ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, November 11, 1996 TAG: 9611110123
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
As if scripted by T.S. Eliot, David Brinkley's last appearance as a headliner was more a whimper than a bang.
Brinkley's show Sunday, restrained and low-key, was a fitting coda to the 54-year news career of a television pioneer.
In the spare, understated style that has made him, well, David Brinkley, he stepped down as host of ABC's ``This Week With David Brinkley'' with an apology to President Clinton. Told as a homily, of course.
At the conclusion of ABC's election night coverage early Wednesday, Brinkley, 76, had labeled the president a ``bore'' and dryly remarked: ``We all look forward with great pleasure to four years of wonderful, inspiring speeches, full of wit, poetry, music, love and affection. [Clinton] has not a creative bone in his body.''
Sunday, in an interview taped Friday at the White House, Brinkley told Clinton: ``I'm reminded of something I wrote years ago. It may be impossible to be objective, I said, but we must always be fair. Well, after a long Election Day and seven hours on the set, what I said was both impolite and unfair. I'm sorry. I regret it.''
Clinton thanked Brinkley and accepted the apology with a smile, saying he had said things late at night when he was tired that he later regretted.
``I always believe you have to judge people on their whole work; and if you get judged based on your whole work, you come out way ahead,'' Clinton said.
After 15 years as patient Papa Bear to the unruly ``This Week'' family, Brinkley told viewers that he plans ``some changes in the next few weeks - nothing drastic - and I will still be here every week.'' (Translation: His noted com- mentaries will continue. On tape.)
In his classic halting cadence, Brinkley closed the show by reprising one of his favorite anecdotes, from the program of July 16, 1995, about a Utah man whose wife of 31/2 years turned out to be male.
``The husband said he never knew it,'' Brinkley said. ``People will wonder why not. The obvious question I will leave to your imagination. But I wonder why he was not suspicious when he watched his wife lather up her face and shave.
``The husband asked for a divorce on grounds of irreconcilable differences. Now, for all of us at ABC News, until next week when we will do a special 15th anniversary show, thank you.''
Sharing a set with Brinkley for 15 years ``is like playing right field with Joe DiMaggio at center,'' said George Will, a baseball enthusiast. ``The temptation is just to stand there and watch him. He makes it look easy, and it's not easy.''
Once the cameras stopped rolling Sunday, Brinkley and his ``This Week'' family - panelists Will, Sam Donaldson and Cokie Roberts, executive producer Dorrance Smith and several high-ranking network executives from New York - retired to the show's ``green room'' for cake and a champagne toast.
The party lasted just 20 minutes.
Proving, once again, the recent assessment of Brinkley by Reuven Frank, former NBC News president and producer of the groundbreaking ``Huntley-Brinkley Report'': ``Of all the people I worked with over 40 years, he knew when to shut up.''
The Associated Press contributed to this story.
LENGTH: Medium: 67 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: AP. President Clinton says goodbye to David Brinkley onby CNBFriday after a White House interview shown Sunday on Brinkley's last
day as host of his television show. color.