This week in TV Guide: May 15, 1971

Are the words "television" and "journalism" mutually exclusive? Of course not; we saw a couple of weeks ago how Edward R. Murrow took on Joseph McCarthy; New York Times critic Jack Gould called it a week that "may be remembered as the week that broadcasting recaptured its soul." That was 17 years ago, and in this first of a four-part look at television journalism, Richard Townley looks as why today's TV news "appears paunchy and pallid. It seems to lack the most important thing Murrow's brand of journalism gave it: promise."

The series begins with a look at local news coverage, which Townley sees as a particular disappointment in the New York and Washington D.C. areas, markets that one would think are the "sine qua non of broadcast journalism." And yet, compared to the work being done by print journalists, "television has almost totally abdicated its responsibility to do original reporting: the kind . . . that's important because we say it is, not because The New York Times says so."

Townley runs through a litany of responsibilities and resources that local news departments have, juxtaposed with the lack of return, all of which convinces the reader that the public deserves better than they get—which one analyst describes as "a headline service." So where's the problem? Townley points to a uniformity of thought in news departments about what constitutes "important" news. It's not an ideological bias, he writes, but one of "a common belief that some stories can be covered better than others on television. Invariably, this means picture stories. And the best stories of this kind—as any movie-goer can testify—are stories of excitement and conflict." Townley points to the civil rights and antiwar movements as stories of conflict that were also legitimate news stories. But, he asks, would the media have become as invested in civil rights if it hadn't been violent, if the South had acquiesced to racial integration? (The protesters, knowing what sells on TV news, clearly understood how to frame the story to get maximum coverage.) Dr Milton Eisenhower, brother of Dwight and chairman of the post-RFK assassination commission on violence in America, says that "for a long, long time [television] has given greater news value to conflict than it has to the fundamental knowledge that people need in order to make wise democratic decisions."

So now we know what the problem is, but why? Townley points to three factors: demands on news managers to be profitable as well as respectable; the definition of success as being measured in ratings in order to deliver that profitability; and the perception that viewers are "lazy, indifferent or ignorant, and easily bored," which "makes thought the slave to picture." The conclusion Townley reaches at the end of his examination: in an industry where "one rating point means hard cash" and one New York station when through three news directors in one year, the tone is set by "men like WNEW-TV's Ted Kavanau, who says: 'We can only take so many risks.'" So it was then, so it is now.

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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 series of the era. 

It's fitting, considering this week's cover story, that Cleveland Amory has in his sights not one, nor even two, but three—count 'em, three—shows: the network evening news programs. Anchoring the nightly news is a tough job, says Cleve; back in the old days, when he was "a boy in Babylon," if an emissary came bearing good news, "we welcomed them with open arms, gave them a banquet and wrote them a rave review." On the other hand, if it was bad news—well, "we first smote them hip and thigh, then slew them, then delivered, to their next of kin, a rotten review." Nowadays, they just lose their jobs—ask the last two anchors at CBS.

There's a problem, in general, with the news on television, Amory says—we need more of it. That is, tough-minded news, with independent thought. We all prefer good news to bad news, but sometimes it just hasn't been that good a day—and that's the way the news has to be presented. But, "with the kind of pressure the news departments are getting these days, we have just that much less chance of getting it. For whether or not no news is good news, one thing is certain—all good news, for a country that pretends to freedom, is bad news indeed."

Amory points out the weaknesses of network news programs: they're all "slavish imitations of each other" (echoing the observations of Richard Townley above); when charges are made against somebody, "the answers to these charges are somehow the things you remember"; and for an industry such as network news that makes such an issue (and rightly so) of independence from government interference, "why don't they give outside commentators the same independence they want?" And don't try to make them into show business; back in the day, "Huntley and Brinkley's competitors always seemed to be searching frantically for a kind of top-banana team consisting of a Pete Personality and a Charley Charisma."

As far as individual broadcasts are concerned, Cleve feels NBC's has improved, with "the professorial Mr. McGee and the wryly earnest Mr. Chancellor," and at CBS, "Mr. Cronkite is as good as he ever was, backed up by Mr. Sevareid, who could be for our taste a bit more full of sound and fury, but he at least signifies something." ABC has become a player as well, with Howard K. Smith (who "has moved unobtrusively but steadily into becoming close to our No. 1 favorite") being joined by Harry Reasoner, "who can be both light and heavy." All that's left now is for public television to come up with a real evening news program, producing four-way competition. "That, not censorship, is the only answer."

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Philo Farnsworth's friends complain there's nothing good on.

It's TV's "great paradox," according to the Doan Report: "more and more people watching while more and more disparagement is heaped on the medium." The average viewer, according to Nielsen, watches "just under six hours" of television each day. (They obviously didn't ask me.) Women, who spend more time at home, watch about 30 hours per week, men about six hours less. And while the wealthy and highly education tend to look down their noses at TV, that doesn't prevent them from watching; men earning over $15,000 (affluent back in 1971!) watch 20 hours a week, their wives take in 23 hours.

One can imagine this has always been the case, and as the number of stations grew, people still complained. Remember Springsteen's song about 57 channels and nothing on? I wonder, though, if we're finally arriving at a point where people are happy with their choices? (If not the amount of money they have to pay.) With the growth of cord-cutting, if people aren't happy with their choices they just get rid of it all.

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And now for the sports page. Canonero II, the upset winner of the Kentucky Derby, tries to make it two-for-two as he takes to the track in the Preakness, second jewel in horse racing's Triple Crown, (CBS, 5:00 p.m. ET). And come out on top he does, defeating Eastern Fleet by a length-and-a-half, leading to great anticipation for June+'s Belmont Stakes, where the horse tries to become the first Triple Crown winner since Citation in 1948. Alas, despite the cheers of a record crowd, he fades in the grueling mile-and-a-half race, finishing fourth to Pass Catcher.

The NBA playoffs ended in April, if you can believe that, with the Milwaukee Bucks defeating the Baltimore Bullets in four games, so the only hoops action left is in the ABA, and game six of the finals is Saturday afternoon (2:00 p.m., CBS) with the Utah Stars taking on the Kentucky Colonels in Louisville. The Stars come into the game with a 3-2 series lead, but the Colonels force game seven by defeating Utah 105-102. That deciding game, played Tuesday in Salt Lake City, isn't on national television—not unusual back in the day. But just because a game isn't seen on national TV doesn't mean it isn't played; Utah beats Kentucky 131-121 to win the fourth ABA championship.

The NHL's Stanley Cup playoffs end this week as well; we'll talk about that later.

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For those not in the horse racing set, Jean Shepherd's America (Saturday, 5:30 p.m., WHYY) takes a tour of America's favorite dishes, pronouncing that "There's a Lot More to Life than a Hostess Twinkie." (Truer words were seldom spoken.) In prime time, Tom Jones . . .And Such Special Friends (8:30 p.m., ABC) features Frank Gorshin, Paul Anka and Dusty Springfield. But for my money, the best entertainment on television for the whole week has to be Kup's Show (1:00 a.m., WNEW). I mentioned Irv Kupcinet's remarkable career last month; the format of Kup's Show was more like a round-table discussion than a traditional talk show, with all of his guests taking part, and tonight's guest list is a prime example of what made it so watchable. We have singer, actor and activist Harry Belafonte; George Reedy, former press secretary to LBJ; Yippie leader Abbie Hoffman; Saul Alinsky, author of Rules for Radicals; Perry Wolf, executive producer of CBS's The Selling of the Pentagon; feminist author Germaine Greer; and Stephen Birmingham, author of a book about Sephardic Jews in America. It's like lighting a match in a fireworks factory. You think the discussion turned out like this?

Sunday starts with an Ella Fitzgerald special (7:00 p.m., WNEW), with guest Duke Ellington; sounds like a wonderful way to start the evening. Ed Sullivan follows (8:00 p.m., CBS), with George Hamilton (singing "If You Could Read My Mind"), Bernadette Peters, Oliver, the Phil Driscoll Explosion, the Young Saints, Georgie Kaye, and Skiles and Henderson. And at 9:00 p.m, the start of a grim double-feature on NET. First, it's NET Playhouse, with an adaptation of Marya Mannes' dark novel "They," set in 1990; a future in which "At age 55, citizens are carted off to detention camps—and given a maximum of 10 years to live." The stars include Cornelia Otis Skinner, Gary Merrill, Jack Gilford and Joseph Wiseman. That's followed at 10:30 p.m. by NET Opera Theatre's presentation of "Owen Wingrave," Benjamin Britten's written-for-television antiwar opera, with a stellar cast featuring Benjamin Luxon, Peter Pears, Sylvia Fisher, John Shirley-Quirk and Janet Baker.

Now here's something we could use today: Hess's department store of Allentown, Pennsylvania presents Hess's 10th International Flower Show (Monday, 8:00 p.m., WPVI), "featuring exotic flowers and the news in fashions." It stars Barbara Eden, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Dorothy Malone and Barbara Walters. Elsewhere, Anthony Quinn stars in the made-for-TV movie The City (9:00 p.m., ABC), the pilot for the fall series The Man and the City, in which Quinn plays the mayor of a large southwestern city (it's not named, but the series is filmed in Albuquerque). Despite Quinn's star power and a good pedigree, the series only lasts a half-season. Meanwhile, apropos of nothing in particular, all three late night talk shows are away from home tonight. Dick Cavett has extended his stay in London for an extra day, while Merv Griffin comes to us from Las Vegas for a week, and Johnny Carson does likewise with one of his periodic visits to Hollywood. I wonder who's home minding the store?

Something that caught my eye on Tuesday morning: Summer Semester (6:30 a.m., CBS) welcomes the famous American astronomer physicist, and NASA scientist Dr. Robert Jastrow, director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, who'll be teaching a nine week course on "New Science," appearing Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. I would gladly have taken that class. Speaking of space—sort of—the 4:30 p.m. movie on WOR is Mutiny in Outer Space, which sounds for all the world like something that ought to have been on MST3K: "After an exploratory moon trip, two astronauts return to their orbiting space station—bringing with them a deadly fungus." At 8:30 p.m, ABC's Movie of the Week has a rerun of The Over-the-Hill Gang Rides Again, with Fred Astaire, Walter Brennan, Edgar Buchanan, Andy Devine and Chill Wills. Says Judith Crist, it's "designed for Golden Agers and movie buffs who get a bang out of seeing familiar faces."

It's been a while since Tennessee Ernie Ford headlined a weekly series, but he's big enough to host Sing America Beautiful on Wednesday night (9:00 p.m., NBC). Ernie's guests for this "hand-clapping singalong" are Danny Thomas, Diahann Carroll, the Smothers Brothers, Arlene Golonka, the International Children's Choir and the Third Marine Aircraft Wing Band. And is Ben Cartwright a Commie spy? Shocking! But here it is in black-and-white, in the 1969 movie Destiny of a Spy (WOR, 11:00 p.m.). Lorne Greene plays a retired Russian agent (so maybe he's not a Commie!) involved in "a plot to destroy a British counter-radar system." No, I guess he's a Red after all. That is, until he falls in love with a British double-agent, played by Rachel Roberts. Will love conquheroiceror Marx? Who knows?

It's farewell to The Jim Nabors Hour on Thursday (8:00 p.m., CBS), with an episode spotlighting the regulars: Frank Sutton does a dramatic reading, and Karen Morrow is torn between two potential husbands (Jim, Ronnie Schell). Plus there's plenty of singing! It means the first time since 1962 that he won't be on a weekly series, after The Andy Griffith Show, Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. and this, but don't feel too sorry for him: according to the Hollywood TV Teletype, he'll be picking up "some of that personal-appearance money this summer," headlining shows from Lake Tahoe to Washington D.C., along with "practically the whole cast of his canceled CBS-TV series." Next year his summers will include his longest-running gig: singing "Back Home Again in Indiana" at the Indianapolis 500, which he'll do faithfully, with few exceptions, between 1972 and 2014. And David Frost takes a page out of Dick Cavett's playbook, spending the entire 90 minutes of his show with guest Johnny Cash (8:30 p.m., WNEW).

Memorial Day 1971 isn't for a couple of weeks yet, but Friday's late movie schedule makes you think stations are gearing up for it now, starting with Hell to Eternity (11:00 p.m., WOR), based on the World War II heroics of Marine Guy Gabaldon (Jeffrey Hunter) "who, at age 18, captured or persuaded to surrender over 1,300 Japanese soldiers and civilians during the battles for Saipan and Tinian islands in 1944." (Definitely not a snowflake there.) Then there's The Day and the Hour (11:30 p.m, WPIX), with Simone Signoret as a member of the French underground who becomes involved with U.S. soldier Stuart Whitman; To Hell and Back (1:00 a.m., WCAU), the incredible true story of Medal of Honor winner Audie Murphy, playing himself; and Away All Boats (1:10 p.m., WCBS), the adventures of an attack transport crew fighting the Japanese, with Jeff Chandler and George Nader. Plus, there's the documentary series Men in Crisis (2:40 a.m., WNEW), portraying the final stages of World War I, with General John J. Pershing leading his American troops against German Field Marshal Eric Ludendorff.

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Finally, there's a topic I've been trying to avoid for as long as possible, but I suppose I have to deal with it eventually. Despite having lived most of my life in Minnesota, even though I rooted for the Green Bay Packers as a child, there is only one sports team that I have consistently taken to my heart: the Chicago Blackhawks. I don't know what it was; maybe it was the legendary Chicago Stadium, the world's loudest arena, its antiquated scoreboard and its mighty Wurlitzer organ; perhaps it was the dynamism of Bobby Hull; or it could have been part of the endless fascination I've had with the city of Chicago. Whatever the reason, ever since I started watching hockey, through thick and thin, season in and season out, the Hawks were my team. It certainly didn't hurt that when the night was clear, I could get the home games on WMAQ radio, with the legendary Lloyd Pettit behind the mic.

In 1971, the Hawks found themselves in the Stanley Cup Final against the Montreal Canadiens. At that point, Montreal had won the Cup 16 times, compared to just three for Chicago. But here they were, behind Hull, Stan Mikita and goalie Tony Esposito, poised to bring the Cup back to Chicago for the first time since 1961, and they had the home ice advantage to boot. The teams split the first six games, each team winning their home games, and game seven was scheduled for Tuesday night in Chicago. For the longest time, everything went our way. The Hawks drew first blood with a goal from Bobby Hull's brother Dennis, then added another from Danny O'Shea. The cameras shook with the roar from the crowd. With less than six minutes to play in the second period, the Hawks still led, 2-0.

And then it all fell apart.

Jacques Lemaire launched a shot from outside the blue line that floated past Esposito, and it was 2-1. Before the period ended the game was tied. Less than three minutes into the third period, the Canadiens led 3-2. And even though the Hawks had 17 minutes to even the score, even though they swarmed the Montreal net, that's they way the game ended, and the Canadiens carried off the Stanley Cup again. I didn't smash anything, as I'd been known to do, nor did I bite the coffee table, as I once did. This was too painful for anger; if you were a Hawks fan, you were absolutely heartbroken, and you knew it would last. It called for bitterness, and I was bitter. And it snowed the next day

The Hawks made it back to the finals two years later, and lost. They made it again in 1992, and lost. Crowds dwindled, the Stadium was torn down in favor of United Center, a more lavish but soulless arena built mostly for Michael Jordan and the Bulls. For more than a few seasons, they missed the playoffs altogether. Through the thick and thin of all those years, with few exceptions, I stuck with the Hawks. When they finally—finally!—won the Cup in 2010, after a drought of 49 years, when some of us had given up on it ever happening, it was like reaching the Promised Land, so emotional that it was almost numbing. They'd win again in 2013, and take a third Cup in 2015, this one a win at home. I'd stopped following hockey by then, but I tuned in to those final games, wearing one of my Blackhawks jerseys and waving my Blackhawks pennant, cheering them on. Those years were a reminder that winning isn't everything, it's the only thing. And yet. . .

Almost every sports fan will tell you that the agony of defeat always outweighs the thrill of victory. As joyous as winning is, it can never make up for losing. And so even after winning three Stanley Cups in six years, there was always something a little bittersweet about those victories, always the one that got away—not 1992, not 1973, but 1971. It's probably why losing hurts so much; it's meant that way, to keep you from wanting to experience it again. But we keep at it anyway. TV  

Around the dial

I quite enjoy these Twilight Zone comic books that Jordan is sharing at The Twilight Zone Vortex, and this week's story from 1972, with the description "An actor goes before the camera—with murder as a co-star!" is no exception. I love the pulp feel of it!

It's good to hear from Carol at Bob Crane: Life & Legacy that all is well with the gang there, and we can expect another installment of the podcast in the near future. Keep up the good work and take care of yourselves!

It's always fun when characters crossover into the realm belonging to other character,s—for example, when George Reeves (as Superman) appears on I Love Lucy—and that's David's focus at Comfort TV this week. You'll enjoy looking at his favorite character team-ups.

Ace in the Hole, Billy Wilder's scathing look at "the dark side" of human nature, is the topic at Classic Film & TV Café. It contains a powerful performance by Kirk Douglas and a cold-blooded one by Jan Sterling; Rick says it's "not among the director's best," but still a good one.

It's another of Jodie's odds and ends at Garroway at Large; this time, his bemused musings on what America might have been like if Sir Martin Frobisher and come a little farther south instead of discovering Hudson Bay. Would the continent be named after him and not Americus Vespucci? The kind of speculation I love to engage in myself.

I never watched The King of Queens, so I know Jerry Stiller best from his work with wife Anne Meara (and for being the father of the obnoxious Ben Stiller, YMMV, but that's for another day), but Terence at A Shroud of Thought has a very good retrospective of a long and successful career.

Little Richard died this week as well, and at The Hits Just Keep on Comin', JB shares his own memories of the singer, along with a roundup of comments and thoughts from around the internet.

You won't want to miss tomorrow here at the blog: it's a rare double-header, with the weekly TV Guide review joined by my contribution to the National Classic Movie Day Blogathon! TV  

Captain Kirk is Archie Goodwin!

You all know by now that Nero Wolfe is a favorite in the Hadley household, both in written form and in the legendary A&E series with Maury Chaykin as Nero Wolfe and Timothy Hutton as Archie Goodwin. There was another Wolfe series, in 1981, with William Conrad and Lee Horsley doing the honors; that one's fun enough, I suppose, but it never really did it for me. But did you know we might well have had yet another Nero Wolfe series?

Back a few years ago I mentioned an item in a 1959 TV Guide issue about a pilot being shot, with Kurt Kasznar playing Wolfe and William Shatner in the role of Archie. At the time, I remarked how I'd like to see that sometime, but the pilot was thought lost. No longer, though; a couple of months ago at Lee Goldberg's YouTube channel, what should pop up but the original pilot, in a very clear print, for all to see!


So what did you think? Comparing it to other versions, it does very well. It's certainly better than the radio adaptation with Sydney Greenstreet; he plays Wolfe a little too avuncular, as if he were channeling Kasper Gutman from The Maltese Falcon. It's also superior to the Conrad version; had Conrad played Wolfe with a little less of Frank Cannon's good humor (perhaps a little more like the hitman he played in The Killers), it would have been better. And of course, Horsley falls far short of the Archie Goodwin standard set by Timothy Hutton.

But this is actually a pretty fair adaptation, and while Kasznar hits the right notes (especially the accent; Wolfe, after all, is from Montenegro), it's our old friend William Shatner who who is a pleasant surprise. After watching him, it dawned on me that Archie is really James T. Kirk in a suit and tie. I mean, look at the smirk in that picture under the header. Doesn't that look just like Kirk after he's pulled a fast one on the Klingons? While Shatner did have the tendency to talk a little too quickly, there was none of Kirk's mannered emoting that we sometimes have fun with—just a same kind of smartass cockiness that describes Archie to a T. It's nice to know Kirk would have had something to fall back on if the Starship thing didn't work out.

It's hard to tell if the quality would have remained over the course of an entire season; while the script picks up many of the mannerisms that distinguish the characters in print, it's also true that the pilot often hits marks that a subsequent series struggles to match. I would have liked to have seen it, though—even a single season would have been well worth it. Pfui! TV  

What's on TV? Tuesday, May 12, 1981

This is, I think, the first time we've visited San Diego (even though the Los Angeles listings are included, it's considered the San Diego issue), and I would have liked to learn more about the culture, so to speak, of San Diego TV. For instance, when was the last time you saw a TV station whose call letters begin with "X"? Unfortunately, by the time we get to the 1980s, there's not much left of a local station's personality, at least nothing that we can see from our brief glimpse here. (Although the aforementioned XETV does have a very interesting history.) There's still plenty to see here, however, as you'll find out.

This week in TV Guide: May 9, 1981

One of the continuing storylines around here has been my efforts, successful so far, to find compelling things to write about in the TV Guides of the 1980s. The difficulty here is that for some of you, 1981 is distant history; it is, after all, 39 years ago. At the same time, the Eighties seem like, if not yesterday (for that would be 2000), just a few years ago. Classifying this era as "classic" television is kind of like finding your childhood toys in an antiques store. It means you're old.

And this brings us, somewhat logically, to Claire Safran's review of Kate Moody's new book, Growing Up on Television. This isn't about her happy memories of favorite shows on the tube, though; Growing Up on Television's purpose is to provide "convincing evidence that viewing changes the quality of childhood, and offers a persuasive explanation of how it does so." That's probably not news to anyone who's been reading this blog for the last ten years, and indeed, Safran points out that the psychological effects ofhe television on children are well known by now. There's been less discussion of the physical effects of TV, however, and that's where Growing Up on Television comes in.*

*As Linus said when asked if he thought television was harmful to you heath, "I don't know. I've never had one fall on me."

The subtitle of Moody's book is "A Report to Parents," and one of its primary purposes is to provide parents with the knowledge they need to make informed decisions about their kids' TV viewing. For example, she points out how television can change brain-wave patters by overloading them with stimuli (and that's before the MTV effect came to be), and too many hours of viewing can affect a young child's overall body coordination. Television also impacts cognitive development; by training the viewer to focus on one spot, TV can hamper the brain's ability to learn to read, something for which it depends on eye movement. As well as educating parents on these potential side effects, Moody also offers what Safran calls "sensible conclusions," such as providing helpful suggestions on how parents can "give the TV set some competition,"

It's not just parents who need to be aware of these physical effects; teachers have to realize that they are dealing with "a new generation of TV people, not Gutenberg people." Pictures, and not words, will become the primary method of storytelling for this generation (think of USA Today's infographics), and smart educators will have to find out how to use TV as a tool, teaching them the value of critical viewing. They must, however, continue to help children rediscover the power of reading. And the community at large must continue to insist on standards for television programming, such as less TV violence, fewer commercials on kids' programs, and better programs in general, making this not only a guide for parents, but a call to action.

In a 2011 interview, Moody lamented that since the publication of Growing Up on Television, "all the problems are still there and I don’t see that anything much has been solved." I doubt that much has changed in the intervening nine years, unless one wants to point to the increasing influence of video games, cell phones, and other forms of stimuli which have served to decrease attention spans even more, while increasing juvenile hyperactivity. It remains important, Safran says, because of "television's power as storyteller to the Nation's children." Quoting George Gerbner of the Annenberg School of Communications (funded by TV Guide's father, Walter Annenberg), she reminds us that "If you can control the storytelling of a nation, you don't have to worry about who makes the laws." Food for thought, in 2020 as well as 1981.

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If you're perusing this week's listings, you might be puzzled when it comes to the CBS Evening News, shown as being anchored by "Rather/Drinkwater." "I remember Connie Chung," you might be thinking to yourself, "but when did Dan Rather have another co-anchor?" Well, it's like this (and I'm going by memory now): there was a time, following the live, East Coast broadcast of the CBS Evening News, when Terry Drinkwater, who was based in Los Angeles and had covered many memorable stories throughout the years, from the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy to the kidnapping and trial of Patty Hearst, would act as co-anchor of the West Coast edition of the news, presenting and updating stories that had happened since the original broadcast. This arrangement lasted a couple of years, before reverting to its conventional format. I believe the networks still update their evening newscasts in various ways, either with a completely new broadcast or by inserting updated stories, but nobody else has done it with a separate anchor.

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Any sports this week? Why sure, although the NBA might want to forget all about it. A note in the sports section of the listings advises us that "CBS may pre-empt regular programming Tuesday and Thursday at 11:30 P.. for taped coverage of the fifth and sixth games (if necessary) in the NBA championship series."

Yes, we're in the tape-delay era of the NBA Finals, when CBS would record the weeknight games and show them following the late local news, an ignominious thing to happen to one of the supposed four major sports. Basketball wasn't the hot sport back then, though. The quality of the game was suffering, and it was widely (and correctly) believed that the sport had a major drug problem. Ratings were low, and because the NBA's regular season started in early October, the Finals would fall during the May sweeps month. For all that, though, the NBA was on its way back to relevance; Magic Johnson and Larry Bird had entered the league at the same time, reigniting the storied Celtics-Lakers rivalry, and after that it was Happy Days are Here Again for the NBA and its followers.

But back to the present: the 1981 Finals pit the Houston Rockets against the Celtics, The Celtics had won 62 games during the regular season, the Rockets just 40. And while Houston plays Boston tough, the Celts eventually win an ugly low-scoring series four games to two. The series garners what was, to that point, the lowest television rating in NBA history (a 6.7 rating), And as promised, the network shows games five and six on tape delay. My, but how those times have changed.

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It's only May, but the networks are already discussing the new fall season, and ABC and NBC are pinning their hopes on reliable male stars from the past. Pay close attention; there'll be a test at the end.

ABC's eight new series are led by Code Red, with Lorne Greene as captain of a "dedicated family" of Los Angeles firefighters (apparently their previous efforts with Firehouse were unappreciated); Today's FBI, with Mike Connors as Efrem Zimbalist Jr., only with four assistants; The Fall Guy, starring Lee Majors as a Hollywood stuntman and bounty hunter; Best of the West, a Western with a former Union soldier who marries a Southern belle; Open All Night, the story of a "grumpy owner of a 24-hour supermarket"; Maggie, a comedy about family life in the suburbs, written by Erma Bombeck; Strike Force, with Robert Stack as captain of an undercover police unit; and King's Crossing, a mystery with two teen girls haunted by "mysterious secrets." To make way, the network's canceling Soap, I'm a Big Girl Now, Vega$, Eight is Enough, Those Amazing Animals, Charlie's Angels and Aloha Pardise.

NBC's new schedule represents Fred Silverman's continued struggle to pull the Peacock Network out of its third-place slump, starting with Father Murphy, starring Merlin Olson posing as a priest to shelter a group of orphans; The Powers of David Star, with a high-student who's also a superhero; Love, Sidney, a follow-up to the TV-movie Sidney Shorr, with Tony Randall as a middle-aged homosexual; The Rock Hudson Show, starring—well, you know—as the elder member of a father-son detective agency; Gabe and Guich, a comedy starring Gabe Kaplan and Guich Koock running a country-music club in Texas; Gimmie a Break, with Nell Carter helping a police captain raise three children; Roomies, featuring Mickey Rooney who moves in with his college-student grandson; Chicago Story, a 90-minute drama following the lives of seven men who grew up together in Chitown; The James Arness Show, with the former Gunsmoke star as a veteran cop teamed with a young partner; and Bret Maverick, James Garner's return to one of his most famous roles. On the outs: BJ and the Bear, Lobo, Nero Wolfe, The Brady Brides, Walking Tall and The Gangster Chronicles.

So, how did it all turn out? Well, there were two unqualified hits in the list: Gimmie a Break, which ran for six seasons on NBC, and The Fall Guy, which had five successful seasons for ABC. Love, Sidney was the only other series to run for more than a single season (44 episodes through two seasons). Three survived for 10 episodes or less (Open All Night, Maggie and King's Crossing), two of them (The Powers of Matthew Star and Roomies, which was renamed One of the Boys), wound up on TV Guide's 50 Worst Shows of All Time. (Almost all of NBC's shows underwent name changes by the time they made it to air, by the way.) Were these shows an upgrade on the shows they replaced? Well, you be the judge.

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That may be next season, but let's get back to this season, and Saturday starts off a heavy movie-and-specials week with a couple of thriller classics: first, XETV shows the modern-day horror of Ira Levin's classic The Stepford Wives (8:00 p.m. PT), with Katharine Ross, Paula Prentiss and Peter Masterson. If that's not to your liking, and it wouldn't be to mine, head to CBS at 8:30 for its special movie presentation of The Exorcist (8:30 p.m.), with William Friedkin directing a cast including Ellen Burstyn, the late Max von Sydow, Lee J. Cobb and Linda Blair as the possessed little girl. And while we don't have anything to compare them to, we have not one, but two renditions of Don Kirshner's Rock Concert tonight. The first (1:00 a.m., KCST) stars David Bowie, AC/DC, Ashford & Simpson, Cameo, and comic Dennis Blair; the other (1:30 a.m., KNBC) features Black Sabbath, Blue Oyster Cult, Pat Benatar and Billy Burnette. Nobody asked me, but I'll give the edge to the KCST version anyway.

Sunday is Mother's Day, and NBC commemorates the day with The All-Star Salute to Mother's Day (9:00 p.m.), made up of just about every B-lister you can think of; just check out the list at the left! In the meantime, it's "An All-New Sunday of Specials on ABC!" starting at 7:00 p.m. with Benji (Takes a Dive) at Marineland. "Will a conniving canine rival keep Benji from becoming the world's first scuba-diving dog?" My guess is no. At 7:30 p.m., it's Pink at First Sight: "While the Pink Panther plays cupid. . .he falls head over paws in love!" Not sure what those two have to do with Mother's Day, but we'll give it a pass. At 8:00 p.m., "It's the golden voice at the Golden Gate!", said voice being that of Perry Como, with special guests Cheryl Ladd and Larry Gatlin and the Gatlin Brothers, in Perry Como's Spring in San Francisco. (By the way, the Gatlin brothers appear in much smaller type in the ad than Larry's name; I wonder how they felt about that?) Following that trifecta of specials, it's the ABC Sunday Night Movie presentation of The Main Event, starring Barbra Streisand and Ryan O'Neal in "The Love Match of the Century!" The caption "First Time on Free TV!"—that's an unsaid sign of the times, isn't it? And I hope all you moms out there feel properly honored by the day.

Wait a minute, didn't we already do a Lynda Carter variety special? Why yes, as a matter of fact. This Monday (8:00 p.m., PT, CBS) she's back in a dazzling new celebration—of what, I'm not quite sure—with Ray Charles, Jerry Reed and Chris Evert Lloyd. Maybe she's just celebrating life, which is what you do when you're Lynda Carter. Over on XETV, "San Diego's Free Movie Channel," it's part one of the movie that made Sally Field a dramatic star, 1976's made-for-TV Sybil (8:00 p.m.), the story of a woman possessed by sixteen different personalities; there's no truth to the rumor that the station is planning on showing the movie in sixteen chapters. Over at ABC, 9:00 p.m. brings a serious study of the disorder anorexia nervosa, The Best Little Girl in the World, starring Jennifer Jason Leigh as the young woman struggling with self-doubt and a lack of self-esteem. It's accompanied by a Background article from Dr. Hilde Bruch, an expert on the disease that "until recently [was] so rare that it was completely unknown to the general public—even to many physicians." It's a puzzling situation, difficult for many parents to comprehend, and Karen Carpenter 1983 death will bring home the fact that anorexia can happen anywhere.

Tuesday features Dean Martin's Comedy Classics (NBC, 8:00 p.m.), a clipfest that recalls the heydays of The Dean Martin Show between 1966 and 1976. Deano himself is on hand to take part in the fun, along with four stars closely identified with his shows: Rat Pack buddy Frank Sinatra, Dom DeLuise, Bob Newhart and Orson Welles. I know Welles was a friend and frequent participant on Martin's roasts; still, I can't help but wonder if, whenever there's a pause in the taping, he isn't sipping a nice Paul Masson white and wondering what happened to his career after Citizen Kane. Opposite that on CBS (and at the same time as XETV's conclusion of Sybil), "Ann is married to five men!" Before you get too excited though, The Five of Me is about Ann's husband Dana and his four hidden personalities. True, it's not as big as Sybil, but in fairness, it's half the length as well.

On Wednesday, XETV features yet another all-star variety special; the gimmick this time is that the stars are all alums of Northwestern University. Among the glitterati on The Way They Were (8:00 p.m.) are Claude Akins, Ann-Margret, Robert Conrad, Patricia Neal, Charlton Heston, McLean Stevenson and more, and the only real reason I'm sharing the ad for this special is that if you look at the picture of Ann-Margret on the far right, you'll recognize that as the template for TV Guide's infamous doctored Oprah Winfrey cover. Your alternatives: Annette O'Toole and Tim McIntire in Stand By Your Man, the Tammy Wynette story (CBS), or Neil Simon's California Suite, with a—let's call it a star-laden—cast including Michael Caine, Jane Fonda, Alan Alda and Walter Matthau (ABC). Both run at 9:00 p.m.

Thursday's feature is yet another movie, the TV-premiere of Dracula (9:00 p.m., NBC), starring Frank Langella as the "stylish" vampire, with Sir Laurence Olivier as Van Helsing, Kate Nelligan and Donald Pleasence. For something a little less intense and more humorous, may we recommend Bob Newhart's special (10:00 p.m., CBS), with Don Rickles, Dean Martin and Dick Martin celebrating routines new and old.

For all of the incredible talent we've been reading about, however, I've been saving the best for last: Friday's world television premiere of the one and only The Harlem Globetrotters on Gilligan's Island, with the original cast (save Tina Louise) and featuring Martin Landau, Barbara Bain and Scatman Crothers in addition to the fabulous hoopsters. It is the third and final feature-length movie based on the series. For me, the most notable item on the schedule is the debut of SCTV Network 90 (12:30 a.m., NBC), replacing The Midnight Special. At first the show presents mostly bits recycled from the previous half-hour syndicated version, but soon they're up and running with some of the funniest, most outrageous television parodies ever seen, taking full advantage of their 90-minute timeslot. Oh, and we don't want to forget Dick Clark's TV's Censored Bloopers (10:00 p.m., NBC), but I wouldn't get too excited about it. After all, it's still 1981; how censored can they be? TV