It's About TV

One of these days I’m going to start a list, and I think I’m going to call it “The Worst ‘Worst-Of’ Lists of All Time.” I know, these “Worst-Of” lists are just evil clickbait, and as such they should be ignored, and their authors sent off to some purgatory where there may still be a chance for redemption, a very, very slim one.

However, one’s opinion toward such lists chances when one is looking for some spark of inspiration, some reason to put pen to paper and write down choice opinions on an issue of the day. Now, let me assure you that I do have ideas for other essays, and there’s a good chance you’ll be reading those essays in the next few weeks. The temptation here was too strong, though – a list of the 12 worst television shows of all time. Surely there has to be some grist for the mill here!

It already had several things going for it, especially if your intention was to pick apart the list and demonstrate why it was a waste of time, and how my job is to read it so you don’t have to, etc. For one thing, the list appeared on the CNN website, and I’m normally of the opinion that 98% of everything that appears on the CNN website should be treated as clickbait and worthy of contempt. (The other 2% are actually advertisements, and therefore exempt.)

Once there, it got better. As it turned out, the list came from Rolling Stone, which previously gave us the “100 Greatest Shows of All Time” list that was similarly ridiculed, to which they said this was a “companion list.” Now, if the presence of Rolling Stone’s name wasn’t itself reason to unload cultural scorn, then the fact that a list of 12 really bad shows can be considered a companion to 100 really good shows is an even better reason. It suggests, for one thing, that the history of television contains a disproportionate share of good shows to bad ones – a ratio of just under 10 to 1, if my math is correct. And if they’re trying to convince us that thus is the history of television, then I think they’ve got another think coming. Why limit it to 12? Why not 1,000? That would be about the right ratio, I’d think.

Anyway, you can see how successful my idea is, that I’m already on the fifth paragraph without even having gotten to the shows in the list. Hey, when it comes to this kind of thing I know what I’m doing!

Yes, the list. I was expecting one of my favorite series, Hogan’s Heroes, to be on the list, because it frequently winds up on such lists, especially the ones written by people who don’t really have a clue as to what the series was actually about. In fact, I’d already composed three sentences of my rebuttal before I found out Hogan’s Heroes wasn’t on the list. I was glad, but I was also sad in a way – it’s always hard for an author to throw material away. But now, to the actual list!

It turns out the absolute worst television show of all time is Duck Dynasty. Now, I have to admit up front that I’ve never seen an episode of Duck Dynasty, but I know what it’s about (more or less), and I know who the Robinson family is. Why do I get the feeling that this choice is more ideologically-based than anything else? I’m not saying, I’m just saying.

In fact, two other shows on this list come from the reality genre – Osbournes Reloaded and For the Love of Ray J– and this is not really playing fair. For one thing, most reality shows belong on a list like this, so by having them make up 25% of the shows on this list just makes the list maker(s) look lazy. It’s like catching fish in a barrel. You’re really telling your readers “I was on deadline and didn’t really have time to do any research, so here.” And seriously, these are the three worst reality shows? What about Real Housewives? What about Honey Boo-Boo? What about Wife Swap, or the one where real-life couples having intimacy problems went into a room to sort things out while a group of “experts” waited outside until they were done? Right.

I mentioned that Hogan’s Heroes didn’t make the list, which at first blush would seem to indicate at least some level of discernment, but wait! The oldest show on the list, The Ropers, only dates back to 1979; the next-oldest, Joanie Loves Chachi, ended in 1983.* C’mon, where’s My Mother the Car? Where’s Turn-On, the infamous one-episode comedy show that was almost cancelled while that single episode was on? What about Jackie Gleason’s bomb You’re in the Picture, which was so bad he spent the entire next week’s airtime apologizing for it. Television had existed for thirty or so years prior to the debut of The Ropers, and apparently none of those shows merited an appearance in this list? Wow, the Golden Age of Television really was Golden, wasn’t it?

*Considering the author makes a point of mentioning star Scott Baio’s presence at last year’s Republican National Convention, I suspect there might have been an agenda at work here as well. And another thing: they write of Joanie Loves Chachi that “this barely beats My Two Dads and Mama's Family.” If it was that close a decision, why aren’t either of those shows on the list? It's not as if the '80s are overrepresented.

Oh, and by the way, they also say that this “killed [Baio’s] career.” Which, of course, is why he wound up as a co-star on Diagnosis: Murder ten years later. It has, as they used to say, the crackle of Confederate money.

(By the way, the rest of the shows on the list: Viva Laughlin, 1600 Penn, The Hard Times of RJ Berger, The Ghost Whisperer, Stalker, and The Pickup Artist. I swear to you, except for The Ghost Whisperer, I've never heard of any of these shows. I wonder why that is?)

More likely, this list was compiled by – wait for it – a bunch of snarky millennials who have no grasp of the history of television, no ability to think back any farther than they day they were born, and probably never heard of the series I just mentioned. Probably they discarded anything in black-and-white just on general principle – those old shows are, like, so uncool, you know. They were made back in the Stone Age. And that’s fine if you want to compile a list of the Worst Shows Since I Was Born, or the Worst Shows of the Last 30 Years, or the Worst Shows of the 2000s, or something. But now, these are The 12 Worst TV Shows of All Time. Get that – all time. Like in since the beginning of time. Which says a lot for truth in advertising.

No, really. Words mean things, and when you bill your list as compiling the worst shows of all frigging time, you ought to have at least one show on there from the 50s or the 60s, or even the 80s, which is woefully underrepresented (nine of the 12 came from the oughts, which again is kind of hard to believe). Northern Exposure, another show that makes the list, was, the authors (let’s assume the plural here) concede, critically acclaimed in its time. If that’s the case, what makes it now one of the worst? C’mon, tell us; we’ll wait. (I’ll be it’s because one of its stars, Janine Turner, is a Republican.) I could name plenty of shows that would wind up on my own worst-of list, shows that probably appear on someone else’s favorites list: Cop Rock, The Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer, Sheriff Lobo, SportsNight, Supertrain, Hello Larry. Every one of these shows has its fans (well, perhaps not Desmond Pfeiffer), and I could at least give you a reason why they’re on my list. It would start a conversation, anyway. The only conversation this list could reasonably start is one on how stupid the individuals who made it are.

Not stupid, check that. Uninformed. And there’s no shame in that; most people aren’t anything like experts on vintage television, nor is there any reason they should be. But when you give your list such an authoritative title, even in just, all you really do is put your ignorance on display for all to see, so in addition to uninformed, I guess you can add hubris, or whatever someone suffering from that is called.

The introduction to this list mentions that “For every bad show that claws its way to the airwaves, there are hundreds of even worse ones that never made it that far.” And that’s where this list has all the others beat, because there are probably hundreds of bad worst-of lists, but how many of them make it into print? You made it all the way, guys - you're the worst of the worst. Congratulations.

There was a time, back when I was in high school in The World’s Worst Town™, when the funniest program on television, without a doubt, was The Gong Show. When it had first started, I’d thought it the dumbest, most idiotic, insulting, and banal thing I’d ever seen.

But then, something happened. Perhaps it was the episode in which every contestant sang “Feelings,” or it could have been Gene, Gene, the Dancing Machine, or the Unknown Comic, or the time when Chuck Barris rode up into the rafters sitting on a crescent moon as if he were one of the starlets in a Ziegfield Follies show – followed a moment later by a mannequin, dressed as Barris, plummeting to the stage. Whatever it was* (and there were more moments like those), for that moment The Gong Show was a daily Theatre of the Absurd, something Ionesco would have been proud of, a skit comedy show cloaked in the guise of a game show. Of course, the moment didn’t last – they never do – and before long, my perception of the show returned to what it had been, and soon after that the show was cancelled. But that was my introduction to Chuck Barris.

*It sure wasn't the Popsicle Twins.

Only it really wasn't. It really came, though I didn’t know it then, years before, through his two hugely successful ABC game shows, The Dating Game and The Newlywed Game. The first one, I thought, was kind of stupid, with shaggy looking guys in full groovy mode, trying to act cool and impress some chick wearing too much makeup. It didn’t kill me to watch it, but it wasn’t nearly as funny as The Newlywed Game, which presented ordinary people, reasonably newly-married couples who were asked ridiculous questions (many of which involved the exotic, to a nine-year-old, phrase “Making Whoopie”) in an effort to find out how well they knew each other. It didn’t move the Dumb Meter far off the bottom either, but there was something very funny about it anyway, watching the wife giving her mate The Look after he’d missed an unbelievably obvious answer, costing them a new refrigerator. (If the lost prize was a new car, she might even hit him over the head with the card on which her answer had been written.) The look of stunned confusion that would occasionally pass across the face of host Bob Eubanks was frequently the best part of the show.

Anyway, that – along with a few other failed efforts – was the primary legacy of Chuck Barris, and it would have been easy to forget all about him except for that bit about being a paid assassin for the CIA.

It came in his memoir Confessions of a Dangerous Mind, when Barris made the claim that all this work as a creator and host of game shows was simply meant to provide cover for his movements around Europe, offing various enemies of the United States. Whenever he’d accompany a Dating Game couple who’d won a trip – say, to beautiful Helsinki, Finland – it was, Barris said, because he had to carry out a hit there, and acting as a representative of ABC gave him a perfect reason for being there.

It was an audacious claim, absolutely preposterous. How could anyone possibly expect people to believe such a ridiculous story? Why would the CIA trust such sensitive work to a man with a drug and alcohol problem, not to mention suspect mental stability? The whole idea was laughable – so laughable, in fact, that after awhile it made you start to wonder. All the objections that made the story so ridiculous could also be seen as making perfect sense. After all, who would be less likely to be suspected of being an international hitman than Chuck Barris? No one would ever believe it – which, one might suppose, would be precisely what the CIA was looking for. The fact that the Agency denied any claim to having had Barris on the payroll just gave his story more plausibility; would they admit it even if it were true? The thought of Barris as a hired gun for the spooks would explain a lot about him, wouldn’t it? George Clooney made a movie out of the book, a very funny movie with a very good cast, that chose to take Barris at his word when he insisted that he was, indeed, a very dangerous man.

Despite the absurdity of the whole thing, Barris continued to cling to the story, never cracking a smile, never hinting that it might not be true. It was either the most prolonged con one could imagine – and Barris was, in a very real sense, a con man, considering his ability to convince networks to go for his outrageous ideas* - or he was simply nuts. Unless, of course, he was telling the truth.

*In an entertaining interview with Larry King, Barris once said, matter-of-factly, that the obvious next step for one of his shows to take was one in which the losers were summarily killed at the end of the show. I think he was kidding.

I don’t know that Chuck Barris ever allowed that façade to crack, to suggest that the story about working for the CIA was just that, an extended joke. If he did, I never heard it. There was a part of me, the common sense side, that wanted to dismiss it out of hand – but there was also that little voice in my head that kept saying Why not? Why couldn’t it be true? In truth I wanted to believe him, wanted to believe that the whole crazy story was true, because there was something about it that just seemed right. I suppose it’s the same instinct that causes us to believe that the underdog can win the championship, that the winning lottery ticket is just around the corner, that there really is a Santa Claus. And you know what? Sometimes, that instinct is right. Whatever the reasons, it made me feel good to believe his story, and it made me like Barris in a way I wouldn’t have thought possible back in those Gong Show days. And if it wasn’t true, if the whole thing was a big joke, then remember the word I used to describe it – absurd – and remember that it wouldn’t have been the first time Barris had used absurdity to his advantage.

It’s tempting to think that Barris’ death on Tuesday at age 87 is just another one of his ruses, meant to protect him while he goes into deep cover on another mission for the CIA. What and where that mission is, and who his target is, is anyone’s guess. But if that thought crossed your mind, even for just a second, then somewhere, I’m sure, Chuck Barris is smiling.

Hang on, all you TV Guide fans out there, help is on the way! After this week's encore presentation (here's my take on it five years ago), we're in for a long run of original issues, and I'm sure you're as happy to hear this as I am. If it helps, think of this as the last in a series of reruns; next week your favorite show returns with all-new episodes.

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Edith Efron kicks off the week with an insightful article into how television looks at the drug problem. (It's interesting, by the way; I wonder, since the drug issue first reared its ugly head on TV, if the medium has ever not been looking at it. That's how constant the problem has been.)

She leads with a quote from Bob Claver, executive producer of The Interns, who leaves little doubt about what he thinks: "Most of the shows on drugs I've seen make the cop a heavy, the parent a heavy and make the kid a hero! They tell you it's understandable to take drugs because . . . look at all the trash around us!" Lest you think this is an exaggeration, Efron writes of how television has responded to President Nixon's call for an "antidrug campaign" on the networks. Of 24 teleplays that Efron analyzed, the "dominant perspective is a strange one: they add up, collectively, to an anti-Establishment cartoon, in which the 'heavies' tend to be liquor-guzzling, pill-taking, profit-making, Protestant-ethic-advocating, middle-class 'squares' . . . while the drug takers - also mostly white middle-class - are cast as acutely suffering, often idealistic 'victims' of this 'society.'"

The reasons for these portrayals are varied, according to the producers of the "drug-plays." Claver says it's because of the "overwhelming" political leftism of the industry. "There's no question about that. So they take the anticop, antiparent and pro-kid position." Alan Armer, former producer of Matt Lincoln, agrees wth Claver but adds that network executives are to blame as well. "[T]here was an effort at the networks, particularly at CBS, to find a younger audience - essentially an anti-Establishment audience." Attempting to capitalize on the success of movies such as Easy Rider meant "in order to reach this younger audience, you had to do stories in which the heavy was the Establishment. So the protagonists all became helpless guys who were being badly used by the Establishment." It would seem, Efron concludes, that "networks were pandering to the leftist young, who are the primary drug consumers in white middle-class society," by "loading the moral decks" in the drug takers' favor.

It's part of a larger question, that of the existential nature of free will. Matthew Rapf, former producer of The Young Lawyers, says that "People who rely on drugs have pyschological problems. They've been exploited. To hold that they have moral responsibility means you'd want to put addicts in jail. Most writers don't agree with this. I don't." Armer counters that "The whole psychiatric thing today says that people who go out and commit rape, murder and robbery are not responsible for their actions, that it's all because their patterns put them on a cold potty at the age of 2. We've been brainwashed! It's become fashionable to interpret things this way. It's a cliche. Of course the addict is responsible! We're very much masters of our own fates. And if we take drugs, we must take the blame."* It's not a popular opinion in the industry, though, which means, as Efron puts it, "the suffering drug takers are morally whitewashed and their sins concealed."

*We've learned more since about the nature of addiction as an illness, and to distinguish between addicted users and habitual ones. Nonetheless, the question of free will remains central to the understanding of the human condition. Whether or not one is an addict, it can't be denied that the initial usage has to be the result of free will in one way or another.

Efron challenges the industry as to why there's been no intellectual discussion about why users turn to drugs. Why no stories about characters turning to drugs to escape conflict over Vietnam? Why no exploration of the "alienated youth" fed up with the hypocrisy of their altruistic liberal parents? David O'Connell, producer of Marcus Welby, M.D. has a pointed take on this: "The upper-middle-class educated families who have talked neosocialism all their lives, but have actually been grabbing for the buck all the time! They've projected a hypocrisy to their kids, and it has affected the kids badly. I don't think most of the writers really understand this liberal hypocrisy, because they share it. So they can't write about it."

Likewise, the panel is puzzled as to why none of the stories touch on the link between drugs and the sexual revolution (the consensus being that the networks want to stay away from sex), nor do they look at the responsibility borne by those who glamorize drug use. Again, Efron asks the question: why? Her conclusion: a combination factors. One is self-censorship; Rapf, for example, says he's not sure these kinds of issues can be raised on commercial TV, and he for one doesn't even try it. Then, there's political bias. O'Connell says liberals are incapable of portraying members of their own group as "heavies," something which conservatives would do without reservation. "Good, strong right-wing writers would probably damn the liberals to such an extent that the results would be unacceptable to the networks." And then there's simple ineptitude on the part of writers who just aren't good enough to write such nuanced storylines.

Drug plays are still with us today, of course, and as we've learned more about the psychology of the drug user and the nature of addiction as an illness, and seen the difference between a habitual user and an addicted one, we have perhaps a more nuanced portrayal of drug use, one that doesn't always glamorize the drugs and pardon the user.

Whatever the reason, there's one fact that's without dispute: in asking the networks to take on an antidrug campaign, the president got exactly the opposite of what he asked for. "It is a most unfortunate result," Efron says in conclusion, "because Mr. Nixon was unmistakably acting on the country's behalf. It is the country itself that has been hurt by this network misadventure."

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Throughout the 60s and early 70s, TV Guide's 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.

Thanks to the wonders of cable television, the Henry Fonda-helmed TV series that most people are familiar with - and I use the word "familiar" very loosely - is the 1959-61 Western The Deputy. Far fewer will remember Fonda's 1971-72 effort, The Smith Family, the story of a plainclothes policeman named Smith and, well, his family. And, if Cleveland Amory's review is any indication, we should all be grateful for small miracles.

It starts with the show's theme, "Primrose Lane." Maybe you're familiar with the song, since it preceded the series by more than a decade, and you might even like it. If so, don't take this personally, but, says Amory, "We've heard worse, but we can't remember where." And then there are the "messages" delivered each week, usually by the children of the cast. It's not that the messages themselves are troublesome - "some of them are a good idea, particularly for nowadays" - but they don't sound like they were written by kids. They sound, in fact, as if they were written by screenwriters. You can always tell when this is the case - instead of being subtle and working on you, they hit you with a sledgehammer.

That's not to say that everything about The Smith Family is regrettable. As Amory points out, the series "is sometimes interesting and once in a while engrossing," but when it comes to making the sale with viewers, "your only hope is to think of it as a put-on - which, we assure you, it isn't." Fonda's presence, unfortunately, isn't much help; he's let down badly by the writing and directing, with the result that, though he's an actor of great stature, "there's a difference between stature and moving through a part like a statue." The series itself is, writes Cleve, about 20 years too late; it might have fit in much better in the 1950s, "with June Allyson playing the filmy-eyed mother, and perhaps a few songs and dances."

It's too bad, but Fonda isn't particularly unique when it comes to big-screen stars who fail to cut it in weekly series, as a previous TV Guide pointed out. Sometimes that's just the way it is. Almost always, it's because the star, for whatever reason, makes the wrong choice of material. In this case, its to our detriment as well as Fonda's.

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At last, March Madness - even though that's not what they call it yet, and it's a far cry from how TV covers the NCAA basketball tournament today. On Saturday, NBC presents a doubleheader, two of the four regional finals that determine the teams headed for the Final Four (even though it wasn't called that yet, either). The four games being played are parceled out based on region; the first game (1:00 p.m. CT) features the East Final, the second (3:00 p.m., time approximate) is either the Mideast or Midwest Final. Meanwhile, viewers out West get the Mideast/Midwest Final followed by the Western Final. There's no thought of showing all four games, or of dividing the games between Saturday and Sunday.

The tournament continues on Thursday night at 6:30 p.m. with the first of the two national semifinal games from the Houston Astrodome, the first appearance of the tournament in a domed stadium. NBC shows the early game in the eastern half of the country and the late game in the western half. The Twin Cities, being in the "eastern" half, gets that first game, starting at 6:30 p,m. It's only on Saturday afternoon, when the championship game is played, that the entire country will see the same game at the same time. Quite a change from today, when every game is televised on one of four different channels. Another interesting difference, as Classic TV Sports points out: because the tournament was much smaller in these days, and because the teams were placed in their regions strictly based on geography, many areas of the country never got the opportunity to see perennial champion UCLA until that final game.

Melvin Durslag, sportswriter for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner and TV Guide's resident sports expert, makes some interesting observations in his article on the tournament. He points out, for example, that playing the game in the fabled Astrodome isn't the best thing for the fans, what with so many of the seats so far away from the court. But it means they'll be able to sell 40,000 tickets for the finals, and compared to all the money that'll make for the NCAA, what's a little inconvenience for the fans? And then there are the players, thinking about the opportunities that await them once they turn pro, with the NBA-ABA bidding war driving salaries to previously unheard-of levels.* Their bodies will be on the court, Durslag warns, but their thoughts will be on their bank account. Maybe NBC can demonstrate this on a split-screen, he notes helpfully.

*In fact, of the teams in the Final Four, two of them - runner-up Villanova and third-place Western Kentucky - had their participation voided due to players having illegally signed pro contracts while they continued to play college ball.

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SOURCE: HADLEY TV GUIDE COLLECTION

This week's starlet (we haven't done one in awhile) is Elaine Giftos, currently starring as the wife of Mike Farrell in Bob Claver's The Interns on CBS. She started out as a dancer, but after she fell off a few stages and missed her partner while trying to dive into his arms and wound up in the orchestra instead, she decided that being nearsighted isn't such a good thing for a dancer. So she turned to acting, although when directors tell her to hold that sexy expression, she still has to tell them that she's not trying to look sexy - she just can't see.

Her movie career took off after an appearance in a skit on The Tonight Show, and although her highlight was playing Barbra Streisand's best friend in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, she's still worked steadily in movies and television, appearing on Bonanza and I Dream of Jeannie before getting the part in The Interns. She loves the work ("The Interns is fun"), but when 6:00 p.m. rolls around, she says, "I become me."

Elaine Giftos never became a big star; The Interns ran for 24 episodes. She continued to work until 2001, though, appearing in series from Ironside to Ally McBeal, before becoming a Feng shui consultant. She says in the article that she'll never marry an actor, and indeed she doesn't: she was married to writer/producer Herbert Wright until his death in 2005. All in all, it's not been a bad life for the woman who once was called "the girl with the most beautiful legs in the world."

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Finally, some notes from the TV Teletype.

Jean Shepherd's America is coming to PBS later in the year. This is long before Shepherd became known for A Christmas Story, but he already has a following from his whimsical books and radio program. Here's an episode he did on his fascination with trains...

We get so used to Teletype notes about noble-sounding shows that never make it to screen, so it's always nice to find examples of some that do. Shepherd's show is one, and here's another - CBS newsman Eric Sevareid's "interview" with Lord North, played by Peter Ustinov, in the first episode of a projected six-year project called The American Revolution. I don't know if there ever were any additional episodes, but this one won a Peabody. No surprise, considering how good Ustinov always is...

Later in April, George Plimpton appears with Bob Cromie on the PBS series Book Beat to discuss his newest, American Journey: The Times of Robert Kennedy. Unsaid in the Teletype blurb is that the book is an oral history, consisting of interviews conducted by Jean Stein, and Plimpton serves as the editor...

Here's a reminder of when the Tony Awards were bigger and more populist than today: ABC's broadcast next Sunday will be co-hosted by Anne Bancroft, Elliot Gould, Lauren Bacall, and Rex Harrison. Awards shows were very big on multiple hosts back in those days. In fact, Bob Hope will be one of 33 co-hosts on next month's Oscarcast...

Hogan's Heroes may have been cancelled, but Bob Crane's nowhere near finished, as he heads out this month on the summer theater circuit to do "Beginner's Luck," the play for which he'll become most known (next to Hogan). In fact, it's the play that he's doing in Scottsdale, Arizona when he's murdered in 1978...

And speaking of plays, PBS (again) plans to broadcast an adaptation of John Dos Passos' epic trilogy U.S.A. next month on Hollywood Television Theater. It was nominated for an Emmy, and I understand it's very good, but I have to wonder - how do you make a 150 minute movie out of a trilogy of books? U.S.A. was Dos Passos' crowning achievement, a monumental story. I can't imagine what they must have had to cut out to make it fit in the allotted time. Imagine trying to do that with Lord of the Rings...

This was one of the first 1970s Twin Cities TV Guides I wrote about, and it's appropriate we look at one of the listings from this issue, since we've spent the last few weeks in the 1960s. Now we're seeing the transition from one decade to the next, and while 1971 doesn't seem that different from the late '60s, that will change by the end of the '70s.

	KTCA, Channel 2 (PBS)
	Morning
	08:30a	Classroom (B&W)
	Afternoon
	01:10p	Classroom (B&W)
	03:00p	Supervision of the Disadvantaged (B&W)
	03:40p	Spanish for Teachers (B&W)
	04:00p	Business Management
	04:30p	Sesame Street
	05:30p	Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood
	Evening
	06:00p	Supervision (B&W)
	06:30p	Inquiry (B&W)
	07:00p	The French Chef
	07:30p	Law Night
	08:00p	They Went That’a Way (B&W)
	08:30p	Books and Ideas (B&W)
	09:00p	Minnesota Gothic (special)

	WCCO, Channel 4 (CBS)
	Morning
	06:30a	Sunrise Semester (Life Processes)
	07:00a	Clancy and Carmen
	07:30a	Clancy and Willie
	08:00a	Captain Kangaroo
	09:00a	‘Morning
	09:30a	The Beverly Hillbillies
	10:00a	Family Affair
	10:30a	Love of Life
	11:00a	Where the Heart Is
	11:25a	Live Today
	11:30a	Search for Tomorrow
	Afternoon
	12:00p	News (local)
	12:30p	As the World Turns
	01:00p	Love is a Many Splendored Thing
	01:30p	The Guiding Light
	02:00p	The Secret Storm
	02:30p	The Edge of Night
	03:00p	Gomer Pyle, USMC
	03:30p	The Lucy Show
	04:00p	Mike Douglas (co-host Beverly Sills, guests Jimmy Durante, Sonny King, Winzola McLendon)
	05:30p	CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite
	Evening
	06:00p	News (local)
	06:30p	Window on the World (special)
	07:30p	To Rome with Love
	08:00p	Medical Center
	09:00p	Hawaii Five-O
	10:00p	The Scene Tonight
	10:50p	Merv Griffin
	12:20a	Movie – “Racing Blood”

Window on the World is a WCCO news report on the proposed Minnesota Zoological Garden; WCCO newsmen travel to various zoos around the country, looking at the new wave zoo that tries to replicate the habitat in which the animals would live in the wild. Indeed, the Minnesota Zoo does eventually come to fruition, although it takes a very long time to catch on with the public, and goes through various financial problems. I grew up with St. Paul's Como Park Zoo as the place for school field trips; I still have a fondness for Como as opposed to the "new" zoo.

	KSTP, Channel 5 (NBC)
	Morning
	06:30a	Minnesota Today
	07:00a	Today
	09:00a	Dinah’s Place (guests Ruth Buzzi, Dennis Allen, Johnny Brown, Barbara Sharma)
	09:30a	Concentration
	10:00a	Sale of the Century
	10:30a	The Hollywood Squares (guests Richard Castellano, Lee Grant, Paul Lynde, Mickey Rooney, Soupy Sales Jo Anne Worley, Wally Cox, Rose Marie, Charley Weaver)
	11:00a	Jeopardy
	11:30a	The Who, What or Where Game
	11:55a	Man to Woman
	Afternoon
	12:00p	News (local)
	12:15p	Dial 5
	01:00p	Days of Our Lives
	01:30p	The Doctors
	02:00p	Another World
	02:30p	Bright Promise
	03:00p	Somerset
	03:30p	David Frost (guests Apollo 14 astronauts Alan Shepard, Stuart Roosa, Edgar Mitchell and their wives, scientist Paul Gast)
	04:30p	Virginia Graham (guests Phyllis Diller, Jim Backus, Dody Goodman, Maynard Sensenbrenner)
	05:30p	NBC Nightly News
	Evening
	06:00p	News (local)
	06:30p	The Men From Shiloh
	08:00p	Bell System Family Theatre – “Jane Eyre”
	10:00p	Twin News Tonight
	10:30p	The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson
	12:00a	The Baron

The Baron was part of a package of similar British programs which appeared Monday through Thursday at midnight on Channel 5. (Friday is movie night, you know.) Monday is Man in a Suitcase, Tuesday is The Champions, and Thursday features The Prisoner. Not bad at all.

	KMSP, Channel 9 (ABC)
	Morning
	07:00a	CBS Morning News (John Hart)
	08:00a	News and Views
	08:30a	Grandpa Ken
	09:00a	Romper Room (Miss Karen)
	09:30a	Mantrap (guests Scoey Mitchell, Jacqueline Susann, Meredith MacRae, Anna Cameron)
	10:00a	I Love Lucy (B&W)
	10:30a	That Girl
	11:00a	Bewitched
	11:30a	A World Apart
	Afternoon
	12:00p	All My Children
	12:30p	Let’s Make a Deal
	01:00p	The Newlywed Game
	01:30p	The Dating Game
	02:00p	General Hospital
	02:30p	One Life to Live
	03:00p	Dark Shadows
	03:30p	Peyton Place
	04:00p	Hazel
	04:30p	McHale’s Navy (B&W)
	05:00p	ABC Evening News with Howard K. Smith and Harry Reasoner
	05:30p	To Tell the Truth (panel Peggy Cass, Bill Cullen, Gene Rayburn, Della Reese)
	Evening
	06:00p	Truth or Consequences
	06:30p	The Courtship of Eddie’s Father
	07:00p	Room 222
	07:30p	The Smith Family
	08:00p	Johnny Cash (guests Charley Pride, the Carpenters, Tommy Cash, Bob Luman, Red Lane)
	09:00p	The Young Lawyers
	10:00p	Eyewitness News
	10:30p	The Wild Wild West
	11:30p	Dick Cavett (guests Walter Hickel, Jim Fowler)
	01:00a	News (local)

WCCO had what would be one of the last blocks of local kids' shows, with Clancy, Carmen, and Willie preceding Captain Kangaroo. This meant the station didn't carry the CBS Morning News, which for many years was instead carried on Channel 9, since ABC didn't have a morning news program of its own. It makes sense to me today, but it confused the hell out of me when I was a kid.

	WTCN, Channel 11 (Ind.)
	Morning
	08:00a	Casey and Roundhouse
	09:00a	News (local)
	09:30a	Jack LaLanne
	10:00a	Dialing for Dollars
	10:30a	Beat the Clock
	11:00a	Divorce Court
	11:30a	The Galloping Gourmet
	Afternoon
	12:00p	Lunch With Casey
	01:00p	Mr. Ed (B&W)
	01:35p	Lucille Rivers
	01:45p	Back Court Show
	02:00p	Minnesota State High School Basketball Tournament (special)
	04:30p	Fred Flintstone and Friends (time approximate)(B&W)
	05:30p	Star Trek
	Evening
	06:30p	Daniel Boone
	07:30p	Minnesota State High School Basketball Tournament (special)
	10:30p	TV-11 News (time approximate)
	11:00p	Wonderful World of Movies– “The 49^th Parallel)(B&W)

I remember Dialing for Dollars from its many years on Channel 5; even though in 1971 we had yet to move to The World's Worst Town™, I have no memory of it being on Channel 11. I wonder if it had the same people? I just checked, and No! While Jim Hutton and Jane Johnston were the hosts most closely associated with Dialing for Dollars on KSTP, the host on WTCN was none other than Mel Jass! I should have known.

	KTCI, Channel 17 (PBS)
	Morning
	09:00a	Sesame Street
	Afternoon
	12:00p	Classroom (B&W)

Aside from classroom broadcasting, there wasn't much on KTCI back then; it hadn't evolved into a full-fledged secondary PBS channel.

THIS MEETING MIGHT NOT HAVE BEEN NECESSARY, IF PAUL DRAKE HAD ONLY HAD A CELL PHONE

Watch an episode, any episode, of an old TV series, any series, from the '50s through the early '90s. And as you watch it, ask yourself this question: how would the plot change, how would the story be different, if the characters had cell phones and computers? Would we ever again hear lines like this?

“Where have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you everywhere.”
“I’m sorry, but you just missed him. Can I take a message?”
“I had to step out and make a call, and when I got back she was gone.”

For those who grow up knowing nothing other than iPhones and iPads, it might be increasingly difficult to relate to an time in which most meetings took place face-to-face rather than over the phone or via email, where major plot twists occur because someone missed a phone call or didn’t know where to reach someone, where someone had to wait hours, if not days, for a piece of information that could be located or verified with a few strokes on a keyboard. In an era of mobile communication, when people are less tied down to homes, to businesses, to landlines, it’s almost impossible to be out of touch. And that makes for a major change.

In a classic Nero Wolfe story – The Mother Hunt, I think it was – Wolfe's right-hand man Archie Goodwin is out on a stakeout when he has to call Wolfe for instructions or reinforcements or something of the sort, so he drives into town to use a pay phone. Naturally, when he gets back he finds the subject’s car, which had been in the garage, is long gone. He’s lost the suspect, and by the time she’s found, she’s also dead. And if you know anything about Nero Wolfe's temperament, you know this is not good news for Archie.

Something like this is an elemental part of so many mysteries, and yet it would be impossible to pull off today. Archie would simply pull out his iPhone and call Wolfe from the car, all the while keeping his eyes focused on the front door of the house. He could even take pictures and email it to Saul or Fred or Orrie, to let them know who or what they should be looking for. Oh, if you needed to create tension you could have the phone drop coverage or have the battery die, but you can’t go there too often without making a joke of it.

And then there's the Route 66 episode where the boys are staying near the coastline, and Buz finds himself struggling frantically to free a woman whose foot has become caught in a reef, before the rising tide drowns her. There’s no phone in their cabin, and Tod’s taken the car to town to buy supplies. Now, you can say that the situation is contrived and maybe it is, but it's still plausible.

So Buz can’t drive to town to get help – he needs to find a phone and call Tod. He runs to various places where he thinks he might find one – leaving the trapped woman in the meantime – only to find that there is no phone, or that the phone is disconnected. But even if he could find that phone, Tod won’t be any help because Buz doesn’t know where Tod is, doesn’t know that on the way back from the store he’s stopped at a diner for lunch. Probably he could call the police, but in the isolated coastal hamlet they’re in, the police might take even longer to get there. In other words, Buz is screwed. It’s only because a boat just happens to sail by (and how’s that for contrived?) that he’s able to get help to free her just in the nick of time. But if he had a cell phone? No problem. Call the police, call Tod (on his cell), call the Coast Guard, take video for YouTube if he wants. In the meantime, stay with the damsel in distress and comfort her – who knows what might come of that?

Perry Mason is a great example of how technology can change things. In a typical Mason episode, Perry’s always sending Paul Drake to San Francisco or New York or Mexico or wherever he needs to go, often on little more than a hunch, in search of the one piece of evidence that proves his client’s innocence. Will Paul find that evidence? And will he get it back to the courtroom in time for Perry to use it in his devastating cross-examination of the real killer?*

*Paul did get a car phone at some point in the series, as did other private detectives such as Richard Diamond and Joe Mannix, which helps to some extent - as long as you're in your car. And yet I can remember several Mason episodes in which Paul, like Archie Goodwin, is forced to rely on a pay phone while he's on a stakeout.

More likely, Paul doesn’t have to rush back to the courtroom – he can just email Perry the document, so he read it right there where he sits. Come to think of it, Paul doesn’t have to leave the courthouse either; he can take the elevator down to the lobby (where he gets a good clear signal on the city's free wi-fi), get the information from one of his operatives, and then text Perry something like “ASK WITNESS WHAT WAS DOING SAT NITE.”

How many times have we seen a plot hinge on a phone call that was missed, with no voicemail to take the message? How many murders could have been prevented by reaching someone on their cell phone instead of driving to their house only to find out they were too late? How often does someone sit at home desperately waiting for news that today would be only a text away? How many misunderstandings could have been avoided if the driver had simply used GPS instead of fiddling with a map (or, if he's a man, refusing to ask anyone for directions)?

This development of technology has to have changed the art of scriptwriting.* So many misunderstandings, cliffhangers, mistakes, anxiety-ridden moments – all the elements of human relationships – become much harder to pull off now, when we’re all so connected, all of the time. And so the story has to change. Information that might have taken 15 minutes to unfold on Dragnet now gets done in the blink of an eye. The phone caller claiming to be John Doe in order to suggest that John Doe is still alive when in reality he was murdered an hour ago – well, that’s a little more difficult with Skype, isn’t it? The frantic drive through rush hour traffic to prevent an assassination can be taken care of easily, with the press of a few buttons.

*I’m sure there’s an article on it somewhere, but frankly I’m too lazy to Google it; besides, I might lose my train of thought.

I wonder if that’s one of the reasons why shows like CSI and NCIS are so prevalent now. The classic police show - Columbo for instance - seldom relies on technology (other than the communications devices found in any standard issue police car), and when it does, it’s usually to confirm a suspicion the detective has already sleuthed out, rather than pointing him in the right direction. I’m not saying this is always the case; a lot of shows from the era used advanced science to identify suspects. But the show featuring the lone wolf – the brilliant police lieutenant, the world-weary private detective – how many of these shows still exist? And of the ones that do, how many of them rely on some kind of a gimmick (think any American crime show, for example), rather than the depiction of good, hard investigative work? Some might say they’ve fallen victim to the ensemble casts that dominate most television nowadays, but I would suggest an additional factor, that these shows reflect the nature of technology today. Simply put, too many of the things upon which these shows were based have now been rendered pointless because technology has changed the way we operate.

I don’t say that it’s good or bad – just different. As for how different, just watch your favorite black-and-white show, pretend there’s a cell phone or a laptop around, and imagine what happens.

A good crop of articles for you to check out this week, as follows.

One of the things I always liked about The Twilight Zone (at least the first two or three times I saw each episode) was the twist at the end that made so many of them so memorable. The Twilight Zone Vortex is counting down the 20 best twist endings; the countdown starts with #s 20-16.

Lately I've been doing some reading on famous murder cases, a bit of research for my next novel (#1 is already out, #2 should be out by the end of this year, and that TV book's gonna be out sometime between #2 and #3), so of course I was attracted by "Murder Case," the Jack Bridges-written episode that appears in bare-bones e-zine's Hitchcock Project.

When I was in college, back in the days before the internet and VCRs, I used to do my research at Wilson Library on the campus of the University of Minnesota, where I'd spend the last 20 minutes of my day reading old TV Guides in the periodical section. Over time, I used TV Guide's Academy Awards issues to write down movies that interested me, particularly lesser-known (to me, anyway) movies that had garnered major nominations. It's how I heard of Albert Finney, and how I wound up enjoying his kitchen-sink dramaSaturday Night and Sunday Morning when it aired on KTCA one weekend. It's a long way of saying that I appreciated Classic Film and TV Café's review of the movie, and the genre.

Now, I know what you're thinking: "Hondo and the Gladiators" sounds like fodder for MST3K. Well, you're wrong. It's episode 15 of Ralph Taeger's 1967-68 Western series that aired on ABC, and The Horn Section is here to tell you all about it.

I think I've told you before about my enjoyment of Allan Sherman when I was young, and so it's not surprising that when I see his name pop up, I pause and read. That's what I did here, with The Lucky Strike Papers, when Andrew gives us a good dose of Sherman, as well as an interesting note on guys named Jackie.

Finally, a moment to add a note on something that nobody else touched on, the death earlier this week of Lola Albright at the age of 92. She played Edie Hart, the patient girlfriend of Peter Gunn, on the show of the same name; her day job (or night job, if you will) was as a singer in "Mother's," the club which doubled as the place where Gunn usually hung out. It gave us a chance not only to appreciate her talent as an actress, but her ability to handle a song as well.

I wrote about Lola Albright a few years ago, and her character here, and there's not a whole lot I can add to that. She and Craig Stevens had real chemistry on that show, and one of the things I liked about that relationship was that it wasn't a starry-eyed romance, nor was it one of clothes-ripping lust. It was an adult relationship between two adults, and there's something refreshing about that. Of course, she did more than just Gunn; she was in numerous movies, most notably as Kirk Douglas' inamorata in the great boxing movie Champion. (Kirk sure didn't know how to treat her like Pete did!) There was a lot of TV as well, including an episode of The Twilight Zone that may or may not make it into that list of twist endings, and an episode of Burke's Law that I particularly enjoyed. It's well worth your time checking out some of those performances.

However, it was Gunn for which people will remember her, and when they remember you the way The Hollywood Reporter did in it's obit of her, as "the charming actress with the smoky voice who sang and starred on TV's Peter Gunn and was spurned by the back-stabbing Kirk Douglas in the classic 1949 boxing drama Champion," then I think you've done pretty well for yourself, because that's not a bad way to be remembered.

As most of you know by now, I'm not in the habit of looking at TV Guides of the 1990s. (And no, this isn't an April Fools' joke.) I can't remember if I'd cancelled my subscription yet - no, now that I think about it a bit more, I was still getting it, though I was probably getting less use out of it than before. But thanks to my friend Steve Harris from In Other Words (and his donation of the 40th anniversary issue, which we looked at here), we have a chance to look at a historic issue celebrating the 45th anniversary of TV Guide! The cover reminds us of some of the great issues (and stars) of the past, and even throws back to the original logo, which is a nice touch. Now, having heaped praise on the exterior, let's see what we can say about the interior...

◊ ◊ ◊
Not surprisingly, the theme of this issue is the number 45, as in the 45 who made the biggest difference. Rather than ranking them from 1-45, the authors have chosen to group the trailblazers by genre, thus we get comedy, creative forces, visionaries, talk show hosts, and so on. Some of them might seem a bit suspect: I'll bet they'd like to have a do-over on that choice of Bill Cosby, for example, even though he was unquestionably part of television history. I think the choice of Robert Halmi, Sr. - for creating Lonesome Dove, Gulliver's Travels, Merlin, and The Odyssey - is a bit premature; though these miniseries might have been blockbusters at the time, I really don't know their staying power, with the exception of Lonesome Dove. And is Roseanne as influential today as they thought she was back then?

Some choices are a given: Lucille Ball, Ed Sullivan, Ernie Kovacs, Rod Serling (am I being heretical in suggesting they could have chosen Paddy Chayefsky instead?). I am a bit surprised that Arthur Godfrey made the list, and Jackie Gleason didn't. Steve Allen and Johnny Carson were obvious picks in the talk category, and Merv Griffin a perceptive one, but Phil Donahue and David Letterman instead of Jack Paar? While Allen may have been the first Tonight host, it was Paar, after all, who really perfected the format as we know it today.*

*And what about Jerry Lester and Dagmar of Broadway Open House?

I might have included Lee Mendelson for bringing the Peanuts gang to life, one of the most notable achievements television has seen, and if not him than perhaps Rankin-Bass, without whom there'd be no Rudolph. I am, quite frankly, quite surprised that Edward R. Murrow made the list but Walter Cronkite didn't; after all, wasn't Uncle Walter the most trusted man in America at one time? David L. Wolper and Aaron Spelling are very good picks, I think, as is Rupert Murdoch, if you keep in mind that "most influential" doesn't necessarily mean "most distinguished." (But then, Time named Hitler and Khomeini "Men of the Year"; I rest my case.) I won't argue with Agnes Nixon for creating the modern soap opera, nor Roone Arledge for revolutionizing television's coverage of sports, but I have a hard time justifying Barbara Walters, especially if you're not going to include Cronkite.

And Ted Turner's selection appears more prescient than ever - where would we be without CNN, WTBS, and their offspring? In fact, I suppose you can make the case that his was the most influential name of them all.

◊ ◊ ◊
There's also a nice look back at the 45 greatest covers; although these aren't ranked either, I'd suspect that issue #1, with Lucy's baby, would be the choice of most. Some of the more notable covers commemorate stars such as Carson, Steve McQueen (Wanted - Dead or Alive), Andy Griffith, Alan Young (Mr. Ed), and Fred Flintstone, while others focus on events - the first moon landing, the premiere of Roots, the phenomenon of Charlie's Angels. I think I only have six or seven of the issues profiled here, including this one with Dick Van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore on the cover, which probably says more about the state of my bank account than anything else.

There's an article on what viewers would have seen the day the first issue of TV Guide hit the newsstands - April 3, 1953. That's kind of fun; the big news on Today concerns the Korean War and Sen. Joseph McCarthy's latest accusation, and when that's done you can catch Ernie Kovacs' morning show on NBC. There are sitcom reruns in the morning and soaps in the early afternoon, and there's more religion as well - a sermon on The Guiding Light - and not just because April 3 happened to be Good Friday; as author Ed Weiner notes, religion is "more an aspect of everyday life" in 1953 than in 1998. After the soaps it's game shows, like Break the Bank, hosted by Bert Parks, and then it's shows for the kids, Howdy Doody being the biggest but not the only one. That's followed by the network news, which is only 15 minutes long, and then it's primetime, and the evening is awash with sitcoms and drama anthologies, with some boxing thrown in. And when the broadcast day ends - and it does end - the test pattern with the Indian head logo comes on, and viewers head for bed, to await the wonders that the new medium will bring next.

There's another article on changing fashions, everything from Davy Crockett's coonskin cap to Valerie Harper's head scarves to Jennifer Aniston's hairdo. Some of the regular features retain the retro theme; Phil Muchnick, TV Guide's successor to Melvin Durslag, takes a fond look back at Red Smith, the legendary sportswriter and TV Guide's first sports expert, who early and often voiced his concern about television's influence on sports (umpires mugging it up for the cameras, directors cutting away from the action to show fans), most of which evolved into something far worse than what Smith foresaw.

Oh, and then there's an article about people who actually collect TV Guides, who are in fact obsessed with them. Move along, nothing to see here.

◊ ◊ ◊
As an addendum, here are the shows in the top 25 the year that first issue appeared:

You'll notice ABC is nowhere to be found; it would be many years before they became a player, but when they did it was with a vengeance.

◊ ◊ ◊
There's something of a retro feel to this week's big premiere: Tom Hanks' out-of-this-world miniseries, From the Earth to the Moon, which debuts Sunday on HBO. It's something of a passion project for Hanks, whose love of the space program was rekindled during his time on the set of Apollo 13. "I was much more enthralled by what was going on with Apollo 10 than with the Starship Enterprise," he recalls. "It was a combination of Shakespeare, Sophocles and T.S. Eliot."

One of the things that stands out for Hanks - as well as some of the others working on the series with him - is how easy it's been to forget all about it. The first moon landing was, after all, nearly 30 years ago, and a sizable part of the population has never known a time when man on the moon was not a reality. While it was happening, though, ultimate success was far from certain - as was demonstrated by the tragic Apollo 1 fire. Says Hanks, "We also want the audience to say, 'My God, look at what people accomplished.'"

That's an understatement, to be sure. I grew up during the manned space program - Alan Shepard's flight came three days before my first birthday - and the excitement it generated compares to nothing else I've seen. My grandparents had lived their entire lives thinking that man on the moon was nothing more than a dream; I hadn't had that much experience, but I didn't need it to know there was something truly awesome (in the real sense of the word) about seeing a television transmission with the caption "Live From the Moon."

Being the space buff that I am, I probably would have been more enthralled by a multi-hour documentary on the space program (provided it was done well, and not one of those dry NASA educational films), but even so, I thought From the Earth to the Moon was pretty good. Ah, yes - wasn't that a time.

◊ ◊ ◊
Before we go, let’s take a look at some of the actual listings in this issue, shall we? (All right, if you insist.)

For one thing, we now have Fox* joining the fray, which means we also have shows like The Simpsons, King of the Hill, The X Files, Melrose Place, Ally McBeal, Beverly Hills 90210, COPS, and America’s Most Wanted. Sure, Fox produced its share of clunkers as well, but there’s no question that these series entered the American consciousness, particularly in the way many of them spoke to a particular demographic. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that, for better or ill, Fox substantially changes the television landscape, perhaps more so than any network since ABC in the late ‘70s. When you think of it, the fact that The Simpsons is still going, even if its best days are behind it, is quite a statement.

*Yes, I know the network insists on spelling it FOX, but you're not going to see that here.

We have two additional networks as well, The WB and UPN, although neither of them is programming seven nights a week, and they’ll eventually merge into The CW. We can thank them for Star Trek: Voyager, Sister, Sister, and shows from Steve Harvey and Jamie Foxx. The biggest breakout, however, has to be The WB’s new series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which I think really defines the network, perhaps as much as any of the shows we’ve discussed. A close second could be either Seventh Heaven or Dawson’s Creek, and while none of these series mean much to me, there’s no doubt that they helped The WB stakeout its own style and demographic, one that has continued in the current CW incarnation.

That’s not to say the traditional networks have been quiet all this time. 60 Minutes, Everybody Loves Raymond and Touched by an Angel are still big hits for CBS, and NBC has its "Must See Thursday" lineup of Friends, Just Shoot Me, Seinfeld, Veronica’s Closet, and ER. (What they wouldn’t give for even one hit like that today.) ABC has Home Improvement, Drew Carey, Ellen, America’s Funniest Home Videos, and (of course) the ubiquitous Monday Night Football. And that doesn’t even begin to touch those other series that you’ll remember – Suddenly Susan, Murphy Brown, Cybill, Frazier, The Nanny, 3rd Rock, JAG– I know they’re all guaranteed to bring back memories for someone.

Even though I didn’t watch most of these shows - truth be told, I didn't watch any of them - it just doesn’t seem as if it’s been nearly 20 years since they were on. Is that because we see so many of them over and over and over in endless reruns on cable stations, or is it because time really does go more quickly as you get older?

What else, anything more specific? Well, the Masters golf tournament begins on Thursday – not on ESPN, as it is nowadays, but on USA. USA also shows – get this – more than one series each night! Instead of countless marathons of NCIS or Law & Order, they have Baywatch, Highlander, and Walker, Texas Ranger, plus a movie, boxing match, or wrestling. Different series each hour - what a concept… As for the Masters, Tiger Woods is the defending champion, having won by a historically huge margin the year before. And now, it seems, the golf world has returned to what things were like pre-Tiger (hint: it’s not so bad).

Otherwise, ABC has the World Figure Skating Championships in prime time (Saturday at 7:00 p.m. PT) A&E begins a pointless remake of the 1964 Best Picture winner, Tom Jones, on Sunday at 5:00 p.m, PT (with numerous repeats throughout the evening), Murphy Brown celebrates her 50th birthday with Sally Field and other guest stars (Monday, 9:30 p.m., CBS), someone gets written out of Babylon 5 on TNT (Wednesday, 8:00 p.m.), ABC's Prime Time Live (Wednesday, 10:00 p.m.) profiles the McCaughey septuplets (born November 19 of the previous year), all of whom are still alive today, and Billy Graham warns that most of us are on the highway to Hell, but there is a way to take a different route (Friday, KCOP, 8:00 p.m.)

Some of these programs may be recalled when we look at TV 45 years from now, while many others will disappear into the mists of time, as was the case back in 1953. The only thing we can be sure of is that we're discussing them, right here, right now - and I wonder how many of them would have expected that?

I suppose one of the things about a large television market like Los Angeles is that with the number of stations available, you get to see the best that TV has to offer, and the worst. And looking at today's daytime schedule, one can certainly see the worst. That's not to say that daytime television was exactly Golden-Age-worthy back in the days we usually look at, but between game shows, soap operas, the odd talk show or music program, kids' shows, and movies, there was at least some variety to it, and if the programs weren't Shakespearean, at least they were mostly harmless. The only thing Shakespearean about today's daytime shows, however, is the tragic nature of their garbage.

Somewhere along the line, someone decided that every borderline celebrity, "journalist," or personality standing on the corner looking as if they had nothing to do at the moment, should have their own talk show. And by "talk," they often didn't mean having guests promoting their latest book, movie, single, or television appearance, but their latest perversion, addiction, or scandal. How else could one explain Ricki Lake, Jenny Jones, Gayle King, Sally Jessy Raphael, Leeza Gibbons, Geraldo Rivera, Steve Harvey, Rosie O'Donnell, Maury Povich, Jerry Springer, and Montel Williams? And that doesn't even include Oprah!

Elsewhere, you'll recall that on Saturday I mentioned how USA didn't strip-mine - er, I mean strip program one series for hours at a time, they way they do now. That's true, but like many other cable stations of the time they did repeat their programming in blocks of four or six hours three or four times a day. I included AMC, back when they were American Movie Classics and showed nothing but movies. And you'll notice that, based on his appearances on multiple talk shows, Matt LeBlanc must be the busiest man in Hollywood.

Well, I guess there's no putting it off - let's take a look!

KCBS, Channel 2 (CBS)
Morning
05:00a	CBS News (Cynthia Bowers)
05:30a	News (local)
06:00a	News (local)
07:00a	CBS News This Morning (guest Bob Barker)
09:00a	Guiding Light
10:00a	The Price is Right
10:30a	Access Hollywood
11:00a	The Young and the Restless
Afternoon
12:00p	News (local)
12:30p	The Bold and the Beautiful
01:00p	As the World Turns
02:00p	Martha Stewart Living
02:30p	Gayle King
03:00p	Geraldo Rivera
04:00p	Inside Edition
04:30p	American Journal
05:00p	News (local)
05:30p	CBS Evening News with Dan Rather
Evening
06:00p	News (local)
07:00p	Entertainment Tonight
07:30p	Hard Copy
08:00p	JAG
09:00p	Public Eye with Bryant Gumbel
10:00p	Public Eye with Bryant Gumbel
11:00p	News (local)
11:35p	The Late Show with David Letterman (guests Quentin Tarantino, Steven Weber)
Early Wednesday
12:35a	The Late Late Show with Tom Snyder (guest Isabel Allende)
01:35a	News (local)
02:05a	Martha Stewart Living
02:35a	Gayle King
03:05a	Entertainment Tonight
03:35a	Up to the Minute

KNBC, Channel 4 (NBC)
Morning
05:00a	NBC News (Linda Vester)
05:30a	News (local)
07:00a	Today (guest Liz Tiberis)
09:00a	Leeza
10:00a	Extra!
11:00a	News (local)
11:30a	News (local)
Afternoon
12:00p	Another World
01:00p	Days of Our Lives
02:00p	Sunset Beach
03:00p	Rosie O’ Donnell (guest Matt LeBlanc)
04:00p	News (local)
05:00p	News (local)
Evening
06:00p	News (local)
06:30p	NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw
07:00p	Extra!
07:30p	Access Hollywood
08:00p	Mad About You
08:30p	For Your Love
09:00p	Frasier
09:30p	Lateline
10:00p	Dateline NBC
11:00p	News (local)
11:35p	The Tonight Show with Jay Leno (guests Jack Lemmon, Walter Matthau, Courtney Thorne-Smith)
Early Wednesday
12:35a	Late Night with Conan O’Brien (guest Matt LeBlanc)
01:35a	Later
02:05a	News (local)
02:35a	NBC Nightside
04:30a	This Morning’s Business

KTLA, Channel 5 (WB)
Morning
05:00a	Headline News
05:30a	News (local)
06:00a	News (local)
07:00a	Morning News
09:00a	Sally Jessy Raphael
10:00a	Little House on the Prairie
11:00a	Live Show
Afternoon
12:00p	Hunter
01:00p	Blossom
01:30p	Charles in Charge
02:00p	Bugs ‘n’ Daffy
02:30p	The New Captain Planet
03:00p	Bugs ‘n’ Daffy
03:30p	Anamaniacs
04:00p	Pinky and the Brain
04:30p	New Batman/Superman Adventures
05:00p	Beverly Hills, 90210
Evening
06:00p	Family Matters
06:30p	Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
07:00p	Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
07:30p	Seinfeld
08:00p	Buffy the Vampire Slayer
09:00p	Dawson’s Creek
10:00p	News (local)
11:00p	Cheers
11:30p	Murphy Brown
Early Wednesday
12:00a	Sally Jessy Raphael
01:00a	News (local)
02:00a	Infomercials
03:00a	Movie – “The Jerk”

KABC, Channel 7 (ABC)
Morning
05:00a	ABC News (Mark Mullen)
05:30a	News (local)
06:00a	News (local)
06:30a	News (local)
07:00a	Good Morning America (guest Meg Ryan)
09:00a	Regis & Kathie Lee (guest Matt LeBlanc)
10:00a	The View
11:00a	Port Charles
11:30a	News (local)
Afternoon
12:00p	All My Children
01:00p	One Life to Live
02:00p	General Hospital
03:00p	Oprah Winfrey
04:00p	News (local)
05:00p	News (local)
Evening
06:00p	News (local)
06:30p	ABC World News Tonight with Peter Jennings
07:00p	Jeopardy!
07:30p	Wheel of Fortune
08:00p	Home Improvement
08:30p	Something So Right
09:00p	Home Improvement
09:30p	That’s Life
10:00p	NYPD Blue
11:00p	News (local)
11:35p	Nightline
Early Wednesday
12:05a	Politically Incorrect (guest Jean Smart, Rick Ducommun, Harlan Ellison, Mark Goodin)
12:35a	News (local)
01:10a	Movie – “Brother from Space”
03:10a	World News Now

KCAL, Channel 9 (Ind.)
Morning
05:30a	Creflo A. Dollar
06:00a	Infomercial
06:30a	Mr. Men
07:00a	Mummies Alive
07:30a	The Mask
08:00a	Wacky World of Tex Avery
08:30a	X-Men
09:00a	The Newlywed Game
09:30a	The Dating Game
10:00a	Jerry Springer
11:00a	Maury Povich
Afternoon
12:00p	News (local)
01:00p	The People’s Court
02:00p	News (local)
03:00p	Judge Judy
03:30p	News (local)
04:00p	DuckTales
04:30p	Mighty Ducks
05:00p	101 Dalmatians
05:30p	Pictionary
Evening
06:00p	Judge Judy
06:30p	Real TV
07:00p	America’s Funniest Home Videos
07:30p	LAPD: Life on the Beat
08:00p	News
09:00p	News
10:00p	News (local)
11:00p	Jerry Springer
Early Wednesday
12:00a	Maury Povich
01:00a	The People’s Court
02:00a	Infomercials

KTTV, Channel 11 (Fox)
Morning
05:00a	I Love Lucy (B&W)
05:30a	I Love Lucy (B&W)
06:00a	News (local)
07:00a	Good Day L.A.
09:00a	Grace Under Fire
09:30a	Grace Under Fire
10:00a	Andy Griffith (B&W)
10:30a	Andy Griffith (B&W)
11:00a	I Love Lucy (B&W)
11:30a	I Love Lucy (B&W)
Afternoon
12:00p	The Beverly Hillbillies
12:30p	The Beverly Hillbillies
01:00p	Happy Days
01:30p	Happy Days
02:00p	Bobby’s World
02:30p	Life with Louie
03:00p	BeetleBorgs Metallix
03:30p	Spider-Man
04:00p	Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
04:30p	Power Rangers Turbo
05:00p	Boy Meets World
05:30p	Living Single
Evening
06:00p	Home Improvement
06:30p	The Simpsons
07:00p	Home Improvement
07:30p	The Simpsons
08:00p	Fox Tuesday Night Movie– “Money Train”
10:00p	News (local)
11:00p	Married with Children
11:30p	Cops
Early Wednesday
12:00a	MASH*
12:30a	Stories of the Highway Patrol
01:00a	Keenan Ivory Wayans (guests Loretta Devine, LOX)
02:00a	Infomercials
03:00a	Perry Mason
04:00a	The Beverly Hillbillies
04:30a	Andy Griffith

KCOP, Channel 13 (UPN)
Morning
05:00a	The Untouchables
06:00a	The 700 Club
07:00a	The Fantastic Four
07:30a	Extreme Dinosaurs
08:00a	Extreme Ghostbusters
08:30a	Bananas in Pajamas & the Crayon Box
09:00a	Infomercial
09:30a	A Different World
10:00a	Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman
11:00a	Jenny Jones
Afternoon
12:00p	Montel Williams
01:00p	Ricki Lake
02:00p	Jenny Jones
03:00p	Roseanne
03:30p	The Cosby Show
04:00p	Montel Williams
05:00p	Ricki Lake
Evening
06:00p	Martin
06:30p	Mad About You
07:00p	Frasier
07:30p	News (local)
08:00p	Moesha
08:30p	Clueless
09:00p	Malcolm & Eddie
09:30p	In the House
10:00p	News (local)
11:00p	Mad About You
11:30p	Vibe
Early Wednesday
12:30a	Star Trek
01:30a	Infomercials
02:30a	Strange Universe
03:00a	Movie – “Crosscurrent”

KCET, Channel 28 (PBS)
Morning
05:00a	Bloomberg Morning News
05:30a	Marine Environment
06:00a	Sesame Street
07:00a	Barney & Friends
07:30a	Storytime
08:00a	Charlie Horse Music Pizza
08:30a	Arthur
09:00a	Barney & Friends
09:30a	Puzzle Place
10:00a	Sesame Street
11:00a	Storytime
11:30a	Teletubbies
Afternoon
12:00p	Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood
12:30p	Puzzle Place
01:00p	Reading Rainbow
01:30p	Magic School Bus
02:00p	Portrait of a Family
02:30p	Literary Visions
03:00p	Wishbone
03:30p	Where in Time is Carmen Sandiego?
04:00p	Kratts’ Creatures
04:30p	Bill Nye the Science Guy
05:00p	Jacques Pepin’s Cooking Techniques
05:30p	Home Cooking with Amy Coleman
Evening
06:00p	Nightly Business Report
06:30p	Newshour with Jim Lehrer
07:30p	Life & Times Tonight
08:00p	Nova
09:00p	Frontline
10:00p	Frontline
11:00p	Charlie Rose
Early Wednesday
12:00a	Life & Times Tonight
12:30a	Something Ventured
02:00a	Classic Arts Showcase

AMC (all movies except where italicized)
Morning
05:00a	Sword in the Desert (B&W)
07:00a	Tin Pan Alley (B&W)
08:35a	The Purple Mask
10:00a	O.S.S.
Afternoon
12:00p	Backlash
01:30p	The Spiral Staircase (B&W)
03:00p	Hollywood Backstage
03:30p	Salome
05:30p	Comanche Territory
Evening
07:00p	Rogers and Hammerstein
08:30p	South Pacific
11:15p	The Mad Magician (B&W)
Early Wednesday
12:30a	The Stooge (B&W)
02:15a	Go, Johnny, Go! (B&W)
03:30a	Honeymoon (B&W)

TNT
Morning
05:00a	CHiPs
06:00a	CHiPs
07:00a	Lonesome Dove: The Series
08:00a	Spencer: For Hire
09:00a	Movie – “The Rose and the Jackal”
11:00a	Movie – “Escape from Fort Bravo”
Afternoon
01:00p	In the Heat of the Night
02:00p	Kung Fu: The Legend Continues
03:00p	Lois & Clark
04:00p	Babylon 5
05:00p	NBA Basketball – New York at Atlanta
Evening
08:00p	Movie – “Time Runner”
10:00p	Movie – “Zone Troopers”
Early Wednesday
12:00a	Movie – “Dark Universe”
02:00a	Gilligan’s Island (colorized)
02:30a	Gilligan’s Island (colorized)
03:00a	Bugs Bunny
04:00a	The Flintstones

USA
Morning
05:00a	Bloomberg Information TV
07:00a	Gargoyles
07:30a	Gargoyles
08:00a	The Facts of Life
08:30a	The Facts of Life
09:00a	Gimmie a Break!
09:30a	Perfect Strangers
10:00a	Wings
10:30a	Wings
11:00a	Major Dad
11:30a	Major Dad
Afternoon
12:00p	Baywatch
01:00p	Movie – “How I Got into College”
03:00p	Movie – “Uncle Buck”
05:00p	USA High
05:30p	USA High
Evening
06:00p	Baywatch
07:00p	Highlander
08:00p	Walker, Texas Ranger
09:00p	Tuesday Night Fights – Witherspoon vs. Thunder (tape delay)
11:00p	Silk Stalkings
Early Wednesday
12:00a	Highlander
01:00a	Magnum, P.I.
02:00a	Boxing (repeat)
04:00a	Acapulco H.E.A.T.

It's beginning to feel like the start of a beautiful spring here in Minneapolis, but that doesn't mean you can't think about Christmas, and at Christmas TV History Joanna looks at the 1974 animated Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus. When I saw the ad for the cartoon, I though to myself that the drawings were very much in the spirit of Charles Schulz, and what do you know - it was produced and directed by Bill Melendez!

From last month, Once Upon a Screen revisits a classic Columbo, "By Dawn's Early Light," from 1974. I take the time to come back to this not just because of Peter Falk, but because the villain du jour is none other than the great Patrick McGoohan, in some ways just as quirky as he was in The Prisoner. Hard to go wrong there.

Speaking of favorites, Classic Film and TV Café presents us with Seven Things We Need to Know About Raymond Burr. I didn't know he'd appeared on a Canadian postage stamp, for instance, and I didn't know his Rear Window character had been made up to look like movie producer David O. Selznick - someone with whom the film's director, Alfred Hitchcock, had frequently clashed.

Cult TV Blog goes back in time to the early Doctor Who adventure "The Gunfighters," which goes back in time to the Gunfight at the OK Corral. When you're known simply as The Doctor, of course, you're bound to be confused with that "other" doctor in Tombstone, Doc Holliday. This has long been considered one of the worst Doctor Who stories, and it's not great - but not nearly as bad as you're led to believe. (Although those American accents...)

Not TV related, but when I was a kid, for some reason I was fascinated by the D.C. Comics series "The Haunted Tank," in which a World War II M3 Stuart tank is haunted by the spirit of Confederate general J.E.B. Stuart. I think there was something about the combination of ghost story and war drama that really appealed to me, and I greatly enjoyed those stories, which appeared in the G.I. Combat issues. So when I saw that Peter and Jack were talking about it at bare-bones e-zine, well - there was no doubt I'd be linking to it!

If you think that sounds a lot like an episode of The Twilight Zone, there was an story about a trio of National Guardsmen who drove a Sherman tank into the middle of the Little Big Horn. You'll have to read on to find out if that was one of the 20 best TZ twist endings, which I mentioned last week and which concludes here with episodes #5 through #1. This is a very fun list, since so many of the episodes on it are so well remembered. Who could forget #5, "Time Enough at Last," where Burgess Meredith's bookworm survives a nuclear explosion only to - no, if you haven't seen it yet, I'm not going to spoil the twist. I remember being stunned by #2, "The Invaders," really enjoyed the bold visual style of #9, "Third from the Sun," and was really impressed by #15, "Escape Clause." It's up to you as to whether or not you quibble about the order in which the episodes are ranked, but there's no questioning the twists involved. If you haven't really sat down to watch The Twilight Zone (and if that's the case, why haven't you?), I'd suggest partaking in a broader sample because some of the subtle character studies are really wonderful, but if you've watched the series before and loved it, I think you'd really enjoy doing a weekend binge with these episodes. Great job, guys!

I hope this has whetted your appetite for more - check out the blogs on the sidebar, and be back here tomorrow for another TV Guide!

The tradition of holding the Academy Awards ceremony on Monday night started, according to Oscar historian Damien Bona, because Monday was the slowest night of the week for movie viewing. By scheduling the show on Monday, the thinking went, you’d be less likely to pull movie fans away from the theater so they could sit in front of their television sets to watch an awards show about movies.

Over the years there had been occasional exceptions to the rule; in 1968 the Oscars were moved to Wednesday to allow interested parties to travel to Martin Luther King’s funeral in Atlanta on Tuesday and in 1981 the ceremony was delayed by a day due to the assassination attempt on Ronald Reagan. Now, of course, they’re held on Sunday, the night on which TV has its highest viewership. (Ironic, isn’t it, that the emphasis is now on what’s best for TV rather than the movie industry.) But there was a time, back in 1971, when the Academy decided to do something really radical – and so they scheduled the Oscars for Thursday. I'm not really sure why; there's no explanation in Bona and Wiley's definitive history, and a cursory internet search failed to turn anything up. Easter was on Sunday, so perhaps the Academy was uncomfortable with staging the big show on Easter Monday - but surely it's been done before, n'est-ce pas? Or maybe the Academy was simply trying different things - the 1970 show was on Tuesday. I think Thursday is a perfectly good day for the Oscars; after all, if the show runs too late you can take Friday off, and make a three-day weekend out of it.* However, whatever the experiment hoped to accomplish apparently didn’t pan out, and next year the ceremony was back to Monday, where it mostly stayed until it moved to Sunday in 1999.

*It’s the third-longest ceremony to date, running eight minutes short of three hours, which today would be considered breathtakingly short – by contrast, the 2002 broadcast will last four hours and 23 minutes. It’s still apparently still too long for the Academy, though: the 1972 show will clock in at one hour and 44 minutes. Yes, those were the days.

SOURCE ALL: HADLEY TV GUIDES

That’s not all that’s different about this year’s Oscarcast though: for one thing, it’s being televised not on longtime home ABC, but on NBC (at 10:00 p.m. ET) – the Peacock Network is in the first of a five-year deal, after which the rights are won back by ABC, which has had them ever since. And Bob Hope, the perennial emcee of the show, is merely one of a number of presenters who share the hosting duties.* Hope has been involved in the show for 30 years, and Leslie Raddatz looks back on some of the more memorable moments from Hope's Oscar career, including his five honorary Oscars, his 14 times emceeing the show, and the time he almost missed the start of the show (in 1953) when, of all things, he got stuck in traffic. The fact that Hope has never won an Oscar legitimately doesn't bother him, he says, although it's certainly been fodder for many of his jokes, such as "Welcome to the Academy Awards, or as it's known at my house - Passover." He also used Mission: Impossible in that joke, a few years later.

*I never much liked the idea of multiple hosts, but after the last few years, maybe they should consider going back to it.

Sign of the times: near the end of his article, Raddatz writes that in the years where Hope hasn't been the host, "he has been missed." And yet by 1971, Hope's jokes are falling flat with a new generation of Oscar attendees. A quip about remembering "when a girl says 'I love you,' and it's a declaration, not a demonstration," was actually booed. After years of multiple hosts (or no hosts at all, as was the case in 1971), Hope returns as solo host in 1978 for the 50th anniversary ceremony, after which Johnny Carson takes over. One thing is for sure, and that's that the Oscars used to have glamour - I'm not sure you can say that today.

◊ ◊ ◊

Throughout the 60s and early 70s, TV Guide's 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 not often that a talk show gets the Amory treatment, but not every talk show is hosted by Merv Griffin. The question is: is this a good thing?

When Merv was in syndication, it was a very good thing, says Amory - "relaxed and easy, earnest when the occasion demanded it, and cute but not too cute when it didn't." And then something happened: CBS. When the network picked up Merv to go head-to-head with Carson and Bishop, the producers found the idea of tampering with a successful formula to be irresistible. They "pushed most of Mr. Griffin's old friends, who were the staples of his syndicated show, off - and just about everything else every show did, on." In the midst of this Carson copycat, however, Merv "got lost in the shuttle. He was less a host than a traffic cop, less a personality than a puppet. We never got to know what he was like, or what he liked." The result, laments Cleve, is that "even the people who couldn't stand Mr. Carson couldn't sit still for the new Mr. Griffin."

The cavalry has arrived, though, in the form of a new producer, and with that change there's hope for the show at last. The show's new format stresses themes - one night was filled with old-time orchestra leaders, which Amory says was "a new-time hit parade all by itself." Other shows featured mayors from around the country, Hollywood fathers and their sons, and bachelors vs. married people. This, Amory thinks, was the best yet, featuring a showdown between Cher and former football player Fred "The Hammer" Williamson. After putting Sonny down - or, rather, his mother (My mother-in-law, she says, had an accident: "She went out wearing a yellow coat, and three men tried to jump her. They thought she was a taxicab."), she turns her attentions on the egocentric Williamson, currently appearing on Julia, who "unburdened himself of some of his deepest public secrets, among them the fact that he is beautiful and never asks girls out on dates - they, it seems, ask him." Merv asks The Hammer what he looks for in a girl, to which he replies, "Looks, and obedience." Chimed in Cher, "Oh - a collie."

Concludes Amory, "A few more shows like this, and Mr. Griffin's troubles will be over." Behind the scenes, however, we know that Griffin and the network were constantly at loggerheads, and that in the dying days of his time with the network he was already arranging a return to syndication. By March 1972 he was back where he wanted to be, free of interference from the CBS suits, where he would remain until his retirement in 1986.

◊ ◊ ◊
This week's biggest sporting event is the Masters golf tournament, the third and fourth rounds of which are seen on CBS Saturday and Sunday. As is always the case, the azaleas are matched by a glittering field of champions, but this year's tournament produces a surprise winner - Charles Coody, winning his only major title by two shots over a couple of golfers named Nicklaus and Miller.

It's the first weekend of baseball season, and since this is a Cleveland-area TV Guide, we're not surprised to see a couple of Indians games, against the Boston Red Sox on Saturday and Sunday. NBC's Game of the Week coverage debuts on Saturday with the defending World Series champion Baltimore Orioles hosting the Detroit Tigers. The Orioles are going to be very, very good this year as well, and they'll make it back to the Series, where they'll lose in seven games to the Pittsburgh Pirates - a Series that will give us the first-ever nighttime post-season game, and change the way we watch the Fall Classic forever.

The NBA playoffs are in full swing, and Sunday at 2:00 p.m. ET ABC will give us a conference finals game between two teams yet to be determined. Just think - the conference finals. The playoffs won't even have started on April 10 this year, and there's something just wrong about that. CBS counters with a quarter-final matchup between the Chicago Black Hawks and either the Minnesota North Stars or Philadelphia Flyers. (Hint: it's the Flyers.) The Stanley Cup playoffs won't have started by April 10 this year either. I think that in many ways sports was a lot better back then.

◊ ◊ ◊
Let's see, I already mentioned Thursday's Academy Awards broadcast, and on the night before, there's a star-studded look at Oscar's past and present. It's not hosted by Barbara Walters, though, but by Hollywood columnist Rona Barrett, whose syndicated special airs on Cleveland's WEWS, thereby preempting a special called Changing Scene, which in turn preempts The Johnny Cash Show. I guess the scene indeed is changing, and we'll see it first-hand with Robert Goulet, Robert Culp (singing!), Barbara Eden, comedians Jud Strunk (I haven't heard that name in years) and Bernie Koppell, John Denver, and the Mike Curb Congregation.

Sunday is Easter, and while it doesn't measure up to Christmas in terms of television content, there are a number of religious specials on the day, including morning services, classical music (on ABC's Directions), and - provided the basketball game doesn't run too long - the Rankin-Bass animated special Here Comes Peter Cottontail (5:00 p.m., ABC), featuring the voices of Danny Kaye and Vincent Price. It's not limited to Sunday, though; Lawrence Welk and his Champagne Music Makers celebrate with their annual Easter program on Saturday (7:30 p.m., ABC) and the King Family returns for their own seasonal syndicated special on Tuesday (7:30 p.m., WUAB).

And the week's starlet is Brenda Sykes, "99 pounds of surprise," who parlayed a winning appearance on The Dating Game to a string of appearances in Mayberry, R.F.D. and Room 222, and movies with Elliott Gould and Rock Hudson. She also happened to be the girlfriend of Fred "The Hammer" Williamson during that infamous appearance on The Merv Griffin Show that we read about earlier. When not tangling with Cher, Williamson mentioned to Merv that "he had no trouble acquiring girls." When the show was over and he went to take her home, he found that she had disappeared - for good. "I think I was ready to break that one up," she says.

Her career pretty much ends in the '70s, with a few more appearances on the big and small screens. Her first husband was Grammy winner Gil Scott-Heron, with whom she had a daughter, poet Gia Scott-Heron; I suppose the fact that I haven't heard of either her or her poetry is my fault.

◊ ◊ ◊
Want a sign of how things have changed? I'll just give you a headline, from The Doan Report: "TV Most Trusted of Mass Media, Survey Says." That wasn't one of Richard Dawson's surveys from Family Feud, was it?

◊ ◊ ◊
Finally, let's take a look at letters. I almost always find these interesting, not least because it gives us a bit of insight not only into what was going on back then, but how people felt about it - something that isn't readily apparent when all you do is read the listings.

John Potter Jr. of Rochester, New York (or as it's known here in Minnesota, "the other Rochester"), is shocked by the FCC's recent decision to give a half-hour of prime time back to local stations. But don't take my word for it - let him tell you himself: "I am shocked [see?] at the recent requirements of the FCC to cut some more network programming for more local programming. How does one of those low-budget amateur local shows rate against shows like Lassie and Wild Kingdom? Americans are going to miss a lot of good shows. Merrill Panitt's response: "FCC says there are a number of reasons for the new rule but 'the main thrust' is to encourage greater diversity of programming by giving independent film producers an opportunity to compete for time."

This entire exchange is full of irony. Mr. Potter is right when he touts shows like Lassie and Wild Kingdom, but it's unlikely he could have foreseen that in the not-too-distant future, Wild Kingdom would, in first-run syndication, fill that very half-hour in many markets, as could Lassie when it went into syndicated reruns. The amateur local programming that had Mr. Potter concerned (and some FCC commissioners hopeful) never materialized, not really, and I can't believe that "independent film producers" profited much either. The real winner was someone like Merv Griffin, who was able to make a few dollars by strip-programming Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune into that half-hour "local" programming. My own opinion is that viewers would, indeed, have been better served had those 30 minutes remained with the networks. The only way this was going to work was if the FCC had forced local stations to producer their own programming. I wonder how that would have gone?

Then there's the letter from Dorothy B. Forsythe of Broomall, Pennsylvania, who has a gripe about commercials. "During a recent illness, I watched daytime TV for five hours and witnessed 151 commercials. On another occasion, as we settled to watch 'Ben-Hur,' my husband said, 'I wonder how many commercials we will see in the next four hours?' I got pad and pencil and counted them - 74. . . I know commercials pay the bill, but isn't there a less annoying way of doing it?" Yes, Dorothy, there is - it's called pay-TV. And today we often pay over a hundred dollars a month for the privilege of seeing commercial-free movies, while other programs have more commercials than ever. What was I saying about ironic?

Staying on the same subject, K. Rita Hart of South Euclid, Ohio (I wonder what the K. stands for?) writes, "A month ago, I came back from a 45-day stay in Sweden (my birthplace). It was grand, but the TV shows are still next to nothing and no commercials. I bless American TV with all its commercials. Without them, we wouldn't hve any good shows at all." Hmm, if she's Swedish, her name could have been Kaarin; went with her middle name to sound more American. At any rate, I can't figure out whether or not she's being sarcastic here. I don't think so; I think she's suggesting that it's the revenue from commercials that allows networks to invest in making better programs, and I suppose that's a plausible theory. Either that, or the "good shows" she's talking about are the commercials themselves, which is how Terry Teachout's mother felt in that article of his that I quoted a couple of weeks ago.

I guess we'll never know the answer, will we? To what the K stands for, I mean.

Lots of movies today, many of them of the B-horror variety, and it's interesting to see how the Saturday movie staple has evolved over the years; in the '50s and early '60s, a lot of them are Westerns, but now they've evolved into sci-fi and horror. The Saturday morning fare brought back memories; I'd forgotten about the old Jerry Lewis cartoon, and I can't remember at all The Bugaloos and the Doubledeckers. Funny how the memory works, isn't it?

It's also the first Saturday of baseball season (by the way, did you see the Opening Week baseball tribute on the other blog? If not, take a moment and check it out), which means Channel 33 cuts American Bandstand back to a half hour. I don't know if I would have been so thrilled about that if I'd been a music fan instead of a sports fan. And a good prime-time lineup, from Mission: Impossible to Pearl Bailey to Mannix. All in all, an eminently watchable day of television.

This week's listings are from Cleveland, with Youngstown and Canton thrown in for good measure.

*WKYC, Channel 3 (NBC)* *Morning*
*06:25a*	News (local)
*06:30a*	*Farm Report*
*07:00a*	*Popeye*
*08:00a*	*Tomfoolery*
*08:30a*	*Heckle and Jeckle*
*09:00a*	*Woody Woodpecker*
*09:30a*	*The Bugaloos*
*10:00a*	*Dr. Doolittle*
*10:30a*	*The Pink Panther*
*11:00a*	*H.R. Pufnstuf*
*11:30a*	*Here Comes the Grump*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Hot Dog*
*12:30p*	*Jambo*
*01:00p*	*Open Line*
*02:00p*	Baseball Pre-Game Show
*02:15p*	Baseball – Detroit at Baltimore
*05:00p*	*Suspense Theatre*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	Governor’s Report (special)
*06:30p*	*NBC Saturday News*
*07:00p*	News (local)
*07:30p*	*Andy Williams* (guests Rosemary Clooney, Don Ho, The Temptations, Cass Elliot)
*08:30p*	*NBC Saturday Night at the Movies –* “Robbery”
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:20p*	Movie Double Feature – “Midnight Lace”, “Hollywood Story” (B&W)

*WEWS, Channel 5 (ABC)* *Morning*
*07:00a*	*Children’s Gospel Hour*
*07:30a*	*Herald of Truth*
*08:00a*	*Uncle Al*
*09:00a*	*Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp*
*10:00a*	*Will the Real Jerry Lewis Please Sit Down!*
*10:30a*	*Here Come the Doubledeckers*
*11:00a*	*Hot Wheels*
*11:30a*	*Skyhawks*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Big Country*
*01:00p*	*American Bandstand* (guests Tommy James, Bobbi Martin)
*02:00p*	Film
*02:30p*	To Be Announced
*03:00p*	*Celebrity Bowling*
*03:30p*	*Sports Challenge*
*04:00p*	*Run For Your Life*
*05:00p*	*Wide World of Sports* (NASCAR Greenville 200)
*Evening*
*06:30p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*07:00p*	*It’s Academic*
*07:30p*	*Lawrence Welk*
*08:30p*	*Pearl Bailey* (guests Peggy Lee, Erroll Garner, Moms Mabley, Pastor Brothers)
*09:30p*	*The Young Lawyers*
*10:30p*	*To Tell the Truth* (panel Orson Bean, Pat Carroll, Peggy Cass, Bill Cullen)
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:30p*	Movie – “Frisco Sal”

*WJW, Channel 8 (CBS)* *Morning*
*06:15a*	*R.F.D.*
*06:30a*	*Sunrise Semester* (Modern Linguistics)
*07:00a*	*Tom & Jerry/Batman*
*07:30a*	*Abbott and Costello*
*08:00a*	*Bugs Bunny/Road Runner*
*09:00a*	*Sabrina*
*10:00a*	*Josie and the Pussycats*
*10:30a*	*Harlem Globetrotters*
*11:00a*	*Archie’s Funhouse*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Scooby-Do, Where Are You?*
*12:30p*	*The Easter Story*
*01:00p*	*Sports World*
*01:15p*	Baseball Pre-Game Show
*01:30p*	Baseball – Cleveland at Boston
*04:00p*	To Be Announced
*04:30p*	*Death Valley Days*
*05:00p*	*Masters Golf Tournament* (special)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*CBS Saturday News with Roger Mudd*
*07:00p*	*Truth or Consequences*
*07:30p*	*Mission: Impossible*
*08:30p*	*He Is Risen* (special)
*09:00p*	*Arnie*
*09:30p*	*Mary Tyler Moore*
*10:00p*	*Mannix*
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:25p*	Movie Double Feature – “Beau James”, “Laura” (B&W)

*WJAN, Channel 17 (Canton) (Ind.)* *Afternoon*
*01:00p*	Sports Interview
*02:00p*	Movie Quadruple Feature – “Accent on Youth”, “The Accusing Finger”, “Ambush”, “Henry Aldrich Swings It”
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*Cardinal Sweethearts*
*07:00p*	*The Big Valley*
*08:00p*	Movie – “If I Were King” (B&W)
*10:00p*	Movie – “Illegal Traffic” (B&W)

*WFMJ, Channel 21 (Youngstown) (NBC)* *Morning*
*08:00a*	*Tomfoolery*
*08:30a*	*Heckle and Jeckle*
*09:00a*	*Woody Woodpecker*
*09:30a*	*The Bugaloos*
*10:00a*	*Dr. Doolittle*
*10:30a*	*The Pink Panther*
*11:00a*	*H.R. Pufnstuf*
*11:30a*	*Here Comes the Grump*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Hot Dog*
*12:30p*	*Jambo*
*01:00p*	*Horizons*
*01:30p*	To Be Announced
*02:00p*	Baseball Pre-Game Show
*02:15p*	Baseball – Detroit at Baltimore
*05:00p*	To Be Announced
*05:30p*	*That Good Ole’ Nashville Music*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*NBC Saturday News*
*07:00p*	*Spotlight*
*07:30p*	*Andy Williams* (guests Rosemary Clooney, Don Ho, The Temptations, Cass Elliot)
*08:30p*	*NBC Saturday Night at the Movies –* “Robbery”
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:20p*	Movie – “Saul and David”

*WVIZ, Channel 25 (PBS)* *Afternoon*
*05:30p*	*Sesame Street*
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*Sesame Street*
*07:30p*	*Rainbow Theater*
*08:00p*	*The Great American Dream Machine*
*09:30p*	*Book Beat* (guest Bennett Cerf)
*10:00p*	*They Went That’a Way*
*10:30p*	*Soul!* (guests Kool ‘n’ the Gang, Voices of East Harlem, Mae Jackson)

*WKBN, Channel 27 (Youngstown) (CBS)* *Morning*
*07:55a*	News (local)
*08:00a*	*Bugs Bunny/Road Runner*
*09:00a*	*Sabrina*
*10:00a*	*Josie and the Pussycats*
*10:30a*	*Harlem Globetrotters*
*11:00a*	*Archie’s Funhouse*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Scooby-Do, Where Are You?*
*12:30p*	*The Monkees*
*01:00p*	*Dastardly and Muttley in their Flying Machines*
*01:30p*	*The Jetsons*
*02:00p*	Movie – “Man of a Thousand Faces” (B&W)
*04:00p*	*CBS Golf Classic –* Beard/Hinson vs. Geiberger/Stockton
*05:00p*	*Masters Golf Tournament* (special)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*Perry Mason* (B&W)
*07:30p*	*Mission: Impossible*
*08:30p*	*He Is Risen* (special)
*09:00p*	*Arnie*
*09:30p*	*Mary Tyler Moore*
*10:00p*	*Mannix*
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:20p*	Movie – “The Devil and the Ten Commandments” (B&W)

*WYTV, Channel 33 (Youngstown) (ABC)* *Morning*
*08:00a*	*Dennis the Menace* (B&W)
*08:30a*	Cartoons
*09:00a*	*Lancelot Link, Secret Chimp*
*10:00a*	*Will the Real Jerry Lewis Please Sit Down!*
*10:30a*	*Here Come the Doubledeckers*
*11:00a*	*Hot Wheels*
*11:30a*	*Skyhawks*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Motor Mouse*
*12:30p*	*The Hardy Boys*
*01:00p*	*American Bandstand* (guests Tommy James, Bobbi Martin)
*01:30p*	Baseball – Cleveland at Boston
*04:00p*	To Be Announced
*04:30p*	*Consultation*
*05:00p*	*Wide World of Sports* (NASCAR Greenville 200)
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*Sports Challenge*
*07:00p*	*The Honeymooners*
*07:30p*	*Lawrence Welk*
*08:30p*	*Pearl Bailey* (guests Peggy Lee, Erroll Garner, Moms Mabley, Pastor Brothers)
*09:30p*	*Johnny Cash* (guests Ray Charles, Liza Minnelli, Arlo Guthrie)
*10:30p*	*The Movie Game* (guests Arlene Golonka, Martin Landau, Richard Long, Rod Serling, Kay Stevens, Miyoshi Umeki)
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:20p*	Movie – “Gammera” (B&W)

*WUAB, Channel 43 (Ind.)* *Morning*
*10:00a*	*Golden Years*
*10:30a*	*Outta Sight*
*11:00a*	*Roy Rogers –* “Sunset in the Desert” (B&W)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Larry Kane* (guests Andy Kim, Curtis Mayfield, Brewer and Shipley)
*01:00p*	*Visual Girl*
*01:30p*	Movie – “The Little Shop of Horrors” (B&W)
*03:00p*	*Honey West* (B&W)
*03:30p*	*Patty Duke* (B&W)
*04:00p*	Movie – “The Story of Louis Pasteur” (B&W)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Maverick* (B&W)
*07:00p*	Wrestling
*08:00p*	*The Invaders*
*09:00p*	Movie – “Arsenic and Old Lace” (B&W)
*11:00p*	*Movie Double Feature* – “Three Men on a Horse”, “Kill and Be Killed”

*WKBF, Channel 61 (Ind.)* *Morning*
*09:30a*	*Kathryn Kuhlman*
*10:00a*	Movie – “Samson and the Seven Miracles of the World”
*11:30a*	*NBA Highlights*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Roller Derby –* Bay Bombers vs. Midwest Pioneers
*01:00p*	Movie – “Great Guns” (B&W)
*02:30p*	Movie – “The Cape Canaveral Monsters”
*04:00p*	*Combat!*
*05:00p*	*McHale’s Navy* (B&W)
*05:30p*	*F Troop*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	Wrestling
*07:00p*	*The Twilight Zone* (B&W)
*07:30p*	Movie – “Nightmare” (B&W)
*09:00p*	*The Prisoner*
*10:00p*	*The Alfred Hitchcock Hour* (B&W)
*11:00p*	Movie – “Pyro”

Hopefully, many of you will remember Liz Trotta, the former correspondent for NBC and CBS from the mid-60s through the 80s. Throughout her career she’s had to battle on two fronts: as a woman - the first to report from Vietnam for television - and as a conservative. She’s also had a perspective on the world that many of her colleagues lack, one that’s shown in the two engrossing books she’s written about wildly different topics.

Fighting for Air: In the Trenches with Television News, written in 1991, is her memoir on her television days, beginning with her time at NBC. It was there that she found herself, as they say, in “the jungles of Vietnam”, and while that sounds like a trite cliché, it’s difficult to find a better way to describe that claustrophobic war, one in which nature itself seemed to suffocate those who went there. Heart of darkness, indeed – Trotta writes that she’s still haunted by the experience, and it’s easy to see why. On one hand, the country tries to swallow you up, while at the same time you have to worry about someone shooting at you, and all the while questions continue to be asked about the meaning of it all. (Sometimes I think the wonder of Vietnam is that anyone returned without being insane, addicted, depressed, or dead – in fact, Trotta’s six-month assignment comes about after two reporters are wounded and another suffers a breakdown; as she puts it, NBC’s “cannon fodder was getting scarce.”)

Trotta’s view of the war is that the only thing wrong is ``the U.S. government's half-hearted commitment to it,'' and that pro-war sentiment gets her in trouble with the more liberal members of the network, including soon-to-be evening news anchor John Chancellor, and it’s a foreshadowing of the trouble she’ll have throughout her journalistic career – well, that and her own outspoken nature. (I knew there was a reason I liked her!) Throughout her career, she covers some of the big stories that the job has to offer, from presidential campaigns to civil war in the Philippines, from war between India and Pakistan to the hostage crisis in Iran, from unrest in Northern Ireland to the murder trial of Claus von Bulow.

Trotta suggests her conservative politics, along with that outspokenness (she’s wonderfully candid about many of her colleagues, as well as the issues of the day) is what leads to her “demotion” by NBC (just after winning an Overseas Press Club award) and her sacking at CBS (supposedly for being “too old” at age 41), and the quality of her work certainly lends credence to those who suggest that the media is more interested in their own narrative than in the actual story.

It’s a great read, but her second book proves to be a real change of pace, one that’s not only intriguing but quite affecting. Jude: A Pilgrimage to the Saint of Last Resort, written in 1998, serves partly as a biography of the famous “patron saint of desperate causes,” about whom we actually know very little. His actual name may have been Judas Thaddaeus, and during his lifetime he may have been a victim of mistaken identity from those who confused him with the betrayer of Jesus.* The Latin translation of the Roman Canon contains no mention of Jude; instead, he is referred to as Thaddeaus. Aside from the Epistle of Jude, which the saint may or may not have written, there is but one line in the Bible credited to him: “Lord, why is it that you will reveal yourself to us and not to the world?” (John 14:22).

*Which may help explain how Jude became the patron of lost causes. Since so many wrongly associated him with Judas and for that reason gave him less attention and reverence than the other disciples, "St. Jude is ready and waiting to hear the prayers of those who call upon him."

Trotta shares with us the fantastic story of the Image of Edessa, or Mandylion, a piece of cloth upon which the image of Jesus had been imprinted and which Jude is often portrayed as wearing around his neck. According to tradition, King Abgar of Edessa had written to Jesus, asking him to come and cure him of an illness; Jesus had replied that he would not be able to come, but the king would later be visited by one of his disciples – which turned out to be Jude, bringing the Mandylion as a sign. Abgar was cured of his illness, and the rest, as they say, is history.

While all this is educational, it is the personal testimonials which Trotta relates that makes the greatest impact. In story after story, ordinary people relate how and what circumstances they've turned to Jude. Probably the most famous is that of entertainer Danny Thomas, who prayed to Jude for success in show business and vowed that if his prayer were to be answered, he would build a shrine to the saint in gratitude. This, of course, is how St. Jude Children's Hospital came to be. And indeed there are many stories of people cured of illnesses, freed from unemployment, reunited with lost family members, and so on. Just as impressive, however, are those who come to Jude not in desperation, but for everyday requests - a good day at work, success on a test. To them Jude is not the saint of last resort, but a friend with whom they talk every day. As for her own relationship with Jude, Trotta confides that she has yet to approach him with that desperate petition for help. She doesn't want to take the saint lightly, wasting his time with something inconsequential to her life. When the time is right to go to him, she will know.

There is something about St. Jude, as Trotta notes, that compels people not just to seek him out, but to share him with others. Almost everyone who has been the beneficiary of his intercession has at one time or another "gone public" with their thanks, hoping to serve as an example for others in similar situations. In my own case, I consider everything about our return to Minnesota - the jobs which enabled us to make the move, the apartment which we found on very short notice, the success of a move that was put together in about two weeks - to be inexplicable any other way. There was absolutely no reason to think that everything would fall into place the way it did; it's not an exaggeration to say that it happened against all odds. Some might ask for more proof - I rather think that asking for help and receiving it is proof enough. Gratitude does not begin to explain it.

The story of Jude is filled with such examples, and as a result some critics have dismissed Trotta's book as mere hagiography. I'm not sure about that; in the first place, as a journalist she's too good for that. She doesn't attempt to hide her Catholicism, however, nor her belief in the intercessory powers of the saints. If that strikes some as cheerleading, so be it.

With Fighting for Air and Jude, Liz Trotta addresses the two dominant themes of our time, Caesar and Christ, and renders to each their due. We stand to profit from those endeavors.

There probably has never been a religious figure, with the possible exception of Billy Graham, more familiar to television viewers than Bishop Fulton Sheen. His program Life Is Worth Living ran on network and syndicated television from 1951 to 1968, and reruns appeared on local television for years afterward.

The following is from his Good Friday reflection at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City on Friday, April 13, 1979. It's known as his "last Good Friday," since he died on December 9 of that year. I've said it before, but I think his message is every bit as relevant today as it was then. Timeless, in other words.

There's another moon landing scheduled for this week, and to say something this matter-of-factly a few weeks ago would have been unthinkable. And yet that's what success will do for you. By Apollo 13 the novelty of a manned moon flight was already wearing off, and it was only the life-and-death struggle to get the astronauts back that captured the public's attention. Apollo 14 would have brought people back somewhat, just to see if anything happened this time, but by the time of Apollo 16, it takes a moon buggy to capture people's imagination once again.

The launch of Apollo 16 comes off as scheduled on Sunday, with the first of three moon walks taking place on Thursday. And while that little car might not look like much, it revolutionizes exploration of the moon, dramatically increasing the amount of terrain that astronauts John Young and Charlie Duke will be able to cover. And there will be more television coverage of this trip than ever before, including three prime-time color broadcasts live from the moon - with, NASA says, an improved and "cleaned up" picture. They also promise a better view of the Lunar Module launch from the moon's surface to reunite with Ken Mattingly, orbiting the moon - the camera on Apollo 15 failed to follow the upward flight of the LM, but "a new-type clutch in the camera mounting should fix that." And while the shock absorbers on the buggy aren't good enough to permit live shots while it's moving, it will allow viewers at home to see some truly spectacular shots of the moon's terrain, including Stone and Smoky Mountains and Palmetto crater.

Hard to believe that after this, there's only one more moon flight - December's launch of Apollo 17, the first nighttime launch. And after that - well, there's the joint mission with the Soviets, and then the space shuttle and the international space station, and - that's it. Forty-five years later, and we haven't returned to the moon since.

◊ ◊ ◊

Throughout the 60s and early 70s, TV Guide's 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.

I'll be upfront (as I always am with you, dear readers) by admitting that I've never been a fan of David Frost, and so you'll forgive me if I seem to be focusing on only the negative parts of Cleve's review. But then, where is one to go when the very first paragraph notes that Our Favorite Reviewer takes "a rather dim vue of it." When he adds that "it's not all bad, by any means," you know that's damning with faint praise. Part of the problem stems from the talent that Frost has apparently displayed for the deft interview, and Amory feels that he deserves higher standards than what he's been given here. The jokes are old - for example, in discussing the Seven Deadly Sins, Frost refers to "autolatry," defined as "the intemperate worship of one's automobile - and they weren't all that funny to begin with.

Frost has a band of regulars, ala Steve Allen, who join him in each episode, and with the exception of Jack Gilford, who does "long vignettes," the cast "are subjected to one or two skits which are either underwritten or overdirected or both." Of course, that's nothing terribly unusual - Saturday Night Live has been doing the same thing for decades - but that doesn't mean it's very good, either. Even when a bit does succeed at hitting the mark, there seems to be just too much of it, and as we all know too much of anything isn't necessarily a good thing.

Amory also complains that guest stars aren't used to their particular advantage, and that can be fatal - when Sid Caesar is your guest and you're not getting laughs, there's something seriously wrong. This show, which happened to be about politics - every episode tends to have a theme - should have been a barrel of laughs; if you can't find something funny about politics, you might as well just give up. And yet, as Amory notes, he could only think of two funny scenes, and one of those was overcooked. It is too bad, as he notes in conclusion, that the show doesn't come off better. "Can't anybody on this show tell what's funny and what isn't?" he asks plaintively. "And, if he can, why doesn't he tell somebody else?"

◊ ◊ ◊

SOURCE ALL: HADLEY TV GUIDE COLLECTION

If David Frost had really wanted to do a funny show about politics, he should have turned to David Brinkley. He's no longer anchoring The Huntley-Brinkley Report since Chet Huntley's retirement, but his commentaries on NBC Nightly News allow him a platform from which he can launch his incisive opinions, most of which are quite funny without him even trying. (Frost, take note!)

For example, there's the story of the time he was in West Virginia covering the 1960 Democratic presidential primary, when the longest lines weren't to talk to the candidates, but to get Brinkley's autograph. "It was just . . .embarrassing," Brinkley recalls. "What I think is that you could put a baboon on television every night for 15 years and he'd become some sort of celebrity."

It's that refusal to take himself seriously that's endeared himself to so many. Brinkley considers himself not a celebrity, nor an anchorman, but a newsman - a reporter. And yet, even within that definition, there are limitations. He compares the lot of the journalist to that of a politician. "In the case of the politicians, it's a seeking of approval and a seeking for power. In journalism it may be more of the first and less of the latter, because there's no real power in journalism. People say you have it, but you don't. You may write about them, talk about them, watch them, follow them, chronicle their doings, but they have the power."

It's not all fun and games, being a respected television reporter; as a matter of fact, it isn't much fun at all. "I like what I do, but I don't much like the way I have to do it," he says, lamenting that with the tight, rigid schedule under which they all have to work, TV newsmen often wind up slapping something together, rather than crafting a story that really interests him. He does find, however, encouragement in his frequent trips to speak on college campuses. Whether or not young people are as smart as they think they are, or have all the answers, ("everybody who's 19 years old is wrong about a lot of things, because in most cases he doesn't know what he's talking about"), "they do talk and they do care about it and they think about it and they ask about it and they read about it." Had previous generations done this, he thinks, "this country would be in much better shape now than it is."

Interspersed with glimpses of Brinkley's grueling workday ("At the end of the day I'm like a squeezed lemon."), are more of his pithy comments on the issues of the day. "The Federal Government is marvelously equipped to start things and totally ill-equipped to stop them. It never stops anything. Everything that was started in the '30s to deal with the Depression and unemployment is still thriving and booming. Government as an instrument of social reform is an idea I used to hold but don't much any longer." He's a fervent believer in freedom of the press, reminding one and all that "if people are concerned about dangers to their liberties, they ought to know where these dangers come from, and they do not come from the press." And he is convinced that "power is very much apart from the people. The people in this country have no power."

Lest you get too caught up in this seriousness, though, one more Brinkley anecdote to lighten the mood""When I was [in the Washington airport] waiting for an airplane, a lady came up to me and said, 'Aren't you Chet Huntley?' And I said, 'Yes.' Actually, that is the polite answer, because first of all, it doesn't make any difference. People confuse us all the time; nothing could be less important, so if I had said, 'No, I'm Brinkley,' then she would have been embarrassed and would have felt it necessary to apologize, which was not necessary, and this would have taken some time and I would have missed my airplane. So I said, 'Yes,' and she said, 'Well, I want to say I think you're pretty good, but I don't know how you put up with that idiot in Washington'."

◊ ◊ ◊
Of all the items of interest this week, one stands out from the rest, a momentous change in television. On Wednesday, April 19, Johnny Carson hosts the last regular episode of The Tonight Show from New York; after a few days off, the show will start up again on May 1 from its new home in Hollywood. This is a landmark in more ways than one. It demonstrates, once and for all, that the celebrity balance of power has moved away from New York and the legitimate theater, and to California, the land of movies and television. That might not mean much to those of you who grew up watching Johnny from Hollywood (or Burbank, if you will), but there was something about New York that gave those shows a different feel.

New York was the home of the first late-night show, Broadway Open House, with Jerry Lester. It was the home to Lester's successors in the time slot, Steve Allen and Jack Paar. When Tonight was done live, it could count on stars appearing after they'd finished a Broadway performance. There were comedians who were playing in the Village, or at clubs in other parts of the city. Most celebrities promoting their latest book or movie or television show had to pass through New York at some point in time, and a trip to Tonight was natural. There was a sense of - I don't know, maybe grown-up sophistication - that wasn't particularly apparent in Hollywood. But one has to go where the stars are - Joey Bishop had done his show from there, and Merv Griffin would soon move his as well - and Johnny wanted to make the move, so there.

Of course, with Jimmy Fallon as host The Tonight Show has returned to the city of its birth, and Letterman was always based there. It's a different New York, naturally, a different world in fact. I'm not sure there is any one center of the entertainment world anymore, not when you can make a successful web series or cut an album from your own home, not when travel between the two coasts is much more commonplace. There was a time, though - and that time runs out this week.

◊ ◊ ◊

The Doan Report has the scoop on the new television season, as CBS and ABC announce their new fall lineups, to go along with NBC, which made their announcement last month. Anything here we should be concerned with? Well, yes.

On CBS, debuting series include M*A*S*H, "an army hospital comedy with Alan Alda and Wayne Rogers,"Cousin Maude, with Bea Arthur in a spin-off from All in the Family, Spencer's Mountain, starring Richard Thomas, and The Bob Newhart Show, with Bob "as a condominium manager, with Suzanne Pleshette as his wife." Obviously, some of these series underwent a bit of fine-tuning between now and the time in September when they go on the air - Spencer's Mountain becomes The Waltons, Maude drops the "Cousin," and Newhart goes from managing a condo to being a psychologist. Still, that's not bad for one season. To make way, the losers include My Three Sons, The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour, and Arnie.

How does ABC counter this? Start with The Rookies, about "four young, antiviolence policement,"Temperature's Rising, which the network tried so hard to make work, The Julie Andrews Show, which should have worked, and Kung Fu and The Streets of San Francisco, which did work. Among the casualties: The Courtship of Eddie's Father, Longstreet, and Bewitched (sorry, Adam-Michael!).

By the way, speaking of Eddie's Father, Brandon Cruz - Eddie - is among the acquaintances waiting to surprise Bill Bixby on This Is Your Life (WJZ, 10:30 p.m. Wednesday). He's joined by Ray Walston (My Favorite Martian), William Windom, and Dinah Shore. I wonder if you could do a show like that nowadays? "Kim Kardashian, this is your life!" I mean, what more is there to show?

◊ ◊ ◊
It was called "Ping Pong Diplomacy," the exchange of table tennis players between the United States and Communist China; it helped make possible Nixon's trip to China, and on Saturday it's the feature presentation on ABC's Wide World of Sports (5:00 p.m. ET), as the Chinese team kicks off its 13-city tour of the U.S. It is not, however, the only pivotal moment in sports history that day, as a syndicated lineup of stations presents third-round coverage of the richest tournament in women's professional golf history, the inaugural Dinah Shore Women's Circle Championship, from Palm Springs, California (5:30 p.m.). The winner's share of the purse is $20,000, nothing to sneeze at, but it's Dinah's long-term support of women's golf, starting here, that makes this tournament one of the oldest and most prestigious on the women's tour to this day, even though the late star's name is no longer appended to the tournament.

On Sunday, we get a glimpse at one of the most infamous stars from the Jerry Springer era of television: Maury Povich. Only he's not involved in sleazy, sensationalist chat yet; he's best-known as the son of famed Washington baseball writer Shirley Povich, and at 10:30 p.m. on WTTG, his Sports, People and Povich show takes a look "A Town Without a Team: - the first year without baseball in the nation's capital, now that the Senators have moved to Texas.

One of the biggest music stars of the early '70s, Chuck Mangione, headlines with the Rochester (N.Y.) Philharmonic in a 90 minute special on PBS Monday night (8:00 p.m. ET). He had some really big hits in the day - do that many people remember him today? Meanwhile, Dinah Shore guest stars as herself in Here's Lucy (9:00 p.m., CBS). The redhead, typically, is star-struck to meet her.

On Tuesday, Today (7:00 a.m., NBC) presents a terrific show, with the legendary conductor Leopold Stokowski* interviewed on the occasion of his 90th birthday, after which John Houseman discusses his memoir Run-Through.

*"Leopold!" in the Bugs Bunny cartoon "Long-Haired Hare," and the maestro in the Disney movie Fantasia.

We've already touched on Wednesday a couple of times, so we'll skip to Thursday, where I love this description of tonight's Ironside: "'Murder Impromptu,' a whodunit about an on-stage stabbing during an improvisational comedy show." I don't ever remember that happening on Who's Line is it, Anyway? - not even the British version. CBS counters this with a CBS Reports look at Chicago Mayor Richard Daley - timely, with a presidential election coming up.

And there's supposed to be some baseball on Friday, but at press time, we're not quite sure. Under the description for the Cleveland - Baltimore game, the notation informs us that "a players' strike threatened cancellation of the game." For those of you who've never known a time when labor unrest was not part of professional sports, you can't appreciate how disturbing this possibility was. The players walked on April 1, and didn't return until April 13, when the union reached agreement with the owners about salary arbitration and increases in the players pension fund. Nearly 90 games were cancelled during the strike, and were never made up - cold comfort to the Boston Red Sox, who will lose the American League East title to the Detroit Tigers by one-half game because the Sox will have one more game cancelled than the Tigers. It's just the way the ball bounces, I guess.

This week it's another trip to the Baltimore-Washington area, and one of the first things you might notice about the prime-time lineup is that for NBC and CBS, the network programming ends at 10:30 p.m. ET, rather than 11. The implementation of the new access rule (about which you read a complaint in the Letters to the Editor section last week) exempts Sunday and Tuesday (for now), but the Peacock and Tiffany networks have both ceded Tuesday's final half-hour back to local stations anyway. (ABC made up for it, at least in the spring, by giving back the last 30 minutes on Wednesday.)

As I've suggested before, this was, on balance, a bad idea - the extra time was rarely used the way it was intended, and today it means more to local stations as a source of revenue than a way of serving the community. For ABC, it didn't make any different tonight anyway; they've preempted Marcus Welby, M.D., for the fifth game of the NBA Western Conference finals between Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's current team, the Milwaukee Bucks, and his future team, the Los Angeles Lakers.

By the way, in case you ever wondered what the original owners of these TV Guides watched at the time, perhaps the pencil marks give us an idea. Or maybe it's just a way of ranking the shows?

*WMAR, Channel 2 (Baltimore) (CBS)* *Morning*
*06:30a*	*Sunrise Semester* (Chemistry)
*07:00a*	*CBS Morning News with John Hart*
*08:00a*	*Captain Kangaroo*
*09:00a*	*Romper Room*
*09:30a*	*Dialing for Dollars*
*09:55a*	News
*10:00a*	*To Tell the Truth*
*10:30a*	*My Three Sons*
*11:00a*	*Family Affair*
*11:30a*	*Love of Life*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Where the Heart Is*
*12:25p*	News (local)
*12:30p*	*Search for Tomorrow*
*01:00p*	*Woman’s Angle*
*01:30p*	*As the World Turns*
*02:00p*	*Love is a Many Splendored Thing*
*02:30p*	*The Guiding Light*
*03:00p*	*The Secret Storm*
*03:30p*	*The Edge of Night*
*04:00p*	*The Flintstones*
*04:30p*	*The Big Valley*
*05:30p*	*Dragnet*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*06:30p*	*CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite*
*07:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*07:30p*	*I Dream of Jeannie*
*08:00p*	*High School Bowl*
*08:30p*	*Hawaii Five-O*
*09:30p*	*Cannon*
*10:30p*	*Man to Man*
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:30p*	*CBS Late Movie* – “Love is Better than Ever” (B&W)
*01:10a*	News (local)

*WRG, Channel 4 (D.C.) (NBC)* *Morning*
*06:05a*	News (local)
*06:10a*	*Faith and Life*
*06:20a*	*Down to Earth*
*06:25a*	*Station Exchange*
*06:55a*	*Events for Washington*
*07:00a*	*Today* (guest Leopold Stokowski, John Housman, James Keogh)
*09:00a*	*Not For Women Only*
*09:30a*	*The Galloping Gourmet*
*10:00a*	*Dinah’s Place* (guest Bobby Goldsboro)
*10:30a*	*Concentration*
*11:00a*	*Sale of the Century*
*11:30a*	*The Hollywood Squares* (guests James Brolin, Roy Clark, Arte Johnson, Paul Lynde, Suzanne Pleschette, Joan Rivers, Karen Valentine, Wally Cox, Charley Weaver)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Jeopardy*
*12:30p*	*Who, What or Where Game*
*12:55p*	*NBC News* (Floyd Kalber)
*01:00p*	*Watch Your Child*
*01:30p*	*Three on a Match*
*02:30p*	*The Doctors*
*03:00p*	*Another World*
*03:30p*	*Return to Peyton Place*
*04:00p*	*Somerset*
*04:30p*	*Mike Douglas* (guests Karen Valentine, Joyce Bryant, Dean Dixon)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*06:30p*	*NBC Nightly News with John Chancellor*
*07:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*07:30p*	*Double Jeopardy* (special)
*08:30p*	*NBC News Special –* “Thou Shalt Not Kill” (special)
*09:30p*	*James Garner as Nichols*
*10:30p*	*Perspective*
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:30p*	*The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson* (guest David Brenner)
*01:00a*	*International Zone*
*01:30a*	*Faith and Life/Events 4 Washington*

*WTTG, Channel 5 (D.C.) (Ind.)* *Morning*
*06:25a*	*Today in Your Life*
*06:30a*	*Educational Show*
*07:00a*	*The Cisco Kid*
*07:30a*	*Porky Pig*
*08:00a*	*The Banana Splits*
*09:00a*	*The Flintstones*
*09:30a*	*Mister Ed* (B&W)
*10:00a*	Movie – “Confidence Girl” (B&W)
*11:30a*	*To Tell the Truth* (panelists Kitty Carlisle, Bill Cullen, Anita Gillette, Gene Rayburn)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Panorama* (guests Bob Brown, William Chapin)
*02:00p*	*David Frost* (guests Phil Silvers, Jane Wyman, Cleo Lane)
*03:00p*	*To Tell the Truth*
*03:30p*	*New Zoo Revue*
*04:00p*	*I Dream of Jeannie*
*04:30p*	*Petticoat Junction*
*05:00p*	*Star Trek*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*I Love Lucy* (B&W)
*06:30p*	*Truth or Consequences*
*07:00p*	*Dick Van Dyke* (B&W)
*07:30p*	*I Dream of Jeannie*
*08:00p*	*Green Acres*
*08:30p*	*Merv Griffin*
*10:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:00p*	*Perry Mason*
*12:00a*	Movie – “Good Day for a Hanging”

*WMAL, Channel 7 (D.C.) (ABC)* *Morning*
*07:00a*	*Assignment*
*07:30a*	Cartoons
*08:00a*	*Magic Door*
*09:00a*	*Major Adams* (B&W)
*10:00a*	*What Every Woman Wants to Know*
*10:30a*	*Password* (guests Barbara Feldon, Roddy McDowell)
*11:00a*	*Love, American Style*
*11:30a*	*Bewitched*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*12:30p*	*Split Second*
*01:00p*	*All My Children*
*01:30p*	*Let’s Make a Deal*
*02:00p*	*The Newlywed Game*
*02:30p*	*The Dating Game*
*03:00p*	*General Hospital*
*03:30p*	*One Life to Live*
*04:00p*	Movie – “Count Three and Pray”
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*07:00p*	*ABC Evening News with Howard K. Smith and Harry Reasoner*
*07:30p*	*The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau* (special)
*08:30p*	*Movie of the Week –* “The Birdmen”
*10:00p*	NBA Basketball– Milwaukee at Los Angeles (special)
*12:30a*	News, Weather, Sports (local) (time approximate)
*01:00a*	To Be Announced

*WTOP, Channel 9 (D.C.) (CBS)* *Morning*
*06:00a*	*Sunrise Semester* (Latin American Literature)
*06:30a*	*Time for English*
*07:00a*	*CBS Morning News with John Hart*
*08:00a*	*Captain Kangaroo*
*09:00a*	*Harambee*
*10:00a*	*The Lucy Show*
*10:30a*	*My Three Sons*
*11:00a*	*Family Affair*
*11:30a*	*Love of Life*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Where the Heart Is*
*12:25p*	*CBS News* (Douglas Edwards)
*12:30p*	*Search for Tomorrow*
*01:00p*	News (local)
*01:30p*	*As the World Turns*
*02:00p*	*Love is a Many Splendored Thing*
*02:30p*	*The Guiding Light*
*03:00p*	*The Secret Storm*
*03:30p*	*The Edge of Night*
*04:00p*	*The Virginian*
*05:30p*	*Andy Griffith* (B&W)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*07:00p*	*CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite*
*07:30p*	*CBS News Special –* “What’s New at School?” (special)
*08:30p*	*Hawaii Five-O*
*09:30p*	*Cannon*
*10:30p*	*The Golddiggers*
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:30p*	*CBS Late Movie* – “Love is Better than Ever” (B&W)
*01:10a*	News (local)

*WBAL, Channel 11 (Baltimore) (NBC)* *Morning*
*06:30a*	*Learning to Do* (B&W)
*07:00a*	*Today* (guest Leopold Stokowski, John Housman, James Keogh)
*09:00a*	*Watch Your Child*
*09:30a*	*Home Economics*
*10:00a*	*Dinah’s Place* (guest Bobby Goldsboro)
*10:30a*	*Concentration*
*11:00a*	*Sale of the Century*
*11:30a*	*The Hollywood Squares* (guests James Brolin, Roy Clark, Arte Johnson, Paul Lynde, Suzanne Pleshette, Joan Rivers, Karen Valentine, Wally Cox, Charley Weaver)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Jeopardy*
*12:30p*	*Who, What or Where Game*
*12:55p*	*NBC News* (Floyd Kalber)
*01:00p*	*Perry Mason* (B&W)
*02:30p*	*The Doctors*
*03:00p*	*Another World*
*03:30p*	*Return to Peyton Place*
*04:00p*	*I Love Lucy* (B&W)
*04:30p*	*Dick Van Dyke* (B&W)
*05:00p*	*Daniel Boone*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Duckpins and Dollars*
*06:30p*	*NBC Nightly News with John Chancellor*
*07:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*07:30p*	*Double Jeopardy* (special)
*08:30p*	*NBC News Special –* “Thou Shalt Not Kill” (special)
*09:30p*	*James Garner as Nichols*
*10:30p*	*American Adventure*
*11:00p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*11:30p*	*The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson* (guest David Brenner)
*01:00a*	News (local)

*WJZ, Channel 13 (Baltimore) (ABC)* *Morning*
*06:20a*	*Afro-American Experience*
*06:50a*	*Consumer Checkout*
*07:00a*	*New Zoo Revue*
*07:30a*	Cartoons
*08:30a*	*Leave it to Beaver* (B&W)
*09:00a*	*Larry Angel*
*09:55a*	Movie – “Outside the Wall”
*11:30a*	*Bewitched*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Password* (guests Barbara Feldon, Roddy McDowell)
*12:30p*	*Split Second*
*01:00p*	News (local)
*01:30p*	*Let’s Make a Deal*
*02:00p*	*The Newlywed Game*
*02:30p*	*Mike Douglas* (guests Karen Valentine, Joyce Bryant, Dean Dixon)
*03:00p*	*General Hospital*
*03:30p*	*One Life to Live*
*04:00p*	*David Frost* (guests Phil Silvers, Jane Wyman, Cleo Lane)
*05:30p*	News, Weather, Sports (local)
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*ABC Evening News with Howard K. Smith and Harry Reasoner*
*07:00p*	*Truth or Consequences*
*07:30p*	*The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau* (special)
*08:30p*	*Movie of the Week –* “The Birdmen”
*10:00p*	NBA Basketball– Milwaukee at Los Angeles (special)
*12:30a*	News, Weather, Sports (local) (time approximate)
*01:00a*	To Be Announced

*WDCA, Channel 20 (D.C.) (Ind.)* *Morning*
*07:00a*	*Astro Boy*
*07:30a*	*Bozo the Clown*
*08:30a*	*George of the Jungle*
*09:00a*	*The Little Rascals*
*09:30a*	*Romper Room*
*10:00a*	*Ben Casey* (B&W)
*11:00a*	Movie – “Innocents in Paris” (B&W)
*Afternoon*
*01:00p*	Movie – “Twin Beds” (B&W)
*02:30p*	*Bozo the Clown*
*03:00p*	*Ultra Man*
*03:30p*	*Spiderman*
*04:00p*	*Speed Racer*
*04:30p*	*Lost in Space*
*05:30p*	*Batman*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Get Smart*
*06:30p*	*Bill Cosby*
*07:00p*	*Hogan’s Heroes*
*07:30p*	*Hogan’s Heroes*
*08:00p*	Movie – “Sergeant Rutledge” (B&W)
*10:00p*	*The High Chaparral*
*11:00p*	*Can You Top This?*
*11:30p*	Movie – “I Married a Witch” (B&W)

*WETA, Channel 26 (D.C.) (PBS)* *Morning*
*08:00a*	*Sesame Street*
*09:00a*	*Sesame Street*
*10:00a*	Classroom
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Hathayoga*
*12:30p*	*The French Chef*
*01:00p*	Classroom
*01:30p*	*The Electric Company*
*02:00p*	Classroom
*03:00p*	*Nine-to-Five*
*03:30p*	Classroom
*04:00p*	*Sesame Street*
*05:00p*	*Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood*
*05:30p*	*The Electric Company*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Hodgepodge*
*06:30p*	*What’s New*
*07:00p*	*Book Beat*
*07:30p*	*Sam Jones*
*08:30p*	*The Advocates*
*09:30p*	*Black Journal*
*10:00p*	*Martin Agronsky: Evening Edition*
*10:30p*	*Firing Line*
*11:30p*	*Hathayoga*

*WBFF, Channel 45 (Baltimore) (Ind.)* *Afternoon*
*12:45p*	*Brother Buzz*
*01:00p*	Movie – “Girl from Hong Kong”
*02:30p*	*Captain Chesapeake*
*03:30p*	*Timmy and Lassie* (B&W)
*04:00p*	*Mister Ed* (B&W)
*04:30p*	*Astro Boy*
*05:00p*	*Batman*
*05:30p*	*Star Trek*
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*Gidget*
*07:00p*	Movie – “Cell 2455, Death Row) (B&W)
*08:30p*	Movie – “No, My Darling Daughter” (B&W)
*10:45p*	News (local)
*11:00p*	*Alfred Hitchcock Presents* (B&W)
*11:30p*	Movie – “The White Orchid”
*01:00a*	News (local)

*WMPB, Channel 67 (Baltimore) (PBS)* *Morning*
*07:30a*	*The Electric Company*
*08:00a*	*Symposium on Drugs*
*09:00a*	Classroom
*11:00a*	*Sesame Street*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	Classroom
*03:00p*	*Modern Supervision* (B&W)
*03:30p*	*Put it in Writing* (B&W)
*04:00p*	*Sesame Street*
*05:00p*	*Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood*
*05:30p*	*The Electric Company*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Hodgepodge*
*06:30p*	*Educational Psychology* (B&W)
*07:15p*	*Charlie’s Pad*
*07:30p*	*The Forsythe Saga*
*08:30p*	*The Advocates*
*09:30p*	*Black Journal*
*10:00p*	*Strategy for Action*
*10:30p*	*Biology* (B&W)
*11:15p*	*Charlie’s Pad*
*11:30p*	*Martin Agronsky: Evening Edition*

Lileks wrote something last week about architecture, and I keep coming back to it because it seems to me that there’s an essential truth embedded in what he wrote, and one way to tell whether or not it’s both essential and true is to try it out in another area, another field of endeavor, and see if it still holds up.

He’s writing about the architectural style called Brutalism, and I’d contend that television today, for all its achievements in storytelling and sophistication, is displaying something of its own Brutalist movement. Architecture and television are both creative, even artistic, forms, and they both can be used to tell a story, so it seems to make some sense to think there could be similarities. And ironically, the era of architectural Brutalism to which Lileks refers – the mid-60s – is precisely the era in which television displayed perhaps its least Brutalist characteristics. Or perhaps it isn’t so ironic after all.

In the most literal sense, the Brutalism of television has, in context, been an issue for decades. Whenever an act of violence occurs – assassinations, riots, mass shootings – television has been held up as one of the contributing factors. As an easy example, the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy resulted in well-documented cases of episodes being pulled off the air in response to public revulsion. These were episodes that had already been made, so there was no question that they’d be aired eventually – just not at the time, in the wake of what had happened. (Whether network executives expected audiences to be more discerning about these episodes when they did air, or, more cynically, they figured people would have forgotten about the fuss, is anyone’s guess.) The point is this: if you go back and look at most of these episodes and compared them to the content of programs on cable and network today, you’d find the level of “violence” laughable, almost genteel. The point is, I think you could make the case that every time this happens, and TV tones its act down accordingly, it winds up regeneration somewhere down the line, ever more graphic (both visually and psychologically) – more brutal – than before. And they’re not just brutal in content, but in look as well; natural lighting which often gives the shows a perpetually dark look; washed out colors that accomplish the same thing, as well as suggesting characters drained of hope; and graphic sex and violence that serves to dehumanize the characters and desensitize the viewers. There was something stylized about the violence of early television – not unlike the stylized nature of Streamlined architecture of the pre-Brutalist era – where, for example, multiple gunshot wounds rarely produced the kind of blood that one would see in real life. It didn’t need to; the viewer’s imagination would supply the rest. Now, the producers want you to see every speck of blood, every particle of bone fragment or brain tissue – and in HD to boot.

I’ve mentioned this before, and it’s not an original thought of mine, that this has created a universe that bears little resemblance to that with which most people are familiar, one to which very few would aspire. As Lileks puts it with regard to architecture, “Their answer to ‘the urban problem’ was to raze history and replace it with something unmoored from human experience.” I think the same goes with television. One of Brutalism’s proponents described the experiment, “We had a very modern, sixties attitude towards what an urban university should be. We thought it should provide skills and philosophies that would help resolve the urban problem. Of course it didn’t. But the buildings reflected that effort.”

The favorite example is a program like Leave it to Beaver, which may have presented an idealistic view of family life in the ‘50s, but which remained recognizable to most people, and which had many aspects that were attainable to the average American family. In the same way that pre-Brutalist architecture gave us buildings that guided the eye upward, presenting their beauty in an aspirational sense, television of the ‘50s and ‘60s lifted viewers up, rather than pressing them down. In addition to their messages, which I’ll get to in the next paragraph or so, there was the sheer beauty of late-‘60s programming, the vividness of the palate in the wake of the transfer to all-color programming. The lighting may have been unrealistically bright, the colors themselves might have lacked decorating sense, but there was something celebratory about them, something that doesn’t come through in the more naturalistic cinematography that’s used today. And, as we know, “naturalism,” along with “functionality,” is a word and a philosophy closely associated with Brutalism. But television of the ‘50s and ‘60s didn’t necessarily have to be functional in an intellectual or philosophical sense, just in the way in which it served its dual purposes of attracting viewers and selling products.

So far the analogy has worked primarily in an aesthetic sense, because both television and architecture are visual media. Pre-Brutalist architecture celebrated that aesthetic pleasure, in the same way that pre-Brutalist television tended not to emphasize the ugly side of life. In fact, though, Brutalism is not just a visual style of architecture, but a philosophical as well; buildings that, according to Lileks, “were technocratic machines for making technocrats and social scientists.” He’s talking about college campuses, where Brutalism was a big hit, but he could be talking about business as well. He continues: “It is possible to be rational and beautiful, but there’s always a certain type of pinched soul drained of wit who distrusts beauty: it cozens and seduces you from the true goal, which is usually some sociopolitical objective.” Again, he’s talking about architecture, but he could just as well be talking about modern television. The aspirational ideal of pre-Brutalist television exists, not just aesthetically, but as a link to the past. The Honeymooners sent the message that success was possible for the lower middle-class. The moral of the story in Dragnet was that crime didn’t pay. Perry Mason presented a man dedicated to preserving the integrity of the legal system and the defense of the innocent. Countless comedies and dramas gave us a nuclear family that could at least give one hope that the thorniest problems could be solved if a family was determined to solve them. Even a show like The Beverly Hillbillies, derisively dismissed though it may have been, could reassure viewers that wealth didn’t have to corrupt the average man. These were all themes that were part of the American psyche, that - to use a cliche - had been passed down from generation to generation in their familiarity.

Shows such as these still exist, but many of them have an additional flavor thrown in, a sense of cynicism that, at its best, does not flatter it, and at its worst, degrades and offends a large segment of the public with its abrupt divorce from the past. We shouldn’t be surprised by this; One of the characteristics of Brutalist architects, writes Lileks, is that many of them typify “a certain type of pinched soul drained of wit who distrusts beauty: it cozens and seduces you from the true goal, which is usually some sociopolitical objective.” The humor of today’s shows, for example, takes many forms, but a genuine wit is seldom one of them. Its primary characteristic is snark and ridicule, which it employs relentlessly in support of its underlying message of tolerance and freedom of expression – or, as some might put it, libertinism. Often, to accept the humor of a given situation, one is forced to accept also the premise which the program tries to present. With Friends, for instance, the premise was that sex is “no big deal”, and only if you conceded that premise did the humor become natural. Modern Family presents homosexuality as “no big deal,” and if shows like this ever think to portray characters who have trouble reconciling this lifestyle with their own moral values, it’s only done with the proviso that those moral values have to be presented as being wrong.

Dramas carry their own agenda, predictably a liberal one. You might recall that a few weeks ago I wrote about the problems ‘70s television had in portraying the drug crisis, and how much of that challenge revolved around ideology.* So it is with television today, especially in its ability to create programing that “flyover” territory can identify with. Considering how over 90% of people in the industry profess a liberal political agenda, it’s only natural. It does, however, transform television from a medium of entertainment (and commerce) to one that favors and advocates a distinct ideological way of thinking and behaving.

*One reason why I’ve tended to limit the pre-Brutalist era of television to the ‘50s and ‘60s; this is not to say, however, that the Brutalist aesthetic had infiltrated programming of the ‘70s and ‘80s to the extent that it has today. It didn’t. However, it would be foolish to suggest that Brutalism simply sprung up out of nowhere, and I think the ‘70s is a good place to look

Everything from police procedurals to legal dramas are filled with this weary cynicism, which again is implicit in the Brutalist style. As Lileks writes, “[Y]ou might think its example was enough to put everyone off the idea for the rest of human civilization.” Just as the Brutalist landscape leaves you thinking that it "looks like a place for a robed, mutated council to pronounce sentence on a man from the irradiated outlands," Brutalist television can leave one with that crushing feeling. Lileks, in another column, has it just right: "The very thing that makes modern TV so different from old rote TV with its one-off eps and no continuity is the same thing that makes it feel like a duty some times." And this makes sense: after all, being forced to sit in school and learn what's good for you often feels like a duty, and as we've seen, Brutalism tried to impart that same kind of aesthetic medicine. The Brutalist message is thus: "If we have curved, meandering paths and different styles of buildings, the students we produce will have minds so accustomed to disorder they will hesitate to shoot the proletariat when - I mean, they will be unable to properly grasp the need for theories that shape the masses for the betterment of all!" In other words, let's make it easy for the viewers to understand the proper feelings, emotions, opinions.

This is an imperfect analogy, of course; all analogies are, and any one of you can probably come up with examples of current television shows that fail to fit neatly into this comparison, or contradict it completely*, as well as dozens of shows from the '50s and '60s that don't even rise to the level of crap. It's also an imperfect example of - well, I won't call it scholarship, because it fails the academic standards of research that would be required to classify it as such. It's an opinion piece, albeit a well-reasoned one, if I do say so myself. But then, I never claimed this site to be a scholarly one. If I took the time to research everything I wrote, there might be fewer mistakes and more sophisticated theories - but there'd also be about half the number of pieces, and I don't really think you'd like that, do you? By the time this makes it to the book, combined with other essays comparing past and present television, I suspect I'll have had the opportunity to flesh it out a little more.

*And let's face it, everyone enjoys a little Brutality once in a while,he says as he watches the end of "For a Few Dollars More." But then, Clint hardly seems to exhibit the world-weariness that so many of today's television stars show.

At any rate, I think it makes for a compelling argument. And you remember how, at the beginning, I said that perhaps it wasn't so ironic after all that the Brutalist era of architecture coincided with the least Brutalist era of television? Recall that as Lileks writes, those Brutalist-designed campuses were intended to be "technocratic machines," and recall also that those students who were products of that education are probably the showrunners and scriptwriters of today. Coincidence?

As usual, we have some very good articles to read this week. I'm constantly impressed by the high quality of writing out there, and the thoughtfulness (not to mention creativity) displayed by so many of these authors. That's why I like to do this roundup every week, and believe me when I say I just scratch the surface - there are just as many good ones that I don't write about; if I did, I wouldn't have time to do much else!

The Broadcasting Archives at the University of Maryland has some great info (and pictures) on Joey Bishop’s talk show from the late ‘60s. As I’ve mentioned before, contrary to what most people think today, Bishop really did give Carson a run, until Johnny put the strongarm on guests to keep them from appearing on the Bishop show.

Network is one of those movies (like A Man For All Seasons) that I didn’t really “get” the first time around, but I’ve come to appreciate both of them since. In Network’s case, it’s a razor-sharp satire of the television industry, witty while still managing to make its devastating points. Realweegiemidget takes a closer look at the movie, which I don’t think could be done today – not because TV doesn’t deserve satirizing, but because too much of what happens in Paddy Chayefsky’s Oscar-winning script seems too plausible!

Great news from Vote For Bob Crane, announcing the debut of their new podcast— The Bob Crane Show: Reloaded. This podcast, hosted by Eric Senich and based on Carol Ford’s Bob Crane: The Definitive Biography (2015), will explore the life and times of Bob Crane. The link includes the first podcast, with future announcements as more episodes become available.

Silver Scenes has a fantastic list of Easter- and other religious-themed movies for the season; even though Easter has passed, there’s always next year – and after all, a movie like Ben-Hur is good for any time of the year!

Back in the day, the Twilight Zone episode "The Fugitive" always made me a bit uneasy. The idea of a young alien king, in the guise of old-timer J. Pat O'Malley, befriending a young girl who suffers at the hands of an abusive aunt - well, that part is OK, but then whisking her to his home planet where she'll grow up to be his bride, that struck me as a bit creepy. The Twilight Zone Vortex doesn't mention that particular apprehension, but their review of the episode leaves little doubt that it's not one of the series' better endeavors.

I ask you: how could you possibly pass up a title like "None of This Crap Works"? If I had a dollar for every time I've said that, I'd be a rich man. At Comfort TV, David uses the phrase to describe his frustrations with streaming video, internet problems - all crap that doesn't work. (Come to think if it, this really does sound like me.) That may be what we're left with, though, if the classic TV DVD market continues to dry up. (David also makes some very interesting observations about the series he struggled to stream, Netflix's 13 Reasons Why.

Cult TV Blog takes me back to an Avengers episode that people either love or hate - "Small Game for Big Hunters." John and I see eye-to-eye on this - we think it's a good episode, and it stands as a reminder once again of why it's important to take a show in the context of the times from which it comes, and to look at that show in terms of what it can tell the viewer about those times.

That should do it for the time being; I'll try and keep up with everyone with my own efforts tomorrow.

We've skipped ahead in time to the late '70s, and moved south to Atlanta, in search of television's past. Who knew that television itself was looking for the same thing?

It's a two-hour CBS News Special Thursday evening (9:00 pm. ET) entitled "When Television Was Young," and unlike many of today's shows about "pioneers of television," this one stays firmly rooted in the 1950's, when the medium really was young. It's hosted by Charles Kuralt, the perfect choice for a retrospective that combines history and nostalgia, looking at an imperfect era with an often romantic hue. We see the great triumphs of early television: series like I Love Lucy, The Honeymooners, and Ed Sullivan, landmark anthology dramas from "Requiem for a Heavyweight" to "Twelve Angry Men," stars such as Paul Newman, Jack Lemmon, Grace Kelly and James Dean, and memorable moments from a time when baseball really was the National Pastime.

However - and you knew there has to be one of those - there are also the dark times: the blacklist, the Army-McCarthy hearings, the Korean War, and the Quiz Show Scandal. Although the decade is remembered for serious, intense dramas, there's also a fair share of interference from advertisers and network executives, who often demand changes in the scripts: minor ones, such as a coffee sponsor objecting to characters drinking tea, and major ones, dealing with significant social issues such as race and sex. Some will seem silly, while others - Southern stations refusing to air programs with black entertainers - are appalling.

Ultimately, it is what it is, and that's what history's all about. It's critical that television remembers its own roots, even if many of today's viewers have no idea about it, or the people who created it. But then, if TV doesn't care, why should anyone else? Fortunately, this show exists in its entirety on YouTube; here's part one as a sample, and you can take it from there.

◊ ◊ ◊

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.

Hey, what a treat! I can't remember the last time we did this - well, I could look it up, but that would just delay the excitement! Let's see what our shows have in store for us...

Kirshner: The Average White Band, Ray Barretto, David Soul, comic Tom Dressen, and the Mime Company.

Special: British rock is the theme of a show featuring Elton John, Rod Stewart, Fleetwood Mac, Genesis, Electric Light Orchestra, and Queen.

Do you even have to ask? The only reason I'd even hesitate is that for so many years, Tom Dressen opened for Frank Sinatra, and you don't want to disappoint The Chairman. But let's face it: this week there's no comparison, which makes it a special night for The Special - winner by a landslide.

◊ ◊ ◊
Continuing with music, some interesting variety specials this week, a genre you don't see much anymore; you can still see concerts with stars like Adele and Lady Gaga, especially (but not exclusively) on HBO or Showtime, but not shows with the traditional Bob Hope-type format. On ABC Saturday night, Paul Lynde gets an hour of his own (8:00 p.m.), a traditional set up with musical guests and comedy skits. Paul's guests are Cloris Leachman, Tony Randall, LeVar Burton, and K.C. and the Sunshine Band, and Paul does a comic monologue about an encounter with an unfriendly alien...

On Monday night at 10:00 p.m, ABC's back as Paul Anka hosts an hour with Natalie Cole and Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band, plus cameos from Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Ann-Margaret, Dean Martin, Don Rickles, and others (singing special lyrics to "My Way."). It's mostly Anka singing his hits from through the years, and he's got plenty of them.

SOURCE: HADLEY TV GUIDES

NBC follows up with back-to-back country-flavored specials on Tuesday; the first, at 9:00 p.m., starring the aforementioned "Ann-Margaret. . .Rhinestone Cowgirl." While you let that image sink in for a minute, I'll mention that the special, taped at the Grand Ole Opry, includes appearances by Bob Hope (of course!), Perry Como, Chet Atkins, and Minnie Pearl. That's followed at 10:00 p.m. by an hour with Mac Davis, and his special guests Tom Jones, Dolly Parton, and Donna Summer, and 84-year-old Memphis guitarist Furry Lewis.

Elsewhere, George Burns co-stars with Abbe Lane in a special taped by the BBC in 1975 and airing on WXIA at 10:00 p.m. Thursday. One of the things for which I'm grateful to classic television is the chance to see Burns in his prime, because by this time he's in what I'd call his "Dirty Old Man" phase, with Brooke Shields or some other comely young thing on his arm while he does a little singing and a little more leering. Quite frankly, I didn't much like that George Burns; the Burns of Burns and Allen, on the other hand, is a lot more fun.*

*Although from the stories we read, that Burns had a wondering eye (and hand) as well.

Whereas variety shows were all the rage just a decade ago, most of them are syndicated now and, like the Ann-Margaret/Mac Davis shows, are of the country variety: Buck Owens, Porter Wagoner, Pop Goes the Country, That Good Ole Nashville Music, and Nashville on the Road all run consecutively on WTCG Saturday night, and that doesn't even include Hee Haw and Dolly Parton. (Note how these shows all feature some of the biggest country stars around.) And then there's the one last big network show, Carol Burnett, Saturday at 10:00 p.m. Carol's guest is a pretty big star himself, in stature if not size: Sammy Davis., Jr.

◊ ◊ ◊

Baseball season is now in full swing, but the year’s biggest play didn’t happen on the diamond, or even a front office. It occurred, instead, in a board room, where on December 23, 1975, arbitrator Peter Seitz ruled in favor of players Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally in a case challenging baseball’s reserve clause, the provision in the standard contract that allowed teams to “reserve” the rights to players even after their contracts had expired. After the appeals process had played itself out, with the owners finally conceding defeat after losing in the federal courts, Major League Baseball and the Players Association sat down and negotiated the terms of free agency, with the result that many players chose to play the 1976 season without a contract, preferring to test the free agency waters after the season.

The 1977 season will be the first contested in this new environment, and the effect this will have on the game, both short- and long-term, is the subject of Tuesday's CBS Reports special, "The Baseball Business," airing at 10:00 p.m. Fans aren't so naïve as to think baseball isn't a business, of course, not with the strike from a few seasons ago; nonetheless, "free agents, player agents, million-dollar bonuses and long-term contracts" are guaranteed to change the way the game is played, and the way fans, players and owners see it. For this report, correspondent Bill Moyers travels to spring training to look at the team "many have singled out as the most flagrant practitioner of checkbook baseball" - and if you think that team is any other than the New York Yankees, you've got another think coming.

In other sports, Saturday at 3:30 p.m. ABC presents professional bowling's most prestigious event, the Firestone Tournament of Champions from Akron, Ohio. I loved watching the Pro Bowlers Tour when I was a kid; after we moved back from The World's Worst Town™, one of life's simple pleasures was reintroducing myself to the sport and my old favorites, while quickly picking up on new stars. Mike Berlin comes out on top, defeating Mike Durbin in the final match. CBS has an NBA playoff doubleheader on Sunday afternoon, and WTCG has syndicated coverage of the NHL playoffs Sunday night at 8:00 p.m. Oh, and WTCG also has the Braves - of course - taking on the Cardinals Friday night at 8:30 p.m.

◊ ◊ ◊

Here's a real collector's item - an article about Bruce Jenner in which the phrase "sex change" is nowhere to be found. The only transformation to be found is the one Jenner's making from track and field to the broadcasting booth with ABC, a challenge Jenner approaches the same way he did when he was in competition: "It may be a good idea," he tells Melvin Durslag. "But I first have to believe it myself, and that's what I'm trying to do."

The son of a tree surgeon, Jenner was an excellent all-around athlete in school, but he didn't try track until he was 20, and didn't get into the decathlon until 1970. Six years later, he won the gold medal at the Montreal Olympics, setting a world record in the process. He admits that his dedication to preparing for the Games put a strain on his marriage, but he hopes that giving up the competitive world of sports will make a new man out of him, and heal the divisions - for the time being, at least. (They divorce in 1981.) Now that he's made himself over, Jenner hopes to start an acting career as well, and as this article is being written, he's won a small part in a movie called - SST - Death Flight.

ABC is bullish on Jenner's future, but as Durslag notes, the athletes most successful at making the transition from the playing field to the broadcast booth - Frank Gifford, Pat Summerall - did so only after long hours of preparation and worth, and the ability to win over their non-athlete colleagues. Concludes Durslag, "[Jenner] has an incredible personality. This will carry him for a while. But how far he goes from there will be up to him." One thing's for sure - as is the case with any former jock, a new life awaits Bruce Jenner.

◊ ◊ ◊
Thanks in large part to the local stations, we have a top-notch slate of movies in this pre-movie channel era. Not so with the ABC Sunday Night Movie, alas, at least according to Judith Crist. That movie, For a Few Dollars More*, represents "the sadism of allegedly adult adventure,""the kind of fun you can find at your neighborhood abattoir." That's more than a bit harsh when describing what's become something of a modern classic, but then, as I remember, she never did like Clint. Or Charles Bronson, for that matter. She opts, instead, for A Boy Named Charlie Brown, the 1969 feature-length Peanuts film being shown Friday night on CBS. It's on up against ABC's Friday night effort, "a silly but slanderous view" of cruise ships: The Love Boat. No suggestion that it's destined for long-run success.

*Which, ironically, I was watching while writing Wednesday's Brutalism piece.

No, the big movies this week are home-grown. On Saturday night's Late Movie, WXIA presents the Oscar-winning From Here to Eternity, with Burt Lancaster, Deborah Kerr, and Frank Sinatra. Monday night WGTV, the PBS channel in Atlanta, has a most un-PBS like movie, the 1943 Howard Hughes epic The Outlaw, starring Jane Russell's breasts. Chattanooga's WTVC gets in the act on Tuesday night, with "a TV-edited version" of the 1970 Best Picture, Midnight Cowboy. Come on guys, it's on at 11:30 p.m. - do you really need to show a bowdlerized version? Wednesday night, WTCG offers the 1964 version of Ernest Hemingway's The Killers, anchored by a terrific Lee Marvin performance, with Angie Dickinson and Ronald Reagan (in his last movie role), and Thursday night this proto-TCM follows up with the eerie, disturbing On the Beach, with Gregory Peck, Ava Gardner, and Fred Astaire.

◊ ◊ ◊
It's been an unusually program-centric review of TV Guide this week, no? And we've barely scratched the surface - for example, on Sunday night, part 15 of Upstairs, Downstairs (9:00 p.m., PBS) takes us to the Great Depression of 1929, when James and Rose are both wiped out by the stock market crash. Not to mention Tom Snyder's week in Chicago with The Tomorrow Show, and a lineup that includes Bill Veeck, Paul Harvey, Studs Terkel, and Fran Allison. And then there's that Monday night Tonight Show where Johnny's guest is Orson Welles! Don't tell me these '70s issues are starting to rub off...

This week offers some interesting program choices - so interesting, in fact, that there's a little something to say about all of our stations. The area covered includes both Atlanta and Chattanooga, Tennessee, and it should have a little something for everyone. Have a look and enjoy!

*WSB, Channel 2 (NBC)* *Morning*
*06:00a*	Film (Navy)
*06:30a*	*Arthur Smith*
*07:00a*	*Today*
*09:00a*	*The Hollywood Squares* (Steve Martin, George Gobel, Paul Lynde, Robert Fuller, Rose Marie, Roddy McDowall, Mac Davis, Stefanie Powers, Lynda Day George)
*09:30a*	*Name that Tune*
*10:00a*	*Sanford and Son*
*10:30a*	*Today in Georgia*
*11:00a*	*Wheel of Fortune*
*11:30a*	*Shoot for the Stars* (guests Tony Randall, Vicki Lawrence)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	News (local)
*12:30p*	*Divorce Court*
*01:00p*	*Liar’s Club* (Betty White, Will Gear, Rue McClanahan, Larry Hovis)
*01:30p*	*Days of Our Lives*
*02:30p*	*The Doctors*
*03:00p*	*Another World*
*04:00p*	*Doris Day*
*04:30p*	*The Odd Couple*
*05:00p*	*The FBI*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*07:00p*	*NBC Nightly News* (John Chancellor and David Brinkley)
*07:30p*	*The $100,000 Name That Tune*
*08:00p*	Movie – “Marooned”
*10:00p*	To Be Announced
*11:00p*	News (local)
*11:30p*	*The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson* (guests Helen Reddy, Dr. Paul Ehrlich, David Sayh)
*01:00a*	*Tomorrow* (guest Paul Harvey)
*02:00a*	News (local)

The 8:00 p.m. movie "Marooned" is a local broadcast, preempting the regular NBC primetime schedule, which includes Grizzly Adams - I don't know why that wouldn't have been more popular down south. They also preempt The Gong Show - what's wrong with this channel?

*WRCB, Channel 3 (Chattanooga) (NBC)* *Morning*
*06:25a*	*Romper Room*
*06:55a*	*News for Little People*
*07:00a*	*Today*
*09:00a*	*The 700 Club*
*10:00a*	*Sanford and Son*
*10:30a*	*The Hollywood Squares* (Rich Little, Paul Lynde, Rose Marie, Roddy McDowell, MacKenzie Phillips, LeVar Burton, Darleen Carr, George Gobel, Gabriel Kaplan)
*11:00a*	*Wheel of Fortune*
*11:30a*	*Shoot for the Stars* (Tony Randall, Vicki Lawrence)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Bewitched*
*12:30p*	*Midday Live*
*01:00p*	*The Gong Show*
*01:30p*	*Days of Our Lives*
*02:30p*	*The Doctors*
*03:00p*	*Another World*
*04:00p*	*The Archies*
*04:30p*	*The Three Stooges/The Little Rascals* (B&W)
*05:25p*	*News for Little People*
*05:30p*	*Batman*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*NBC Nightly News* (John Chancellor and David Brinkley)
*07:00p*	*The Liar’s Club*
*07:30p*	*The Partridge Family*
*08:00p*	*The Life and Times of Grizzly Adams*
*09:00p*	Movie – “The Savage Bees” (special)
*11:00p*	News (local)
*11:30p*	*The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson* (guests Helen Reddy, Dr. Paul Ehrlich, David Sayh)
*01:00a*	*Tomorrow* (guest Paul Harvey)

As I mentioned on Saturday, Paul Harvey's appearance on Tomorrow is part of Tom Snyder's week in Chicago. I remember when shows used to do this kind of thing more often, but it only works if your guests are part of the fabric of the city you're visiting. Outside of New York and Hollywood, Chicago has perhaps the greatest television heritage of any city in America.

*WAGA, Channel 5 (CBS)* *Morning*
*06:30a*	*Sunrise Semester (Teaching the Learning Disabled)*
*07:00a*	*CBS Morning News with Bruce Morton and Hughes Rudd*
*08:00a*	*Captain Kangaroo* (guest Peggy Cass)
*09:00a*	*Phil Donahue*
*10:00a*	*Double Dare*
*10:30a*	*The Price is Right*
*11:30a*	*Love of Life*
*11:55a*	*CBS News* (Douglas Edwards)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	News (local)
*12:30p*	*Search for Tomorrow*
*01:00p*	*The Young and the Restless*
*01:30p*	*As the World Turns*
*02:30p*	*The Guiding Light*
*03:00p*	*All in the Family*
*03:30p*	*Bewitched*
*04:00p*	*Adam-12*
*04:30p*	*Mike Douglas* (co-host Tamara Dobson, guests Darilyn Dobson, Sterling Hayden, Victoria Fyodorova, Kenny Nolan)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*07:00p*	*CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite*
*07:30p*	*Cross-Wits* (Jonathan Harris, Alice Ghostley, Gregory Sierra, Sally Ann Howes)
*08:00p*	*Good Times*
*08:30p*	*Loves Me, Loves Me Not*
*09:00p*	*CBS Wednesday Night Movies –* “El Condor”
*11:00p*	News (local)
*11:30p*	*CBS Late Movie* – “The Keegans”
*01:05a*	News (local)

The CBS Late Movie feature is "The Keegans," a movie about a professional football player who's a suspect in a murder case. Yeah, like anybody's going to believe that could happen.

*WGTV, Channel 8 (PBS)* *Afternoon*
*03:00p*	*Through All Time*
*03:30p*	*Studio See*
*04:00p*	*Sesame Street*
*05:00p*	*Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood*
*05:30p*	*Sesame Street*
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*Zoom*
*07:00p*	*Classic Theatre Preview*
*07:30p*	*Folk Guitar with Laura Weber*
*08:00p*	*Nova*
*09:00p*	*Theater in America –* “The Prince of Homburg”
*11:00p*	Movie – “The Outlaw” (B&W)

I might have thought WGTV would have more on today - perhaps the daytime schedule was filled with classroom programming.

*WTVC, Channel 9 (Chattanooga) (ABC)* *Morning*
*06:55a*	*Funtime*
*07:25a*	*New Tomorrow*
*07:30a*	*Good Morning America*
*09:00a*	*Phil Donahue* (guest B.B. King)
*10:00a*	*Room 222*
*10:30a*	*The Edge of Night*
*11:00a*	*Happy Days*
*11:30a*	*Family Feud*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Second Chance*
*12:30p*	*Ryan’s Hope*
*01:00p*	*All My Children*
*02:00p*	*The $20,000 Pyramid* (Dick Cavett, Adrienne Barbeau)
*02:30p*	*One Life to Live*
*03:15p*	*General Hospital*
*04:00p*	*Leave it to Beaver* (B&W)
*04:30p*	*The Beverly Hillbillies* (B&W)
*05:00p*	*The Brady Bunch*
*05:30p*	*Andy Griffith* (B&W)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*ABC Evening News with Harry Reasoner and Barbara Walters*
*07:00p*	*My Three Sons*
*07:30p*	*Family Affair*
*08:00p*	*The Bionic Woman*
*09:00p*	*Baretta*
*10:00p*	*Charlie’s Angels*
*11:00p*	News (local)
*11:30p*	*The Rookies*
*12:40a*	*Mystery of the Week –* “The Two Deaths of Sean Dolittle”

I was pretty shaken when I saw the title of the Mystery of the Week movie until I remembered that Dr. Dolittle's first name is John. Just a case of mistaken identity - whew.

*WXIA, Channel 11 (ABC)* *Morning*
*06:30a*	*Not for Women Only*
*07:00a*	*Good Morning America*
*09:00a*	*Merv Griffin* (guests Paul Anka, Kelly Monteith, Fred Travalena, Deniece Williams, Ken Edwards)
*10:30a*	*The Edge of Night*
*11:00a*	*Happy Days*
*11:30a*	*Family Feud*
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	News (local)
*12:30p*	*Ryan’s Hope*
*01:00p*	*All My Children*
*02:00p*	*The $20,000 Pyramid* (Dick Cavett, Adrienne Barbeau)
*02:30p*	*One Life to Live*
*03:15p*	*General Hospital*
*04:00p*	*Bonanza*
*05:00p*	*Emergency One!*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*ABC Evening News with Harry Reasoner and Barbara Walters*
*07:00p*	*Concentration*
*07:30p*	*To Tell the Truth* (Hugh Downs, Peggy Cass, Bill Cullen, Kitty Carlisle)
*08:00p*	*The Bionic Woman*
*09:00p*	*Baretta*
*10:00p*	*Charlie’s Angels*
*11:00p*	News (local)
*11:30p*	*Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman*
*12:00a*	*The Rookies*
*01:10a*	*The Protectors*

The Protectors was a Gerry Anderson live-action series, as opposed to his better-known Supermarionation efforts. It stars Robert Vaughn, who my many accounts was pretty difficult to work with in this British series. The Man From U.N.C.L.E. it ain't.

*WDEF, Channel 12 (Chattanooga) (CBS)* *Morning*
*05:55a*	*Farm Report*
*06:30a*	*Morning Show*
*08:00a*	*CBS Morning News with Bruce Morton and Hughes Rudd*
*09:00a*	*Captain Kangaroo* (guest Peggy Cass)
*10:00a*	*Double Dare*
*10:30a*	*The Price is Right*
*11:30a*	*Love of Life*
*11:55a*	*CBS News* (Douglas Edwards)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	News (local)
*12:30p*	*Search for Tomorrow*
*01:00p*	*The Young and the Restless*
*01:30p*	*As the World Turns*
*02:30p*	*The Guiding Light*
*03:00p*	*All in the Family*
*03:30p*	*Match Game ’77* (Richard Dawson, Charles Nelson Reilly, Patti Deutsch, Arlene Francis, Nipsey Russell, Brett Somers)
*04:00p*	*Tattletales* (Charles Nelson Reilly and Elizabeth Allen, Gary Mule Deer and Debra Winger, Alan Hamel and Suzanne Somers)
*04:30p*	*Merv Griffin* (guest Charles Nelson Reilly, young opera artists)
*05:55p*	*Paul Harvey*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	News (local)
*06:30p*	*CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite*
*07:00p*	*Gunsmoke*
*08:00p*	*Good Times*
*08:30p*	*Loves Me, Loves Me Not*
*09:00p*	*CBS Wednesday Night Movies –* “El Condor”
*11:00p*	News (local)
*11:30p*	*CBS Late Movie* – “The Keegans”

I don't think I've ever seen this before - starting at 3:30 p.m., there are three consecutive shows featuring Charles Nelson Reilly. Talk about being everywhere!

*WTCG, Channel 17 (Ind.)* *Morning*
*05:35a*	*World at Large*
*06:10a*	News (local)
*06:30a*	*Romper Room*
*07:00a*	*The Three Stooges and the Little Rascals* (B&W)
*08:00a*	*Lassie*
*08:30a*	*Leave it to Beaver* (B&W)
*09:00a*	*Hazel*
*09:30a*	*The Lucy Show*
*10:00a*	Movie – “Sitting Pretty” (B&W)
*Afternoon*
*12:00p*	*Perry Mason* (B&W)
*01:00p*	Movie – “23 Paces to Baker Street”
*03:00p*	*The Flintstones*
*03:30p*	*The Archies*
*04:00p*	*The New Mickey Mouse Club*
*04:30p*	*Gilligan’s Island*
*05:00p*	*Family Affair*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*The Beverly Hillbillies*
*06:30p*	*Andy Griffith* (B&W)
*07:00p*	*Gomer Pyle, USMC*
*07:30p*	*Hogan’s Heroes*
*08:00p*	*Night Gallery*
*08:30p*	*Night Gallery*
*09:00p*	Movie – “The Killers”
*11:00p*	*All That Glitters*
*11:30p*	Movie – “Master of the World”
*01:25a*	Movie – “Rogue River”
*03:00a*	News (local)
*03:30a*	Movie – “Shack Out on 101” (B&W)

A double-feature of Night Gallery followed by "The Killers" makes for a pretty good night's entertainment if you ask me.

*WETV, Channel 30 (PBS)* *Morning*
*09:00a*	*Sesame Street*
*10:00a*	*The Electric Company*
*10:30a*	*Infinity Factory*
*Afternoon*
*01:00p*	*Big Blue Marble*
*04:00p*	*Sesame Street*
*05:00p*	*Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood*
*05:30p*	*The Electric Company*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Zoom*
*06:30p*	*Villa Alegre*
*07:00p*	*DeKalb Cancer Society*
*07:30p*	*The MacNeil/Lehrer Report*
*08:00p*	*Georgia Forums*
*09:00p*	*The Pallisers*
*10:00p*	*Anywhat*
*10:30p*	*World in Action*
*11:00p*	*Anyone for Tennyson?*
*11:30p*	*Captioned ABC Evening News*

That captioned ABC news was a PBS feature for many years beginning in 1973 and running for a decade, until real-time captioning became a reality.

*WATL, Channel 36 (Ind.)* *Afternoon*
*05:00p*	*Entertainment Page*
*05:30p*	*Entertainment Page*
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*Lovers and Friends*
*07:00p*	Movie – “The Two Kennedys”
*09:30p*	*Reflections*
*10:00p*	*The PTL Club*

Following the 7:00 p.m. movie, Channel 36 opens their phone lines for questions and comments from viewers regarding "The Two Kennedys," a European documentary on the assassinations of Jack and Bobby. I suspect that movie traffics heavily on conspiracy theories.

*WTCI, Channel 45 (Chattanooga) (PBS)* *Morning*
*08:30a*	*Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood*
*11:30a*	*Sesame Street*
*Afternoon*
*01:30p*	*The Electric Company*
*03:30p*	*Lilias, Yoga and You*
*04:00p*	*Sesame Street*
*05:00p*	*Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood*
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Zoom*
*06:30p*	*Overmountain People*
*07:00p*	*Food Stamps*
*07:30p*	*The MacNeil/Lehrer Report*
*08:00p*	*Nova*
*09:00p*	*Theater in America –* “The Prince of Homburg”

I've seen Lilas, Yoga and You in these TV Guide listings for years - it began on Cincinnati's PBS station in 1970 and continued nationally until 1999, during which time 500 episodes were produced.

*WHAE, Channel 46 (Ind.)* *Morning*
*06:45a*	News (local)
*07:00a*	*Cartoon Festival*
*07:30a*	*The Lone Ranger*
*08:00a*	*Mighty Mouse*
*08:30a*	*Deputy Dawg*
*09:00a*	*Heckle and Jeckle*
*09:30a*	*Dennis the Menace* (B&W)
*10:00a*	*Mister Ed* (B&W)
*10:30a*	*The Rock*
*11:00a*	*Charisma*
*11:30a*	*The 700 Club*
*Afternoon*
*01:00p*	*Wagon Train* (B&W)
*02:00p*	*Magilla Gorilla*
*02:30p*	*Huck and Yogi*
*03:00p*	*Popeye and Porky Pig*
*04:00p*	*Superman*
*04:30p*	*Batman*
*05:00p*	*The Brady Bunch*
*05:30p*	*McHale’s Navy*
*Evening*
*06:30p*	*The Rifleman* (B&W)
*07:00p*	*The Big Valley*
*08:00p*	*The 700 Club*
*09:30p*	*The Rock*
*10:00p*	*Acts 29*
*10:30p*	*Gerald Derstine Shares*
*11:00p*	*The Best of Groucho*
*11:30p*	*Mayberry R.F.D.*
*12:00a*	News (local)

Classic television nearly from beginning to end, with religious programming in prime time. What an odd combination, although it does tend to reinforce my belief in vintage TV as a near-religious experience.

*WRIP, Channel 61 (Chattanooga) (Ind.)* *Afternoon*
*02:50p*	*Dr. J. Harold Smith*
*02:55p*	*Hercules*
*03:00p*	*Word of God School*
*03:30p*	*Bozo’s Big Top*
*04:00p*	*Uncle Waldo*
*04:30p*	*Mike Douglas* (co-host Roy Clark, guests Buddy Greco, Bruce Dern, Jan Miner, Honey [Mrs. Lenny] Bruce)
*Evening*
*06:00p*	*Quest for Adventure*
*06:30p*	*Lassie*
*07:00p*	*Daytime/Nighttime*
*08:00p*	*Peter Marshall* (guests Rita Moreno, Ron Palillo, Jack Knight, Bill Saluga)
*09:30p*	Movie – “Cheer, Boys, Cheer” (B&W)
*11:00p*	*Dr. J. Harold Smith*

I've known about Peter Marshall's variety/talk show, but it seems as if I always forget about it until I'm reminded by seeing it again. I'd even forgotten about it between the time I saw it in this issue and when I got down here to type about it.

Worst of the worst

Chuck Barris, R.I.P.

This week in TV Guide: March 20, 1971

What's on TV? Wednesday, March 24, 1971

How technology changed television (and it's not necessarily how you think)

Around the dial

This week in TV Guide: April 4, 1998

What's on TV? Tuesday, April 7, 1998

TV Jibe: What cats really think about TV

Around the dial

This week in TV Guide: April 10, 1971

What's on TV? Saturday, April 10, 1971

Two from Trotta

Bishop Sheen, Good Friday, 1979

This week in TV Guide: April 15, 1972

What's on TV? Tuesday, April 18, 1972

The Brutalist era of television

Around the dial

This week in TV Guide: April 23, 1977

What's on TV? Wednesday, April 27, 1977