'Prime' viewing at lunchtime PTC

Two films airing on Showtime today may be enough for you to consider calling in sick today, or at least taking a long lunch.

Maggie Smith won the first of her two Academy Awards for 1969's "The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie" (11: 15 a.m.-1: 15 p.m.), where she's marvelous as a teacher at a Scottish girls' school in 1932 whose students become immersed in art, music and some ill-chosen politics. There are even a few romantic subplots and some schoolgirl conniving thrown in for good measure. But the story is secondary to Smith, who's so good that her performance has since become a model for every would-be actress trying to portray an English schoolteacher.

All sorts of star power is displayed in "12 Angry Men" (1: 15 p.m.-3 p.m.), director Sidney Lumet's 1957 film about group dynamics, in which Henry Fonda is the lone holdout among a group of jurors trapped in a swelteringly hot room until they can reach a verdict. Take your pick from among the great actors doing some of their finest work, including Fonda, Lee J. Cobb, Ed Begley, E.G. Marshall, Jack Warden, Martin Balsam and a young Jack Klugman.