This week in TV Guide: April 20, 1968

Xf all the most obvious ways in which television shows the passage of time and the change of the culture, I think the variety show may be the most overt, although I'm willing to listen to opinions to the contrary. It's not just those psychedelic appearances by the Stones and the Doors and Jefferson Airplane with Ed Sullivan; I think that an entertainment format that dates back to the vaudeville era is not necessarily the best way to reflect the radical changes in progress. Case in point is Romp!!, a "psychedelic search for fun, filmed in Europe, Japan, California and board a Bahama-bound liner," which airs Sunday at 7:00 p.m. PT on ABC. 

Romp!! is hosted by Ryan O'Neal and Michele Lee, and stars Jimmy Durante, Barbara Eden, James Darren, Cream, Harper's Bizarre, and Liberace, with special appearances by Sammy Davis Jr., Casey Stengel, Sonny Tufts, The Celebration, Richard Dreyfuss, Joey Bishop, and Michael Blodgett. You know it's hip; Ryan O'Neal appears in a sportcoat and turtleneck rather than a tie, and the romping takes place "in a studio equipped with a squooshy floor, the better to romp on." The stars cavort with "all sorts of bikinied and mini-skirted lovelies." It does beg the question, though, as to how you can have both Cream and Durante in the same show—I mean, I love them both; I also love enchiladas and hot fudge sundaes, but not on the same plate at the same time.

Clockwise from left: Sammy and Joey, Liberace,
Ryan O' Neal, Jimmy Durante, Michele Lee

The larger problem with all this is that intergenerational variety shows don't always work. The only thing hip about Casey Stengel is the broken one that forced his retirement as manager of the New York Mets in 1965. Casey was always cool, but not hip. The spectacle of an older generation trying to act like this is, as I've said before, a disturbing image, and it often fails miserably. It's particularly painful listening to someone like Frank Sinatra singing songs written in the '70s and '80s; as great a singer as Frank is, most of them just don't fit his style.

But for all that, the music often isn't the main problem with the variety show in this transitory period—it's the comedy. Bob Hope's skits from decades before feel increasingly tired in this new era. It doesn't matter whether they're funny or not (and some of them are, very); they're just a bad fit with the "relevance" performances of the rock groups. Plus, try using them in the skits; can you see Grace Slick playing the Anita Ekberg role in one of his sketches? 

Again, I'm not saying these shows aren't funny; I  enjoy watching a lot of them. I'm just pointing to the disconnect that's part of the television generation gap, and how it must have appeared back then. The kids probably weren't satisfied by it at all; not authentic enough. Whatever the case, it must have been a hard gig back then, running a variety show.

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During the 60s, the Ed Sullivan Show and The Hollywood Palace were the premiere variety shows on television. Whenever they appear in TV Guide together, we'll match them up and see who has the best lineup..

Sullivan: Scheduled guests are Patty Duke; Diahann Carroll; singers Tom Jones and You're Father's Mustache; comics Totie Fields and Richard Hearne; magician Pavel; and the Muppets.

Palace: Host Bing Crosby welcomes Sid Caesar, the King Sisters, singer Florence Henderson, jazz pianist Joe Bushkin, comic Gene Baylos, the rocking Every Mothers' Son, Bunraku (Japanese puppets) and 16 children of the Palace production crew.

Unusually, Ed's lineup in TV Guide is exactly what was seen on the show; even more unusually, Ed actually participates in an act, appearing with Richard Hearne in his "Mr. Pastry" skit. Over on the other show, Der Bingle is always worth a couple of points, and you've got Caesar and the future Mrs. Brady. In the long run, though, it's hard to vote against Kermit and the Muppets, and even harder to trun back Tom Jones, who's in great form tonight with an extended medley that pulsates with the kind of energy that gives Sullivan the edge this week.

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From 1963 to 1976, TV Guide's weekly reviews were written by the witty and acerbic Cleveland Amory. Whenever they appear, we'll look at Cleve's latest take on the shows of the era. 

There are times when Cleveland Amory leaves you in no doubt from the beginning as to where he stands. This is one of those times, starting with one of Amory's laws of television: "If at first you don't succeed, fail, fail again." The failure this week is NBC's The Jerry Lewis Show, which is better than his ABC show from a few years ago; then again, that was one of the great failures in television history, so the bar was pretty low.

It's not that Amory is reflexively not a fan of Lewis, which is often the case with Lewis critics. "He can be a clown, as the saying goes, with the best of them; and time and again, in a whole comedy role, he has proved how funny he can be. As a host of a children's show he would be ideal. As host of an adult show, however, he is five fathoms over what might be described as his depth." It's a pity, in many ways, for it's a well-made show in many respects - the graphics are solid and it's imaginatively shot. What it is not, however, is well-written, and such sketches "are so embarrassingly overplayed by Mr. Lewis that they seem even worse than they are."

Amory cites one episode in particular that is supposed to serve as an example for the rest of the series. Lewis plays "Sidney," a regular on the show, who this week is "the yelled-at helper of a senior citizens' home—one who finally turns on his tormentors. Dreary to begin with, the tale grew so increasingly unfunny as to be actually fascinating in its tastelessness. And by the seemingly never-arriving end, the whole business was positively frightening." The premise of the skit itself is something I feel reasonably certain we'd not see on TV today; as for the slapstick that seems typical of many other sketches, though, I have to admit it doesn't sound much different from what you see on MeTV commercials for Carol Burnett. Of course, Cleve wasn't a fan of hers either, at least at first, so maybe there's something to that.

I'm not exactly unbiased here, since I was always a fan of Jerry Lewis. It could be something that Amory suggests early on, how Lewis is "extremely popular in movies." Perhaps he was just too big a personality to fit on the small screen. If so, he wouldn't be the first case, nor would he be the last.

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Saturday's highlight is the tenth annual presentation of The Wizard of Oz (7:00 p.m. PT, NBC). According to the always-reliable Wikipedia, this would have been the first year that the broadcast didn't include a wrap-around series of segments featuring different celebrities as hosts of the broadcast; Danny Kaye was the host I most clearly remember. This is also the first season that Oz is seen on NBC rather than CBS. I particularly enjoy the notice in the listing that "The opening of the film is not in color." Later, on The Jackie Gleason Show (7:30 p.m., CBS), the original Alice Kramden, Pert Kelton, returns as Alice's mother. 

Despite Romp!, Sunday provides a terrific night of entertainment, with a rerun of Frank Sinatra's special from earlier in the season (8:00 p.m., NBC), with Ella Fitzgerald and the great guitarist Antonio Carlos Jobim as guests, and that makes it a terrific show indeed. That's followed by the Tony Awards (9:00 p.m., NBC), a throwback to the days when you recognized not only the shows and stars but the the songs from the musicals as well. It's hosted by Angela Lansbury and Peter Ustinov, and tonight's winners will include Robert Goulet, Martin Balsam, and Tom Stoppard. You can see a clip from the show here. 

The Singer Company, which sponsored many a fine special in its day (did they sponsor Elvis' comeback special? Why, yes they did!), and on Monday they cue up Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass (9:00 p.m., CBS), singing a boatload of their hits, some of them performed on a Mississippi riverboat. You really couldn't turn around without bumping into Herb and the Brass back in the day, and it's great to see that he's still touring all these years later. Later on, Jack Benny and Ed Ames are among Johnny Carson's guests on The Tonight Show (11:30 p.m., NBC). Can one ever see Ed Ames and The Tonight Show in the same sentence and not think about tomahawks?

Leading off Tuesday night is Where the Girls Are, a "mod hour" on NBC (8:00 p.m.), hosted by Noel Harrison with appearances by Don Adams, Prof. Irwin Corey, Barbara McNair, the Association, the Byrds, and Cher. The network had high hopes for this; according to the TV Teletype, it "could become a regular on NBC's schedule if it clicks with the audience." Apparently it didn't, at least not enough to earn a spot on the schedule. (And for this they preempted Jerry Lewis?) A better choice might be Harry Reasoner's "The Weapons of Gordon Parks" (10:00 p.m., CBS), a profile of the photographer, poet, composer, painter, and filmmaker. Those talents, says Reasoner, are his "weapons against bigotry and indifference." 

The Clampetts are in London Wednesday for the first of three episodes of The Beverly Hillbillies filmed across the pond (8:30 p.m., CBS). Look for Alan Napier, Batman's beloved Alfred, a a chemist—that's a pharmacist to you and me. (And look for a profile of Irene Ryan in the next section.) Eddy Arnold, one of the great country crossovers, hosts the first of six "County Fair" episodes of The Kraft Music Hall (8:00 p.m., NBC) with Al Hirt, Joanie Sommers, John Byner and Mark Wilson. And on Run for Your Life (9:00 p.m., NBC) James Daly plays a slimy talk-show host, Franchot Tone is the judge whom he attacks on the air, and our hero, Ben Gazzara, is the prime suspect when Daly gets plugged. I wonder how this one's going to turn out?

On Thursday, NET Playhouse presents a new version of George Orwell's "1984" (10:00 p.m.), part of the BBC's series The World of George Orwell. David Buck, Joseph O'Conor and Jane Merrow star, with a script by Nigel Kneale that was originally written for the BBC's legendary 1954 adaptation. It's up against The Dean Martin Show (10:00 p.m., NBC), with Dean's special guests Bing Crosby, Lena Horne and Dom DeLuise. Among the highlights: Crosby and Martin as a couple of golfers being driven crazy by their caddy (Dom), with the great golfing champion Byron Nelson in a cameo as himself. And I have horrible news for you about Peyton Place (9:30 p.m., ABC): Betty and Steve's divorce is final. I don't think I can go on with the rest of the evening.

CBS's Friday Night Movie is a blockbuster: a repeat of Tony Curtis and Sidney Poitier in Stanley Kramer's The Defiant Ones (9:00 p.m.). Judith Crist praises its power and fine performances, and places it far above Kramer's subsequent take on racial tolerance, the saccharine Guess Who's Coming to Dinner? You can bet that coming just over two weeks after the assassination of MLK, it's sure to pack an extra punch. A close second for the evening is the Bell Telephone Hour's "Jazz: the Intimate Art" (10:00 p.m., NBC) featuring Louis Armstrong, Dave Brubeck, Dizzy Gillespie, and Charles Lloyd, and presented without commercial interruption. And if you're in the mood to end the week with a movie, look no further than The Girl Hunters (10:00 p.m., KGSC in San Jose), starring Mickey Spillane as his famous detective, Mike Hammer. How often do you get to see an author play his own creation?

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In a story that provides a nice bookend to our lede, Edith Efron takes us backstage for a look at Irene Ryan, whom we know as lovable Granny on The Beverly Hillbillies. Not surprisingly, the woman you see on-screen is very similar to the actress playing her; co-star Buddy Ebsen describes her as "a fighter in the American pioneering tradition," "the kind of woman who used to load the rifles, hand them to the men and shoot ’em herself." Paul Henning, producer-writer of Hillbillies, calls her "tough. A very strong sense of right and wrong. She’s completely self-reliant. She’s got a strong inner moral fiber. Life strengthens this in some, weakens it in others. Hers is in beautiful shape. She personifies the pioneer American." A grip on the crew says "She looks like you can push her over, but she’s tough. I’m telling you—that old dame could fight Indians!"

Her character wasn't built through years as a farmer's wife in Iowa, though, but traveling throughout the country from her early childhood, appearing in road shows, vaudeville, and plays. It required, Efron says, a hard, demanding discipline, and when you combine it with the poverty and professional obscacles she's had to overcome, it's not a surprise that her late-career fame came from playing Granny. "It was a role Irene could play with consummate skill, because in her own way she had lived it." Ryan says that the strength comes from inside. "Listen, you have to pull yourself up by yourself. Nobody can do it for you. You know the greatest influence in making me what I am? It’s me. I can take those jolts that life dishes out and come up again. That’s what I admire most in other people, too— inner strength."

That work ethic is reflected in her view of the contemporary world. "There's no place on earth like America," she says. "We've advanced in so many wonderful ways—in architecture, in science, in space. I’m sorry I’m as old as I am, I'd like to live another hundred years. The moon! I’d like to see the damn thing!" On the other hand, she despairs at some of the traits she sees in the younger generation. "On the set, for example, it’s Buddy Ebsen and I who have the discipline. Max Baer and Donna Douglas—they’re the ones who are late and seldom apologize for it, seldom call. I wouldn’t think of coming in late." You can see it in her attitude toward the protests sweeping the nation; while everyone has the right to protest, "you've got to go about it in the right way—not kick in cars and hurt people. It’s lack of discipline." Politically, she describes herself as a conservative. "I’m a 19th-century liberal, really—not a 20th-century liberal. I’m devoted to Reagan. His whole thinking is congenial to me."

She's an adored presence on the set. "People love Irene for exactly the same reasons they admire Granny," Henning says. "She’s got spirit. She’s tough, intractable, spunky. Nobody can push her around. She’ll tackle the whole Army if she thinks her cause is right. Irene’s an individual. She’s independent. There’s damn little independence today. People admire her." She gets fan mail from children wishing she was their grandmother, and esteem from teens and young adults who appreciate her stability in a world that seems to be crumbling around her.  "As a result," one says, "you can count on her." 

And the popularity of The Beverly Hillbillies is a reflection of all this. Says Efron, "The ratings are a clear-cut response to the American character, which still rings out true, even in comic disguise." Irene Ryan puts it even more bluntly: "If you don’t like this series, something’s the matter with you!"

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Oh, and here's another of those great "little did they know" stories, this time courtesy of the New York TV Teletype: "A two-hour version of the old stand-by "Heidi" will be visible on NBC next November, starring Maximilian Schell, Michael Redgrave, Walter Slezak and Peter Van Eyck, among others." It's hard to imagine from that innocent little remark what huge consequences were in store. Ask the fans of the Raiders and Jets how it turned out. 

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MST3K alert: I Was a Teenage Werewolf (1957) A psychiatrist's drugs turn a youth into a monster. Michael Landon, Whit Bissell, Yvonne Lime, Tony Marshall. (Saturday, 1:00 a.m., KCRA in Sacramento) "You are not drinking a piña colada at Trader Vic’s, young man, you’re just not old enough."Michael Landon was two years away from Bonanza when he starred in Werewolf, and he remained a fan of the movie for the rest of his life. "I think it's a good movie. I like it. My kids like it. They better like it, their dad's in it." TV