This week in TV Guide: June 21, 1969

This week's cover story is a fascinating interview with Jackie Gleason by Larry King, who had the very easy task of asking Gleason what he thinks about a number of topics, and then sitting back and letting The Great One share what's on his mind. On the assumption that what's good for Larry King is good for moi, we'll follow suit and let Jackie take center stage; he is, as one might suspect, never at a loss for words. Therefore, here's Gleason on:

Fame: "It's a strange thing about popularity. You want it all your life and when you get it, after you're a success, anonymity is priceless. I’m a nut for five-and-ten-cent stores. | like to wander around notions counters and things like that. | can't do that today because a lot of people would stop me. Yet, I’d be disturbed if they didn’t. That's the paradox of this business. You want everybody to present you with accolades and you want everybody to say, ‘Oh, there he goes; there’s the Great'One.’ And, at the same time, you want to be alone."

The networks: "Every television performer has problems with his network. The performer always thinks he’s bigger than the network. It’s a constant kind of war . . . We were trying to put on a show and we would have people strolling in at all hours, the hierarchy you know, and they were telling us how to do particular things. So I went right to Mr. Paley [William Paley, chairman of the board of CBS] and said that I wanted a letter from him saying that I was to have sole control over my show, with no interference from anyone. He gave it to me. Now I just show it to these guys before they say anything to me."

Psychiatry: "I can see how it helps certain people, but I’ve never had a need for it. Once some friends told me that I was too fat because of some mental hangup. I thought it was because I liked to eat a lot. Anyhow, they suggested I see a psychiatrist, so I did. He weighed about 270 pounds. I tried to help him with his problem."

The Now Generation: "I'm encouraged by part of it. I feel some good is done and some bad. The trouble is they’re so mixed up you can’t discern who’s who. That’s the problem. Some are sincere and some are not. Some really want some good for everybody and the others are sincere about their insincerity. It’s tough. You can't tell what's constructive and what’s destructive. I don’t feel out of their world, but I guess I would if they were running the whole show. . .  I don’t rap the long-hair thing. Christ had long hair. So did Ben Franklin and those people. You can't judge people by the way they dress. A genius might be under a Daniel Boone jacket."

Religion: "Being a Catholic is no hangup with me. You know when you've sinned and you know the consequences. I thought of switching religions to have a more comfortable way of sinning. I studied them all. At first they appeared very attractive because they were easier, not because they made more sense. I believe you should stick with the religion you’re brought up with. Religion is an obligation . . .| know you don’t have free will. What you have is free choice. You can't jump over the ball park, but you can choose to think about it."

Living in Florida: "I’m here to stay. I’m addicted to golf and here I can play it all year 'round. The people here have been nice to me. You know, Larry, Howard Hughes offered me one million dollars, tax free, to take my show to Las Vegas. I almost fell out of my chair. The thought of one million clams, tax free, doesn’t happen every day. I thought about it and decided not to. I wouldn’t like Las Vegas no matter what I got."

Life: I’m 53 years old. I love what I do. I have all the money I'll ever need. I’m not looking for challenges. I do what I do very well and think I get better at it. My weight doesn't bother me because I don’t mind it. I like good food so I eat it. I smoke because it’s a habit I’m too old to break and I enjoy cigarettes, too. I drink because it’s a lot of fun. I admire great boozers. Guys who can go all day and never show it. I play golf every day and am more fascinated with it all the time. . . Everything I've wanted to do I've had the chance to do. Life ain't bad, pal."

As I said, never at a loss for words. They called him the Great One for a reason.

l  l  l

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. 

When the summer season comes upon us, our man Cleve often turns his attention toward programs that wouldn't ordinarily find their way into his column, and this week is no exception, as we look at the venerable sudser As the World Turns, now in its fourteenth action-packed season. In case you haven't followed the show lately, here is a capsule summary for your benefit. It is, as Amory says, "really very simple, once you get the hang of it":

Start with Chris. Chris is married to Nancy, who is the mother of Bob, who was married to Lisa, who had an affair with Michael, who was married to Claire, who is the mother of Ellen, who is married to David, who is the father of Dan, who is married to Susan, but who is in love with Liz, who is dating Paul, who is doctoring Martha, who is the mother of Sandy, who is engaged to Bob, who was married to Lisa and is the son of Chris. See, we're right back to Chris. It’s just one big happy family circle, or, actually, two family circles—the Hughes and the Lowells—who, among other things, are congenital intermarriers. But don't worry about that. If you want to worry about something, worry about the illegitimate children. The place is crawling with them. 

Got all that? It provides us, says Cleve, with an example of what we've come to call hate viewing. You'd think that with all this bed-hopping going on, things would be pretty entertaining, but, in fact, "It's all so deadly serious that the best way to watch it is in a kind of negative way. Don't root for, root against." And it seems that this is exactly the way its "fans" watch it. When Eileen Fulton, who played villainess Lisa Hughes, left the series, fans were furious. "They had become so devoted to hating her that they demanded her return." She did return, eventually, but do you think that changed things? Upon running into a viewer who wanted to know if she "was" Lisa Hughes, Futon smiled and said she played the "part," whereupon the woman "slapped Miss Fulton in the face, shouting, 'You're mean! You're rotten! You're despicable!' She was, of course, a fan of Lisa's. As well as a typical soap opera fan, we have to think.

l  l  l

Since we featured Jackie Gleason in this week's lede, it's only appropriate that we begin Saturday with a look at a full-hour Honeymooners skit, in which the Kramdens and Nortons continue their shark-jumping around-the-world trip (7:30 p.m., CBS). Don't think that things are all fun and games, though; while in Paris, Ralph and Norton are arrested for passing counterfeit francs. My money—and it's not counterfeit—is on them to work their way out of it. But if you want some real crime drama, stay up late for the 11:00 p.m. movie on KOVR in Sacramento: Compulsion, a fictionalized account of the Leopold-Loeb case, with Dean Stockwell and Bradford Dillman as the youthful killers, and Orson Welles in a brilliant performance as their attorney, who in real life was Clarence Darrow.

No "Sullivan vs. The Palace" this week, as Johnny Cash fills the summer Hollywood Palace slot; Ed's still hard at work, though, and his guests this week are Flip Wilson, Jackie Mason, country singer-guitarist Sonny James, singers Karen Wyman and Hal Frazier, and the Georgia Tech Glee Club. (Sunday, 8:00 p.m., CBS) 

Remember when Bill Cosby was a respected role model, a man who crossed the color barrier to become America's favorite dad? Yes, well, times have changed, haven't they? On Monday's NBC Children's Theatre (8:00 p.m.), Cosby hosts "As I See It," a presentation of short films made by youngsters between the ages of 6 and 12, who were given the opportunity to "film their world as they see it." They then talk about their lives with Cosby, who shares memories of his own childhood growing up in Philadelphia. Later, on Dick Cavett's prime-time show (10:00 p.m., ABC), Dick welcomes an eclectic big-name cast: opera star Beverly Sills, movie star Natalie Wood, political columnist Drew Pearson, and comedian Pat McCormick.

Remember when 60 Minutes was just a twice-monthly series of specials? That's how it was back in 1969, and on Tuesday's program (10:00 p.m., CBS), Yugoslavian leader Josip Tito is interviewed on the challenges posed by the youth movement and calls for more freedom. Tito was one of the rare Eastern block leaders who was respected in both East and West, and his ability to hold Yugoslavia together is even more impressive today given how violently the country fragmented in the post-Soviet era.

Wednesday features a rerun of last season's highly-regarded special The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (9:00 p.m., ABC), starring Jack Palance as the man with the split personality, produced by Dark Shadows creator Dan Curtis, and written by Ian McLellan Hunter. Over on NBC, Kraft Music Hall, which is hosted by Sandler and Young for the summer, features guest Sid Caesar. (9:00 p.m.). If you're looking for something a little different, here's a program that won't interfere with either of these shows: Book Beat (8:30 p.m., NET), with host Bob Cromie interviewing the legendary Lillian Gish on her book The Movies, Mr. Griffith and Me. 

The most challenging show of the week—or any other week, for that matter—is probably The Prisoner, and the disturbing episode "The Schizoid Man," in which Number 6 is confronted by his double. (Thursday, 8:00 p.m., CBS) It's the second year in a row that CBS has used The Prisoner as a summer replacement series, and as was the case last summer, it's by far the best thing going. Cass Elliot has a variety special tonight (9:00 p.m., ABC), with an eclectic guest cast to say the least: Buddy Hackett, Martin Landau and Barbara Bain, Mary Travers, Joni Mitchell, and John Sebastian. And in the "wasted potential" category, the Thursday night movie is The Defector (9:00 p.m., CBS), Montgomery Clift's last film, a cold-war drama that, according to Judith Crist, is a run-of-the-mill antiheroic espionage film, "wasting talent along with fine location atmosphere."

The Name of the Game on Friday is "The Black Answer" (8:30 p.m., NBC), as reporter Jeff Dillon (Tony Franciosa) is thrown into the investigation of the killing of a non-violent black activist; the suspect is a black militant group called the Black Battery, led by Joe X (Ivan Dixon). A more conventional thriller finds The Saint embroiled in an assassination attempt against the prime minister of a British colony (10:00 p.m., NBC); Roger Moore is joined by Edward Woodward for the thrills.

l  l  l

The Doan Report notes that the recent Emmy show was a very bad advertisement for television, but not quite in the way you think. The best comedy series award went to Get Smart, which had been cancelled by NBC (although subsequently renewed by CBS). The best comedy-writing award went to The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, likewise cancelled. And then there were the acting awards: best dramatic actor went to Carl Betz for Judd for the Defense, best actress to Barbara Bain of Mission: Impossible, and best comedy actress to The Ghost and Mrs. Muir's Hope Lange. You guessed it; Judd and Mrs. Muir were cancelled (although the latter was picked up by ABC), and Bain had already left M:I. And if that weren't bad enough, the award for best dramatic series went not to any of the commercial network contenders, but to NET Playhouse. There's no disputing the quality of that show, given that it was awarded a Peabody earlier in the year, but none of this speaks very highly of the commercial networks.

Doan also has a note on this little thing coming up next month called a moon landing. Can you believe it's almost here? NBC has announced plans to preempt 30 consecutive hours to cover the landing, including all 22 hours that astronauts Armstrong and Aldrin plan to be on the moon's surface, with coverage beginning at 11:00 a.m. on the Sunday of the landing. CBS and ABC quickly announced similar plans. Boy, I can still remember that like yesterday; one of the most amazing things those of us who were alive back then will ever have the privilege to see.

l  l  l

Back on June 1, ABC had a special called D-Day Revisited, hosted by movie mogul Darryl F. Zanuck, who returned to the beaches of Normandy, where he filmed his epic The Longest Day in 1962. Zanuck provided commentary on the battles of that monumental day, accompanied by clips from the movie. 

I'm not sure what the network's expectations were for this program, but based on this week's Letters section, I think I can be fairly confident in saying that this is not what they were counting on. As you know, whenever there's a disputatious issue being discussed in the section, the editors present a cross-section of letters that roughly correspond to the ratio of opinions expressed in said letters. If that is, indeed, the case, I'd say the response was universally negative.  

We begin with this letter from Nicholas Snider of Coaling, Alabama, who compares the program to CBS's 1964 documentary in which the Normandy tour guide was none other than General Eisenhower himself. Zanuck's version, says Mr. Snider, "was so inferior as not to be noticed, were it not for its unrelenting vulgarity. That the program itself was completely inept is one thing, but that one hour of such shameless horn-blowing should even consider itself a tribute to human courage or the war dead is the ghastliest sarcasm of the season."

We next move on to U.S. Representative Frank Horton (R, NY), who accuses Zanuck of using the solemn occasion as a cheap ploy to promote the upcoming re-release of The Longest Day in theaters. It was, he says, "a transparent attempt to capitalize" on the efforts of the men who landed at Normandy, and adds, for good measure, "It seems in bad taste to tie the marketing of such entertainment to the gallant efforts of the men who died on those beaches a quarter century ago. The facade fell away quickly as soon as the first promotion spot came on the television screen, advertising the fact that the motion picture would “soon be seen at your neighborhood theater."

The coup de grâce, however, belongs to this brief letter, which serves, I think, as the final word on the issue. "Despite certain overtones reminiscent of a barker’s come-on at a county fair, and the self-glorification which seemed to emanate from ABC’s 'D-Day Revisited' program, neither a book called 'The Longest Day,' nor the screenplay of the movie, was written by Darryl F. Zanuck. In the midst of his celebration of himself, he might do well to read 'The Longest Day' dedication: 'For all the men of D-Day.' They, not Mr. Zanuck, made 'The Longest Day.'" It's signed "Mrs. Cornelius Ryan, Ridgefield, Connecticut, " and she should know: her husband did write the book and screenplay.

l  l  l

MST3K alert: Village of the Giants (1965) A mysterious substance causes teenagers to become giants. Tommy Kirk, Johnny Crawford. (Sunday, 2:00 p.m., KXTV in Sacramento) There's no two ways about it; this is just an awful movie, so bad it isn't even good. What movies like this never try to explain is how, when people suddenly become giants, they don't just tear right out of their clothes like the Incredible Hulk. Somehow, though, even if they'd all suddenly become naked, I don't think that would help matters much.  TV  

Around the dial

Let's start across the pond this week, as John makes his way through the "Ann Way Season," comprising appearances by the British character actress. The latest comes from the great, absurd British series Ripping Yarns, and the episode "Whinfrey's Last Case."

Garry Berman links back to a review from last year on the series Pan Am, which ran for 14 episodes in 2012. It's a wonderful time capsule for an era that seemed to promise endless potential, and one in which taking a jet wasn't like running the gauntlet through a torture chamber.

At bare•bone e-zine, Jack's Hitchcock Project continues with "Final Arrangements" by Robert Arthur, part of the show's sixth season. It's something of a letdown, despite a fine cast led by Martin Balsam as the would-be wife killer.

One of the more interesting aspects of classic television is the way in which various trends in programming ebb and flow. At Travalanche, Trav looks at one such trend, that of shows using World War II as a backdrop for drama or comedy. Read more about these shows, and why they worked (or didn't).

Michael Cole died earlier this week, aged 84, and with that all three of those impossibly young cops of The Mod Squad are now dead, as well as their mentor, Tige Andrews. There was more to his career, of course, and Terence looks at some of them at A Shroud of Thoughts.

With Christmas just around the corner, it's a perfect time for Martin Grams to look at the "lost" Lone Ranger radio Christmas special of 1938. It was performed but not recorded for syndication, since it could have been aired at any time of the year. The solution? Read all about it.

Let's talk just a little more about Christmas, as JB does the Christmas Shuffle at The Hits Just Keep on Comin'. Has nothing to do with television (although you'll have heard some of these tunes on the tube), but who's going to complain about a little more Christmas cheer.

At Classic Film & TV Corner, Maddie reviews the 1968-70 series The Ghost & Mrs. Muir, based on the 1947 movie of the same name, with Hope Lange and Edward Mulhare essaying the roles originally played by Gene Tierney and Rex Harrison. It's a charming way to spend some time.

By the way, that great picture at the top comes from this article on 25 ideas to celebrate an old-fashioned Christmas. One of those ways: "Watch the Christmas TV Special From When You Were a Kid." That's what we'll be doing tonight, and I can't think of a better way to start the weekend.  TV  

Encore: What Hogan's Heroes (and other WWII television series) can teach us about wartime military ethics

Every time I check on the most-read articles here at It's About TV, the Hogan's Heroes ones are always near the top. Therefore, since I've been writing about my Top Ten favorite series, it seems appropriate to honor the #2 show on the list with this piece from—can it be?—five years ago. And in case you think I'm reading too much into a mere sitcom, I counter that the best way to respect a series is to take it—and the issues it raises—seriously.

Xhen you’ve seen every episode of Hogan’s Heroes as many times as I have, you’re allowed to let your mind wander a bit. By now, I can identify each episode within the first ten seconds, can quote an alarming amount of dialog, know all of Hogan’s scams and how Klink reacts to them, and rest secure in the knowledge that through it all, Schultz never sees anything. It’s all as comforting as a warm blanket in the middle of winter.

So when you’ve seen, say, "Information Please" for the tenth time, you start to pay more attention to the little things, like when Hogan decides the only way to get rid of the German officer threatening their operations is to frame him as a traitor, and Newkirk, after listening to the plan, comments that "We really are a nasty lot, we are." And "The Assassin," when, after discovering that a Nazi scientist is in camp working on atomic research, Hogan declares, "We got to kill him," to which a startled Carter remarks that it "Just doesn’t sound like us, Colonel." And "Hot Money," which involves the Nazis setting up a counterfeiting operation, in which the lead scientist of the operation voices concern over the morality of counterfeiting even during wartime.

These represent some of the rare moments of genuine self-reflection in the series, when, even amid the absurdist humor, the characters dwell on the implications of their actions with an acute awareness of the consequences involved. Setting aside the fact that we’re talking about fictional people in a very improbable setting, you have to ask—what does it all really mean? The storylines in Hogan’s Heroes encompass a wide range of acts, including deception, misinformation, lying, and killing. How does one assess their morality during wartime? After all, just because we’re talking about a comedy, that doesn’t mean truth can’t be found somewhere in the midst. And not just Hogan's Heroes, of course, but other wartime television series as well.

To find the answers to these questions, I decided what I needed was an expert. So I went out and got one.

Dr. Robert G. Kennedy is a Professor of Catholic Studies at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, and his area of expertise includes St. Thomas Aquinas, who did quite a lot of writing about the Catholic theory on Just War. Among other things, he’s presented on topics such as "A Catholic Analysis of Modern Problems for the Just War Tradition," "Is the Just War Theory Obsolete?" and "Is the Doctrine of Preemption a Legitimate Element of the Just War Tradition?" With credentials like this, I figured he was just the person I was looking for. He also knows something about military ethics as portrayed in television and the movies, which made it less likely he'd think I was completely around the bend. "It’s interesting, the questions that a 50-year-old sitcom can prompt," he said after I’d described what was on my mind; then, as a true scholar and gentleman, he gave serious consideration to my questions and rose to the challenge.

"The Catholic tradition since Augustine has held that lying—deliberately asserting to someone as true something that you know to be false—is always wrong. The key word here is asserting." For example, things such as acting in a theatrical performance, telling a joke, and so on, are in many cases not assertions; consequently, false statements on those cases are not lies. (Philosophers often debate where to draw lines, but that’s a question for another day.)

Addressing the question in "Information, Please," in which the boys frame a German officer, Major Kohler, by falsely implicating him as a traitor, Dr. Kennedy continued. "If Hogan makes a false assertion, he is lying and acting wrongly, even if the end to be achieved is worthwhile. On the other hand, if memory serves, the story line in these matters often involved deception (lying is a species of deception, but not all deception is wrong). Suppose Hogan 'carelessly' leaves a forged document someplace where Klink will find it, and Klink immediately draws a conclusion, as he was meant to do, that some officer or another is a traitor"—a fairly common occurrence in the show. "Or suppose Hogan, in conversation with Klink, asks a number of insinuating questions, planting the idea in Klink’s mind that the officer is a suspicious character.

"In neither of these cases does Hogan assert anything, even though he certainly means Klink (and others) to draw conclusions that are false but helpful to Hogan’s aims. In cases like this he has certainly engaged in deception, but he has not lied. Not all deception is morally sound, but in some of these cases it might be." He added, however, that deception intended to cause an innocent person to be harmed, even if it might not be lying, may still very well be immoral, a concern which Newkirk seems to be alluding to in his comments.

By now, I was beginning to understand why I’d wanted an expert.

In the episode "How to Win Friends and Influence Nazis," Hogan’s assignment is to convince Dr. Karl Svenson, a world-famous Swedish chemist working on a formula for a new steel alloy, not to give the formula to the Nazis. Failing that, his mission is to assassinate Svenson, which he’s prepared to do with a small bomb implanted in a pen. To understand the morality of such an action, it’s important to make a distinction—not between military and civilian personnel, as is sometimes supposed, but between combatants and non-combatants. "Some persons in uniform are generally held to be non-combatants, such as chaplains, medics, and perhaps even the JAG corps. But even here, the instant a medic or chaplain picks up a weapon, he becomes a combatant—which is why we generally have very strict rules against these people ever engaging in actual combat. The moment they do so, they contaminate the immunity of all other medics and chaplains. They can say a prayer but they can’t pass the ammunition.

"Strictly speaking, combatants are liable to attack, even lethal attack, even when they are not actually engaged, at that moment, in combat operations. The argument would be that they are still ongoing participants in the wrongful project of the enemy and therefore may be subject to the force necessary to impede their project. An air base, for example, is a legitimate military target, even at night when the personnel are asleep. But there are limits. Injured soldiers in a hospital are likely not combatants, soldiers on leave back home, even when wearing a uniform, are likely not combatants, and so on. In all this, by the way, there is the assumption that it is the enemy who is engaged in a wrongful project, not our own side. We also assume, while acknowledging that this is hard to measure, that the level of force applied should not exceed what is necessary to impede the wrongful project. So, we should not kill enemy soldiers if we can disable them; we should not disable them, if we can persuade them to surrender."

In the case of Dr. Svenson, "though a civilian, [he] is likely a combatant, even if a reluctant one. Even though he is not in uniform, he is engaged critically, if at some remove, in developing weapon components that could be strategically effective against his nation’s opponents"—such action means "he is directly participating in the wrongful project of the Germans and therefore enabling in a proximate way their combat operations.* Is he a legitimate target? Again, there are extremes but here we can talk about the distinction between pre-emptive action and preventive action. Pre-emptive action, which is often justified, seeks to neutralize an imminent threat. Preventive action seeks to neutralize a threat that one can imagine becoming real at some point in the future, but which poses no imminent danger. It is hard to imagine a situation in which preventive action can be justified.

*An analysis that could apply to “The Assassin” as well.

"So, what is the situation with [Svenson]? Is he on his way to deliver the formula for the new alloy to the Nazis or is he merely making progress on developing the formula, and might reasonably succeed, in a month, or a year or two? I would say that if he has the formula and is about to give it to the Nazis, then he probably poses an imminent threat and could be a legitimate target. But probably not if he is merely making progress. We would also want to know how important his formula really is and what other means might be available to prevent the exchange. The answers would address the issue of proportionality." In this case, Svenson tells Hogan that work on the formula will require "two or three month’s more work," to which Hogan replies, "I’ve now got time to convince you to come over to my side." The implication is that Hogan is prepared to do whatever it takes to make killing Svenson a last resort; it’s a wise—and moral—judgment.

Then there’s an episode like "The Swing Shift," in which the men infiltrate industrialist Hans Speer’s cannon-making factory, so they can sabotage the plant with explosives? Assessing this situation requires "sound judgment and attention to details and context," according to Dr. Kennedy; while extreme situations are often easy to resolve, "the closer they are, in fact, to the middle, the less clear they become." Given that factory workers are not automatically considered combatants, any attack, if possible, should be staged when the workers are not working. In "The Swing Shift," however, the plan is for the factory to operate around the clock. What then?

Dr. Kennedy compares this example to the bombing of the famous ball bearing plant at Schweinfurt* "Ball-bearing manufacture was a choke point in the German war industry, as so many pieces of equipment required ball bearings. Destroy the plant and war production would be crippled. It had very high strategic value, not merely a tactical value. A strong argument can be made that harm to the workers was justified by that strategic value."

*Ironically, in this episode, Hogan’s request to London for an air strike is tabled due to higher-priority targets, among which is—the real-life ball-bearing plant at Schweinfurt. It’s not the first time the writers got little details like this correct, and quite possibly the mention of Schweinfurt was designed specifically to justify the sabotage to Herr Speer’s factory (whose name, of course, is an indirect reference to Nazi Armaments Minister Albert Speer). 

Overall, these kinds of actions call for careful consideration. Examples of non-uniformed combatants could include “a civilian truck driver delivering ammunition to troops in battle or of a technical advisor helping combat troops to operate complex equipment, and so on.” However, Dr. Kennedy adds, "I am less inclined to say [that factory workers are combatants] in general. One issue here would have to do with what it is they are making? Is it bullets and cannon shells or army boots? Are they building ships or canning vegetables? We usually draw some lines with respect to the proximity of the support provided—the mother knitting socks for her soldier son is not a combatant—and whether the support itself is neutral (that is, not combat specific). In the latter case, we would likely say that the truck driver delivering groceries to a military base is not a combatant since this would be done without regard to war or peace.

"A second issue has to do with timing. Factories don’t move and in principle, therefore, they could be attacked when the workers are not working. In the Second World War, the British bombed Germany at night, when they could not see the target. Their reasoning was that it didn’t matter whether they hit the factory or the workers’ homes: production would stop either way. But Catholics would think that there is a very important difference here.

"A principle of proportionality has to be introduced: is the military objective sufficiently important to justify a certain level of genuinely unintended casualties? One test question is to ask whether we would proceed with an operation if we were bombing (let’s say) one of our own cities that had been occupied by the enemy, and the unintended casualties would be our own citizens. We are on more solid grounds if we could answer affirmatively, as the French did with respect to the bombing of their own railyards immediately before D-Day. At the other extreme, was the bombing of Japanese and German cities in the latter days of the war, when our objective was clearly to use the deaths of non-combatants as leverage to force surrender."

In summary, says Dr. Kennedy, "war is a very messy business. It always involves unintended casualties and collateral damage. Cases like these, and there are a great many, irritate people who want formal rules for all occasions. There are no such rules, which is why prudence is the preeminent practical virtue. And in the difficult cases, the decision maker often lacks some vital piece of information, so in the end we often do the best we can. Here again, the genuinely virtuous person, who will be less swayed by bias or emotion, is more likely to judge well."

By this time I was thoroughly exhausted, but also exhilarated and intellectually stimulated. I thanked Dr. Kennedy not only for his time, but his patience in answering what some people might consider silly questions that read far too much into light entertainment. Looking back on the discussion, it seemed to have justified my decades-long fandom of Hogan’s Heroes (which I think does very well when it comes to ethical choices). More important, it provides us something to think about whenever we watch depictions of war on television (or in the movies)—not to the exclusion of the program’s entertainment value, but rather in amplification of it, complimenting and enhancing our understanding of what we watch. Furthermore, the same questions can be asked of other kinds of shows: police procedurals, for example, or mysteries. It doesn’t matter whether it’s the most searing drama or the silliest comedy—they all play using the same set of moral rules, even if they don’t abide by them.

War forces terrible choices on everyone: not just the combatants, but those who issue the orders sending them into battle, the politicians responsible for making policy, the civilians providing support to their armed forces. We live with the consequences of our choices, and someday we answer for them. How right Robert E. Lee was, when he observed that "It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it." TV  

A special thanks to my friend Dr. David Deavel for providing the introduction to Dr. Robert Kennedy.

This week in TV Guide: March 2, 1968

It is, indeed, a week of big specials, and I must confess that I love these editions, not just because they make my job a whole lot easier (although they do), but because they bring an excitement, a vitality to the television week that's pretty hard to come by anymore. I mean, is there anything out there that's so special it can not just make you, but practically force you, to watch television? Yet that's the feeling one gets here, leafing through the pages and being assulted by one close-up after another, many of them looking, well, pretty special. And what better way to start than with the man who knew Hitler?

t  t  t

William L. Shirer had been a foreign correspondent since 1925, working for several newspapers and wire services before joining Edward R. Murrow's team at CBS, a team that included Eric Sevareid, Charles Collingwood, Howard K. Smith, Walter Cronkite and Winston Burdette. He was in Berlin the day Hitler went to war, and was there in 1945 when the Nazis fell. "Hitler didn't like me," Shirer tells Neil Hickey. "He considered some correspondents friendly and some not. Still, I was in almost daily contact with him. He was a keen and cynical judge of people. Once he said, in private conversation, 'Ever man has his price, and you'd be surprised how low that price is.'"

Following the war, Shirer wrote about his observations in the 1,245-page best-seller The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, which comes to television this week as an epic documentary shown on ABC over three nights (Wednesday, Friday and Saturday), with narration by Richard Basehart, a pulsating score by Lalo Schifrin, and extraordinary footage, much of it seldom sceen, tracing the decline of Weimer Germany, the growth of Hitler and the Nazis, and the war that in retrospect is both tragic and inevitable. (For my review of the series, go here.)

In later years, I suspect this might have been done as a docudrama (like the network's 1982 Inside the Third Reich), but the power of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich comes from the knowledge that what we see and hear is the real thing, from the rallies at Nuremberg to the destruction wrought across the face of Europe. It should have a "special fascination" for young Americans, Shirer thinks, given that half the population was born after the end of the war; he's amazed by the ignorance he sees among students today when talking about Nazi Germany. "Some don't even know who Hitler was. The Sudetenland crisis, the Munich conference, the Anschluss with Austria—they don't know what the hell you're talking about." (Unfortunately, based on what we hear from today's students, they seem to have gotten even more ignorant since then.)

While Shirer's book has been widely praised, it's not without its critics; some historians accuse him of holding an anti-German bias, of lacking an understanding of the subtleties in the Nazi's rise to power, of presenting an unbalanced view of the war. Others suggest the book is "not sufficiently scholarly nor sufficiently well written to satisfy more academic demands." It is, in other words, a popular history rather than a scholarly one, a criticism that I think is not without merit. Despite this, both book and documentary offer a riviting look at what Shirer calls "the story of a great, civilized, Christian people, far advanced in music, science, the arts—and how such a nation can be taken hold of by an evil influence."

The story of Nazi Germany is both fascinating and horrible, and the more you learn about it the more fascinating and horible it becomes. That we have become so ignorant and misinformed about this period of history—that the words "Hitler" and "Nazis" can be thrown out so casually and in such a careless way, with no real understanding of the horrors they truly entail—is the fault of many, primarily those historians and educators who choose to ignore or distort the truths about  

National Socialism and its leaders, and those in the media, such as YouTube, who censor or flag videos that try to tell the story, all in the name of cracking down on "hate" speech. The only hate on display is a hatred for the truth, which is only too common; Joseph Goebbels himself would be proud.

t  t  t

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: Ed's scheduled guests are comedians Alan King, Jack E. Leonard, Joan Rivers, and Morecambe and Wise; songs from Lou Rawls, Sergio Franchi, Gail Martin and Dana Valery.

Palace: Host Sammy Davis Jr. welcomes Diahann Carroll; Rowan and Martin, who conduct a sidewalk interview about actors in politics; Peter Lawford, who gives Sammy a musical French lesson; and the rocking Checkmates, Ltd.

If you've spent any time at all at this site, you know I'm a big fan of Sammy Davis Jr., so this is pretty much a foregone conclusion. But Palace has a lot to offer anyway, with Sammy and Diahann performing a condensation of Porgy and Bess, and I suspect the Rowan and Martin bit makes good mention of both Ronald Reagan and George Murphy, the governor and senator, respectively, from California. And while I think Alan King's very funny, there's just no comparison this week. It's all sweetness for the future Candy Man this week, as Palace takes the prize. 

t  t  t

Throughout the 60s and early 70s, TV Guide's weekly reviews were written by the witty and acerbic Cleveland Amory. Whenever we get the chance, we'll look at Cleve's latest take on the shows of the era. 

There are, says Cleveland Amory, three kinds of people: those who don't like games of any kind; those who don't like games on TV but enjoy them at home; and those who love games on TV. The first two groups should, under no circumstances, watch ABC's The Newlywed Game. As for the third group, they "are not necessarily people beyond help. They are just beyond outside help."

For the uninitiated, if there are any of you out there, The Newlywed Game pits four teams of newly-married couples (one year or less) against each other, with the winning couple being the ones where the husband most often correctly predicts how their wives will answer particular questions, and vice versa. These questions, according to Cleve, are either complicated or inane, or both. Many of them, although Amory doesn't get into this, are also loaded with double ententres, most of them having something to do with "Whoopie," and one of them resulting in one of the great moments in television history.

Nobody could possibly be surprised that Amory turns his nose up at The Newlywed Game; it's not his kind of show, and I'm not quite sure it should be anyone's type of show. In truth, it more closely resembles some of today's reality shows more than it does a game show, with the humor often coming at the expense of the dim contestants. (You also couldn't be surprised that the show was the creation of Chuck Barris.) The show, he notes, is hosted by a young man named Bob Eubanks, who goes on to become one of the most famous, and most fondly remembered, of all game show hosts. He never pretended that the show was anything other than what it was, and he didn't generally make fun of the contestants; he just gave them the rope and let them hang themselves. But hey: at least they all believe in marriage, and in the Sixties, that's saying something.

t  t  t

Sunday gives us another of ABC's "Movie Night" TV dramas based on big-screen classics of the past and featuring stars of the present. (Or, as Judith Crist calls them, "nonmovies.") Tonight it's A Hatful of Rain (9:00 p.m. ET), based on Michael V. Gazzo's play about a Korean War veteran hooked on morphine and the effect it has on his young family. Gazzo himself adapted the script for the broadcast, which stars Michael Parks, Peter Falk, Sandy Dennis and Herschel Bernardi in the roles played by Don Murray, Tony Franciosa*, Eva Marie Saint and Lloyd Nolan in the 1957 film version. 

*Franciosa copped a well-deserved Oscar nomination for Best Actor for the film version, in which Art Fleming, the beloved original host of Jeopardy!, has a small part.

On opposite A Hatful of Rain (and The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour) is NBC's warhorse Bonanza, now in its ninth season. Dwight Whitney's cover story profiles David Canary, the "new boy" on the set. Canary's presence as ranch foreman Candy is symptomatic of the challenges facing the Cartwrights in this era of the "now generation" (more on that later); last season, CBS's Smothers Brothers hurt Bonanza in the ratings, and Tom Smothers hurt the show's image with his cracks about the show and its "middle-aged spread." Robert Blees, the show's new line producer, admits as much, telling Whitney, "[Candy's] there to shake up the Cartwright establishment, put a bomb under all those chliche little morality plays. While Papa Ben is yelling for a fair trial, Candy is capable of something a little more underhanded—and human." It's a dilemma that all long-running shows eventually face, whether because of the age of the actors involved or the stagnancy of the plots, or both, but it's doubly unfortunate for Bonana that the show has to try and tell a conventional story of traditional families in the Old West while all around it the acid trip of the Sixties rages on. I wonder if any other decade in TV's history forced shows to deal with such cultural and societal upheaval?

A brief note on Monday; here's an ad for The Cleveland Amory Show, weekdays at 10:00 a.m on Philadelphia's WFIL. I'm not sure if I've ever known that Amory had his own talk show, or if I've just forgotten about it. You can't find much on it online, although there's a note in a 1968 issue of Broadcasting that it's part of a trend caused by "the decline in the supply of feature films and the rise in price of movies." Triangle Program Sales, is looking to put the show into national syndication in the spring; that wouldn't be Triangle as in Triangle Publications Inc., the publisher of TV Guide (and located in Philadelphia), would it? I'll bet Mike Doran would know for sure. I would have watched it, though.

Tuesday's special is Dear Mr. Gable (8:00 p.m., NBC), a tribute to the man known in Hollywood as "The King," produced by his old studio, MGM, and narrated by Burgess Meredith. Clark Gable, who had died in 1960, is still very much a contemporary figure in American pop culture; even though his most famous movie, Gone with the Wind, was made in 1939, Gable maintained a charisma and movie-star presence to the end of his life at age 59. The documentary includes clips from many of Gable's hits, including It Happened OneNight, Mutiny on the Bounty, Boomtown, and the aforementioned Gone with the Wind. Speakng of which, the scenes shown from GWTW mark the first time any clip from the movie has ever been shown on television; it will be 1976 before the film, which MGM re-releases every few years, receives the TV treatment.  

t  t  t

 

For a nation that fought a war to free itself from the tyranny of royalty, we Americans sure seem to be obsessed with royals. A royal love story is even better! And somewhere between the love stories of Edward and Mrs. Simpson and Charles and Di, we had a royal love story of our very own—and her name was Grace Kelly. Twelve years after her fairy-tale marriage to Prince Rainier of Monaco, Her Serene Highness makes a rare television appearance to host ABC's Monte Carlo: C'est La Rose (Wednesday, 9:00 p.m.) a musical tour of Monaco that includes British comedian Terry-Thomas, French singing stars Françoise Hardy and Gilbert Bécaud (whose hit song "C'est La Rose" serves as the show's theme), and choreographer David Winters and his dancers. The show is a hit, not surprisingly; one reviewer comments that the Princess is "not only breathtakingly beautiful but quite charming as well." Look at her picture from the Close-Up. The simplicity is beauty itself: still only 39, a dozen years removed from Hollywood, but looking every bit as glamorous as any movie star.

Grace's tour of Monaco is just one of an extraordinary night of specials on ABC, beginning at 7:30 p.m. with "The Savage World of the Coral Jungle," the second documentary in The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau. Narrated by Cousteau and Rod Serling, the special gives viewers a stunning look at the mystery and beauty of a coral reef in the Indian Ocean. That's followed at 8:30 p.m. by The Now Generation, hosted by Ryan O'Neal, a pilot for a projected series on the "now generation." Ryan's guest tonight is his former Peyton Place co-star Mia Farrow, who shares her thoughts on Vietnam, today's youth, and how her life has been changed by "celebrity guru" Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. That brings us to the Princess at 9:00, and concludes with part one of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich at 10:00. 

And now for the rest of the story, the part that makes 3½ hours of specials even more special: Three of those hours—Cousteau, Grace and the Reich—are produced by the same man, David L. Wolper. Think of it: one producer, and a documentarian at that, whose shows make up almost an entire night of television  (If only there was some way to tie him to The Now Generation; and believe me, I looked.) Yes, that is special.

t  t  t

As we know, this is not always the case  

Nineteen sixty-eight is an election year, and if we had forgotten for even a minute, the end of the week will surely remind us. On Thursday, it's the excellent drama The Best Man (9:00 p.m., CBS), Gore Vidal's savage look at a political party coming together to nominate its presidential candidate, with an all-star cast including Henry Fonda, Cliff Robertson, Edie Adams, Margaret Leighton, Lee Tracy, Kevin McCarthy, Ann Sothern and Shelly Berman. It is, says Judith Crist, "a caustic commentary on the facts of our political life," saved from cynicism by its integrity, "for it pretends to be neither a panacea nor a speech-ridden preachment—simply a picture of practical politics." And in that sense, the movie isn't dated at all. (You can read more about it at my list of the top 20 political movies.)

Meanwhile, Les Crane's guest on Friday is Alabama governor and independent presidential candidate George Wallace (11:00 p.m., WKBS). Wallace had announced his candidacy for the presidency in 1967, but unlike his campaigns in 1964 and 1972, he's running not as a Democrat, but as the standard-bearer of the American Independence Party. (He won't be getting Crane's vote, though; "I wouldn't vote for you for dogcatcher," Crane told him.) Virtually every obituary of Crane lists Wallace as one of his guests, probably because they all used the same information from AP, but since there's very little video of the Crane show still in existence, we can't see it for ourselves. I can show you, however, this show, from later in 1968, in which Crane interviews Joseph Lewis, author of What Makes Reagan Run?

t  t  t

A non-TV Guide reminder: as I mentioned yesterday, my conversation with Ed Robertson on his TV Confidential program is now available for listening on demand. We talk about my book The Electronic Mirror and some of the  programs that helped shape the era of classic TV. I really hope you'll give it a listen, because it was a lot of fun and I think you'll enjoy it; and after you've given it a listen I really hope you'll by a copy of The Electronic Mirror, because it's a good book and I think you'll really enjoy it. And also because I need the money. Or at least I would like the money. So would my accountant. Confidentially, that is.

t  t  t

Finally, some odds and ends: Debbie Reynolds also has a special this week (Thursday, 8:00 p.m., ABC, and it's not your imagination that most of this week's specials come from that network), with an all-star cast of guest stars including Bob Hope, Jim Nabors, Frank Gorshin, Bobby Drin, and her old co-star from Singin' in the Rain, Donald O'Connor.

Monday, Dick Cavett's This Morning, premieres as a Monday-Friday morning show. (11:00 a.m., ABC) Dick's guests for this premiere show are Muhammad Ali, Tony Bennett, Tony Randall, and the Lemon Pipers; at the conclusion of the program, Marlene Sanders offers a news update. This is Cavett's first network show; by the end of next year, after a stopover in prime time, he'll be in the late-night spot vacated by Joey Bishop.

The Teletype reports that Lucille Ball's two kids, Lucie and Desi Jr., may join their mother on her new CBS series Here's Lucy next season. (They do.) Also in the Teletype, a British-based adventure series, The Prisoner, will be a summer replacement for Jonathan Winters' show on CBS. (It winds up as a replacement for The Jackie Gleason Show.) The Doan Report says that Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, Lost in Space, I Spy, The Monkees and I Dream of Jeannie are among the shows targeted to be cancelled this season, replaced by Here Come the Brides, Hawaii Five-O, Adam-12 and Name of the Game, among others. Richard K. Doan's report on TV coverage of the 1968 elections notes that President Johnson (who's still a candidate at this point) overrode the Democratic site committee's rejection of Chicago as the party's convention site, based on Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daily's assurances that "the Windy City's cops would be prepared to put down any unruly exhibitions of disagreement with the Administration's war and domestic policies." (The networks are dubious, and they're preparing for trouble.) 

Finally, the letter of the week comes from Rita Roork of Muskogee, who writes that "I wouldn't really call the Smothers Brothers irreverent, just irrelevant." I think I'll agree with that. TV  

This week in TV Guide: May 21, 1977

The Quiz Show Scandal, you may recall, had to do with public deception. Television viewers were tricked into thinking that a contest between two people, a battle of knowledge, was legitimate—on the level. It was not. As far as we know, however, no viewers were damaged by the deception; there's no record of anyone losing thousands of dollars betting on the outcome of the latest Van Doren-Stempel showdown. And since the American television viewers of the 1950s weren't a bunch of snowflakes, they emerged from the scandal more cynical, less willing to believe it what they saw on the tube, but otherwise more or less intact. You wouldn't have known that from the reaction, though: the Congressional investigation, the indictments, the shaming. Oh, the humanity. It was one of the great scandals of the time, a Turning Point in American culture—you know, the proverbial "we'll never see things in quite the same way again."

Anyway, we're now flashing ahead about 20 years, to something I saw at the time, and completely forgot about, until now. It was the odd era of the Heavyweight Championship of Tennis, and it's the subject of not one, but two pieces in this week's issue.

The Heavyweight Championship of Tennis series goes back to the Wild West days of the sport, which at the time lacked a true season-ending measurement of determining the year’s number one. Owing to the nature of the various tours in existence back then, it was quite possible that the world’s best players might not ever face each other outside of the four Grand Slam tournaments*, which resulted in this made-for-TV extravaganza, something more like boxing than tennis (coincidentally, at a time when both sports were much higher in the public’s consciousness than they are today), with gunslingers facing off against each other outside the boundaries of regular tournaments.

*Even with the vagaries of tournament tennis, having the top players meet in the Majors was no sure thing; Wimbledon suffered through a men’s boycott in 1973, and the French Open banned the participation of “contract” players who had signed with the new World Team Tennis league. There's no percentage in going into the politics around all this.

The answer to this was the Heavyweight Championship, a series of "winner-take-all" matches for tennis supremacy, aired by CBS, pitting the reigning champion and consensus #1 player in the world, the odious Jimmy Connors, against a variety of challengers—or contenders, if we're continuing with the boxing analogy. Over a two-year period, Connors takes on (and wins) matches against Rod Laver, John Newcombe, Manuel Orantes, and Ille Nastase, held in such exotic places as the sports pavilion at Caesars Palace. (Yet another boxing hotspot!) There’s only one problem with this, and surprisingly enough it doesn’t come from any of the tennis authorities itself, but from the Federal Government.

That problem: the matches were not winner-take-all, and CBS knew that was the case. Oops.

Connors (L), Nastase (R): both boors

Unlike the quiz shows, the matches weren’t actually rigged. Nonetheless, as Richard K. Doan points out in the Doan Report, the advertising for them was clearly deceptive; Connors’ match against Nastase on March 5, for example, was allegedly for a winner-take-all pot of $250,000, when in reality Connors was guaranteed $500,000, win or lose, and Nastase would get $150,000. According to series promoter Bill Riordan, "The reason the public was told that there was no more than $250,000 at stake was that CBS told me it would be immoral if it was any higher." I know, that's kind of quaint in an era when a golfer can make $10 million for winning a major championship, but this is forty years ago we're talking about.

It all comes to a head at the start of the Connors-Nastase match, when announcer Pat Summerall cited the $250,000 winner-take-all stakes. CBS Sports VP Barry Frank, hearing the claim (it's nice to know he watches his network's presentations), ordered Summerall not to repeat it, but never called for a retraction or correction. A network spokesman claims that the network could not announce the true split because "they did not know how Riordan had doled out the prize money"—implying, of course, that they knew all along there would be a division between the players.

In November, the House Communications Subcommittee holds that CBS did indeed engage in deceptive practices, saying that the network deliberately intended to mislead the public, and calling their conduct "inexcusable." The Federal Communications Commission, adding insult to injury, intends to investigate whether CBS has violated the Communications Act. And if this isn't bad enough, in January 1978, the International Tennis Federation accuses CBS of deceptive practices in billing an upcoming four-man event between the winners of the Grand Slam tournaments as the "Grand Slam of Tennis," charging that the title will "mislead the American public and do harm to the credibility of the sport," and that CBS's actions, if unchecked, will "cheapen the title 'Grand Slam' and destroy one of the game's great traditions." Not only that, they continue to run commercials listing U.S. Open champ Guillermo Villas as one of the participants, despite him having pulled out due to injury several days previous. Does this network not learn?

This week's As We See It is devoted to the tennis fraud as well. The Editors note that tennis seems susceptible to this kind of thing, often paying appearance fees to players for competing in tournaments, regardless of how they perform. The problem, according to the editorial, is that television money has popularized sports to an extent that borders on corruption. The money leads to problems, "not the least of which are under-the-table deals to hoodwink the suckers (viewers) into thinking there's a real prize at stake, as in the case of the Connors-Nastase payoff." (Shades of the quiz shows...)

The Editors are about as unimpressed with Connors and Nastase as I was, back then. "Connors and Nastase, whose God-given talents could help them set an example of clean living and exemplary conduct for the youth of our time, are a couple of vulgar characters who all too frequently are an embarrassment to the game. To have their arrogance and disdain for the public compounded by a conscienceless promoter and a shameless network sports department is a truly disgusting development." Yet another testament to the power of television.

t  t  t

It must be truth or dare week at TV Guide. Next up, there’s an interesting exchange of opinions in this week’s Letters section, responding to an article by Frank Walton from the April 23 edition, in which Walton criticizes the accuracy of NBC’s Baa Baa Black Sheep (aka Black Sheep Squadron), a series based on the real-life World War II exploits of Gregory "Pappy" Boyington and his famed squadron called the "Black Sheep." (They wanted to be known as "Boyington's Bastards," but the military put the kibosh on that.) Walton, the squadron’s Air Combat Intelligence Officer, sharply disputed the image of the pilots (several of whom he quoted in his article) as “a collection of misfits and screwballs,” and casts a dark eye at what the self-aggrandizement of both Boyington and the actor who plays him, Robert Conrad.

Pappy Boyington with Robert Conrad

The first letter comes from none other than Pappy Boyington himself, who accuses Walton of engaging in “more fiction and downright falsehoods than does the dramatization he is criticizing,” and says that Walton “is not a pilot and hasn’t the slightest knowledge of how a combat pilot thinks.” He’s joined in this criticism by the show’s creator, Stephen J. Cannell, who says that Walton “is anxious about the fiction in the series because he is obviously a man with no knowledge about television or storytelling or 8 o’clock violence on TV which would make the kind of documentary story he wants unacceptable to network censors.” And a neutral observer, A.T. LaRoche (Navy retired), asks why Walton sees fit to criticize the show, since “Hogan’s Heroes, McHale’s Navy, etc. are also made for entertainment of the TV-viewing public and are not factual.” That last letter prompts a tart response from the Editor (probably Merrill Panitt), who replies that it does matter, “Because ‘Hogan’ and ‘McHale’ never lived. Gregory “Pappy” Boyington did—and does.”

Now, Cannell (who, you might notice, doesn’t dispute the central tenet of Walton’s article) is probably right in pointing out that any television series designed to entertain is bound to have “a high degree of fiction” in it. But let's take a closer look at what Walton actually wrote in that article. Whereas the series portrays the Black Sheep as "a group of green, inexperienced 18- and 19-year-old kids," in fact the youngest member of the squad was 21—there were no teenagers. Nor were they lacking in experience; nearly a third had completed at least one tour in the South Pacific, and between them they had 16 Japanese kills to their credit—and that's before they joined the Black Sheep.

Boyington portrays the squad in interviews as men who "had nothing to lose, those Black Sheep. They knew if they distinguished themselves, they might get off with easier sentences." Conrad, in a talk show interview promoting the series, added that "All these guys had failed in everything they'd ever done. None of them could make it on their own." In fact, writes Walton, "not a single member of the squadron" was facing, or had ever faced, any kind of disciplinary action. Nor did they engage in the kinds of brawls frequently portrayed in the series.

Eight of the Black Sheep remained in the Marines after the war, all retiring as colonels. As for those who returned to civilian life, seven become owners or presidents of businesses; two are elected mayors of their cities; three are lawyers; seven are directors, executive directors or managers of companies and firms. At a reunion in Hawaii with nearly two dozen members of the squadron, Boyington left with no doubt as to how the men felt about how they were portrayed in the series. Even though he serves as technical adviser to the series, he admitted that he couldn't explain how or why they had been played as misfits and screwballs.

The series only runs for a year and a half, hardly long enough for this to become one of the big controversies in television history. There is, to my ears, something about Walton’s article that rings true, just as the protestations , Boyington and Cannell ring false. Of course we all know that compromises are made when a true story is brought to the small screen; nevertheless, as Walton points out, the "real facts" of the squadron's accomplishments would have made a story of high adventure. Having settled on a narrative, though, Cannell chose to play it through to the end, regardless of how inconvenient the truth might be.

Boyington, who won the Congressional Medal of Honor for his accomplishments, led a very colorful and controversial life both during and after the war, going through multiple marriages and divorces, enduring financial difficulties, and battling both alcoholism and lung cancer—cancer arrested by the squad's former flight surgeon, one of the "misfits." Frank Walton goes on to write a well-received book, Once They Were Eagles: The Men of the Black Sheep Squadron, which he says is the true story of the men from the Black Sheep Squadron, and their own heroic accomplishments. It is published in 1986, two years before Pappy Boyington dies.

t  t  t

On weeks when we can, we'll match up two of the biggest rock shows of the '70s, NBC's The Midnight Special and the syndicated Don Kirshner's Rock Concert, and see who's better, who's best.

Kirshner: Al Stewart, Chubby Checker, the Bay City Rollers, Queen, Blondie, the Babys, comic Rick Podell and the Mime Company.

Special: In performance: guest host Neil Sedaka, Judy Collins, Joan Baez, Helen Reddy, the Captain & Tennille, Thelma Houston, and Kim Carnes.

Plenty of hits to choose from between these two shows, no doubt about it. I grant Neil Sedaka's talent as a songwriter, but I don't like Judy Collins, I don't like Joan Baez, I don't like Helen Reddy, and I don't like the Captain and Tennille. (Personal opinions only; YMMV) That seems to make the choice pretty simple, doesn't it? But I will add that I like Al Stewart, Chubby Checker is a throwback to the old days, and Queen is, well, Queen. That alone is good enough to make Kirschner this week's winner.

t  t  t

Good grief, I've spent a lot of space already on not very much. Let's take a quick look at the rest of the week while we have time.

On Saturday, Kentucky Derby winner Seattle Slew tries to make it two in a row (and succeeds) in the Preakness Stakes (2:00 p.m. PT, CBS). The Slew will go on to become horse racing's tenth Triple Crown winner. On Sunday at 8:00 p.m. PT, CBS presents the first of consecutive nights of big movies, the kind that networks don't run anymore (not that they show any theatrical movies anymore) with a single-night showing of Ben-Hur, the winner of 11 Oscars including Best Picture; its running time of three-and-a-half hours is accomplished by shaving 40 minutes off. They wouldn't cut out the chariot race, would they? (Now that's a real winner-take-all match!)  The following night, CBS comes back with Hello, Dolly!, starring Barbra Streisand and Walter Matthau. (8:00 p.m., Monday) On Tuesday, gossip columnist and occasional What's My Line? panelist Aileen Mehle, better known as Suzy Knickerbocker (or just plain Suzy), hosts an hour-long profile of two giants of their professions: Frank Sinatra and Muhammad Ali. (10:00 p.m., NBC) Earlier in the evening, Henry Winkler makes a crossover appearance as The Fonz on Laverne & Shirley (8:30 p.m., ABC)

David Frost's one-on-one interviews with Richard Nixon come to a conclusion Wednesday (9:30 p.m., syndicated) as the former president reflects on his final days in office, and other events of his presidency. (The Doan Report notes that Frost has agreed to an additional episode consisting of material not previously used, sometime in the fall.) On Thursday, Anthony Hopkins gives a brilliant performance as Bruno Hauptmann in a repeat of the three-hour TV-movie, The Lindbergh Kidnapping Case (8:00 p.m., NBC) Opposite it at 9:30 p.m., an ABC News Special presents Barbara Walters interviewing Cuban leader Fidel Castro. And speaking of Lindbergh, on Friday, Eric Sevareid interviews Charles Lindbergh's widow Anne Morrow Lindbergh, a noted writer and poet in her own right. (8:00 p.m., PBS) The Apollo 8 astronauts, the night before their historic flight to the moon, met with Lindbergh, the Lone Eagle. Said Lindbergh, "In the first second of your flight tomorrow, you'll burn 10 times more fuel than I did all the way to Paris." His death, only three years ago, is recent history indeed, and the end of the era of aviation pioneers. TV