ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Saturday, October 19, 1996 TAG: 9610220111
SECTION: SPECTATOR PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: KNIGHT-RIDDER NEWSPAPERS
Early in the ABC movie ``Talk to Me,'' a veteran TV talk show executive producer lays down the law to her inexperienced junior producer.
``I want tears or a fight within the first segment,'' she says with the authority of an Air Force general ordering a bombing run.
The novice producer doesn't need to hear her boss say ``or else!'' It stands to reason she'd better deliver an explosive combination of guests or she'll be hung out to dry. She may be new, but she's smart enough to know she can't get anywhere in the world of TV talk without either cutting a few throats or feeling the cold edge of the knife at her own.
Hard-edged and cynical, ``Talk to Me'' is that rarest of all TV movie genres - the serious, socially critical drama that dares to find fault with the very industry that puts it on the air. It delivers a broadside against the exploitative nature of TV talk shows and zeroes in on the people who will do virtually anything to make sure their program stays competitive.
In this case, it involves a segment that brings prostitutes together on the air with the families they've disgraced and humiliated. As flamboyantly entertaining as the program turns out to be, it leads to a tragedy brought about almost entirely by the TV publicity.
Obviously inspired by the suicide of a man who believed he'd been humiliated by an episode of the real-life ``Jenny Jones'' talk show, ``Talk to Me'' suggests such shows have gone far beyond fairness and common decency into the realm of corrupted manipulation.
As it turns out, the film arrives after the talk-show world itself has reacted to the same tragic incident by veering sharply away from such exploitative material. Such talk-show veterans as Oprah Winfrey and Geraldo Rivera have reinvented their shows, while popular newcomers such as Rosie O'Donnell are taking the industry back to the variety/entertainment style that once dominated TV talk.
Still, ``Talk to Me'' retains its punch, thanks to a viciously entertaining performance by Veronica Hamel (``Hill Street Blues'') as hardhearted executive producer Sadie Burns. There also are convincing performances by Yasmine Bleeth (``Baywatch'') as conscience-stricken young producer Diane Shepherd; by Peter Scolari (``Bosom Buddies,'' ``Newhart'') as malleable host Howard Grant; and by Jenny Lewis as Kelly, the drug-addicted hooker whose life is destroyed by those who want to exploit her misery for either money or ratings.
The film's executive producer, Steve White, minces no words in explaining why he thought the TV industry needed to have this kind of mirror held up to it now. ``Talk shows have become like the Roman circus,'' he said. ``When we get our pleasure from watching other people degraded, it's really about the decline of our own civilization.
``Even though we consider this a cautionary tale, not a true story,'' said White, ``there's an amazing amount of true incidents in it - and the people in talk really do talk like that.''
Some in the TV talk business may wonder what gives an actress like Bleeth the right to criticize them when she built her reputation in ``Baywatch,'' a program noted for its own brand of exploitation - of the human body, both female and male. Bleeth thinks that's comparing apples and oranges.
```Baywatch' is pure fiction,'' she said. ``We're not trying to capitalize on people's real misfortunes. On a lot of these sensationalistic talk shows that's exactly what they're trying to do. I think there's a huge difference.''
Scolari believes the exploitative trend of TV talk probably goes back to the fact that soap operas once dominated the afternoon TV environment. He thinks the connection is that the soaps started daytime viewers on the habit of peeking into people's private lives.
At the heart of ``Talk to Me,'' though, is the notion that the business became so venal because too many people, like Bleeth's essentially decent character, make Faustian deals.
Hamel said actors are faced with Faustian bargains all the time. She was offered one of the roles in the original ``Charlie's Angels'' and turned it down because, ``It was a set and blow dry. I wanted to do more.'' But then she had to wait nearly five years for her shot at stardom as Joyce Davenport in ``Hill Street Blues.''
Bleeth said her own Faustian bargain may have been taking a role in ``Baywatch,'' knowing it might brand her as someone who ``ran around in a bathing suit.'' Like her character in ``Talk to Me,'' though, she has drawn a line she'll no longer cross: posing nude for magazines.
``I think everyone has a personal line [they won't cross],'' she said. ``That's what the characters in this movie show: what each individual person's breaking point is.''
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: Yasmine Bleeth (from left), Peter Scolari and Veronicaby CNBHamel star in ``Talk to Me,'' a behind-the-scenes-look at the
competitive world of talk shows, airing Sunday at 9 p.m. on
WSET-Channel 13. color