. So “Top Chef” fans accustomed to watching insecure egomaniacs behave like jerks may find this all a little too mature and uplifting.

• Jumbled in the offerings of this month’s PBS pledge drives on PBS, “American Masters” (8 p.m., PBS) airs the hour-long appreciation “Neil Young: Don’t Be Denied.”

Again, this film is scheduled on the general PBS schedule, but as this is pledge month, it could air at any time in June. Please check your local listings.

“Denied” mixes vintage footage with interviews of the reclusive Young made especially for this 2008 BBC production. The film includes clips from Young’s Canadian high school band as well as Young with Buffalo Springfield; Crosby, Stills and Nash; and his longtime collaborators, Crazy Horse.

The film puts special emphasis on Young’s lifelong habit of zigging when other pop stars zagged and of outraging audiences and disappointing collaborators. And it doesn’t even get into the whole “Southern Man” versus “Sweet Home Alabama” fracas. Despite, or perhaps because of, his ornery nature, Young remains one of a handful of artists from the Woodstock era to remain even slightly relevant to younger audiences. To quote a Young lyric (that he probably won’t sing anymore), “Long may you run.”

• TCM celebrates the films of writer/director Preston Sturgis, who, in the space of 10 years, created some of the best and smartest comedies in Hollywood history, including “The Lady Eve” (7 p.m.), “Sullivan’s Travels” (9 p.m.) and “The Palm Beach Story” (11 p.m.).

Tonight’s other highlights

• The top 20 compete on “So You Think You Can Dance” (7 p.m., Fox).

• On two episodes of “Law & Order” (NBC), murder on the base (8 p.m.), death on the Web (9 p.m.).

• “Mythbusters” (8 p.m., Discovery) looks into legends of sonic booms.

• Witness protection becomes a problem on “CSI: NY” (9 p.m., CBS).

• A nudist’s fatal run raises eyebrows on “The Unusuals” (9 p.m., ABC).

• “True Hollywood Story” (9 p.m., E!) profiles Patrick Swayze.

• Billy offers a unique take on insurance reform on “Pitchmen” (9 p.m., Discovery).