THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, March 4, 1995 TAG: 9503020085
SECTION: TELEVISION WEEK PAGE: 12 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LARRY BONKO, TELEVISION COLUMNIST
LENGTH: Long : 149 lines
GEORGE WENDT, who probably still hasn't paid his bar bill at Cheers, returns to work in prime time Wednesday night at 8 in a sitcom on CBS.
Kelsey Grammer from ``Cheers'' is still Frasier Crane on NBC's ``Frasier.'' But Wendt isn't Norm the accountant who nursed his beers on ``Cheers'' any longer.
In his new show, Wendt will be obliged to do more than park himself on a bar stool and trade one-liners with Sam Malone and Carla as he did for 11 seasons on NBC.
Since CBS named it ``The George Wendt Show,'' you know that Wendt is carrying a heavy load in this series about brothers who work on the radio giving tips to people with car trouble. Pat Finn is his co-star in the show, inspired by the ``Car Talk'' series on National Public Radio.
Cynthia Stevenson, who had a small role as Norm's secretary on ``Cheers'' before she landed on ``Bob'' with Bob Newhart, also returns to weekly television Thursday at 8:30 p.m. on NBC. In the sitcom ``Hope & Gloria,'' she works for a radio talk-show host played by Alan Thicke.
Great time slot. Right before ``Seinfeld.''
Talking to the TV press in Los Angeles recently, Stevenson said her character in the new series won't be much of a departure from the roles she played on ``Bob'' and ``Cheers,'' where she had a crush on Norm. ``I'll be some kind of a goof, which is fun to play. I'm that imperfect person who tries to look good but usually falls on her face.''
Once upon a time, there was one television season that began in September and ended in May. Then the networks created a ``second season'' starting in January. Now there is a ``third season'' in March as broadcasters scramble to hold viewers who are itching to pull the trigger on their remotes.
At least eight new network shows will premiere in March with more to come in April including a series on NBC starring Patty Duke and Debbie Allen. Four premieres are scheduled in the week to come.
In addition to ``The George Wendt Show'' on CBS and ``Hope & Gloria'' on NBC, Fox on Friday night at 8 brings out a series that is a perfect companion piece to the spooky ``The X-Files.'' Lori Singer stars in the science-fiction drama ``VR 5,'' which is about losing yourself in the world of virtual reality.
``You were in there! You had gone into a machine!'' one of Singer's suitably impressed friends tells her in the first episode. After computers, interactive TV, flight simulators, cyberspace and virtual reality, what's left to blow one's mind? A fifth level of virtual reality. ``VR 5.''
``The appeal of this show is that it is about escaping. Don't we all have something we want to escape from?'' Singer asked when she met TV reporters in Los Angeles.
Fox has scheduled two other series' debuts for March including ``Medicine Ball,'' a drama with a light touch about interns who work in a Seattle hospital, and ``The Great Defender.'' Both shows are a cut above what one expects to see on Fox, the network of sleaze.
In ``The Great Defender,'' which premieres Sunday at 7 p.m., Michael Rispoli plays an attorney who advertises for clients on TV and attracts an odd lot in his waiting room. In one episode, The Great Defender goes after a shipping tycoon who arranged to have a kidney stolen from an unwilling donor because he needed a transplant.
Think of this as a blue-collar ``L.A. Law.'' ``Medicine Ball'' starts March 13 in the Monday night time slot now occupied by the fast fading ``Models Inc.''
CBS on March 11 brings Valerie Harper back to sitcoms in ``The Office.'' On March 14, CBS premieres a drama, ``Under One Roof,'' in which James Earl Jones is featured as the head of a middle-class family in Seattle. Looks like TV producers have discovered Seattle.
Still to come from NBC this month is ``NewsRadio,'' a sitcom starring Phil Hartman that signs on March 21, and ``Pride & Joy,'' another situation comedy. This deals with three couples who are starting families. The first episode airs March 21.
ABC will put ``Bringing Up Jack'' on its schedule soon. No date set. Here's something new: A stand-up comedian (Jack Gallagher) starring in a sitcom. He's also cast as a radio guy.
Television, which has been properly accused of being a copy machine with rabbit ears, continues to turn out shows set in radio or TV. Look what Mary Tyler Moore started back there in the 1970s in the WJM-TV newsroom.
Bill Steinkellner, one of the ``Hope & Gloria'' executive producers, says it's no secret why he and other producers choose a setting in radio or TV to find laughs. ``It's an interesting environment, a perfect place to bring in guests and get their stories told,'' he said.
If not a radio or TV studio, it's a hospital. If not a hospital, it's a courtroom. Coming soon to CBS: another lawyer show, ``The Wright Verdicts.''
Also fine-tuning the Spring schedule is local United Paramount Network affiliate, WGNT in Portsmouth. The station will launch a new talk show hosted by Charles Perez Monday at 11 a.m. A week later, a talk show starring Richard Bey, seen locally in all his tasteless splendor on cable out of WWOR in New Jersey, will begin on Channel 27 at 1 p.m. Channel 27 will also carry ``The History of Rock 'n' Roll'' starting Wednesday at 8 p.m.
So much for the March adjusting and tweaking. What else does television have to offer in the days to come?
Two of the hottest young stars on television in George Clooney of ``ER'' and Courteney Cox of ``Friends'' will be among those handing out statuettes on ``The People's Choice Awards'' on CBS Sunday night at 9. Tim Daly and Annie Potts co-host host this bit of fluff that has been going on for 21 years.
Tommy Lee Jones stars in, directed and shared in writing the script for ``The Good Old Boys,'' a film that premieres on TNT Sunday night at 8. Jones plays an old time cowpoke named Hewey Calloway who is almost a dufus as tries to cope with civilization pushing back the Western frontier. Good work here by Sissy Spacek and Sam Shepard in supporting roles. . . . If you're a member of the ever-shrinking minority that can't get enough of Chevy Chase, behold Comedy Central's schedule on Sunday: Five hours of Chase on ``Saturday Night Live'' reruns starting at noon. . . . Master illusionist David Cooperfield guests on ``A Phyllis George Special'' Wednesday night at 8 on The Nashville Network. Maybe he'll make George's powder puff questions disappear.
Here's your chance to catch up on all the episodes involving the third gang of strangers thrown together to make a TV show on MTV. Starting Saturday at noon, it's seven hours of ``Real World III.'' The marathon starts all over again Sunday at 10 a.m. and runs to 8 p.m. . . . It isn't pretty, but ``Investigative Reports: Secrets of a Child Molester'' on A&E Friday night at 10 is a special worth seeing. It takes you inside the minds of those who prey on the young and helpless. This is the Ross Nelson story. . . . The bearded one will be featured on The Disney Channel Sunday night at 9 in ``Kenny Rogers: Going Home.'' Disney promises glimpses of Rogers' early career including his years as a member of a jazz trio, The Bobby Doyle Three.
As the budget cutters hack away at public broadcasting, PBS affiliate WHRO opens its annual spring membership drive today. That means special programming. Right off the bat, Channel 15 on Sunday reels off six hours of perhaps the best documentary series ever made about war, ``Victory at Sea.'' Tuesday night at 10, WHRO airs the program that users of personal computers have been waiting for ever since they unpacked their PCs at Christmastime. ``Internet Show: Driver Education for the Information Superhighway'' is scheduled for Tuesday night at 10.
The Family Channel revives the 10-hour miniseries ``Holocaust'' beginning Monday night at 8. See Meryl Streep before she became a superstar. . . . Catch The Eagles in their early years on VH-1 Saturday night at 8 and Sunday at 5 p.m. in ``The Eagles: Hell Freezes Over.'' On Saturday at 4:30 p.m., it's more vintage rock on VH-1 with ``Conversations with the Rolling Stones''. . . . The duel of ad campaigns between the makers of Wonderbra and Ultrabra will be examined among other image-making on a new Bravo series that begins Saturday at 6:30 p.m. ``Media Television'' examines the psychology of advertising. Is a single photo still worth a thousand words in the expanding universe of advertising? ILLUSTRATION: [Cover]
[Color Photos]
Annie Potts is a co-host for the People's Choice Awards, which air
Sunday night at 9 on CBS.
People's Choice nominee Jodie Foster for ``Nell.''
People's Choice nominee Sherry Stringfield for ``ER.''
Sissy Spacek stars in TNT's "The Good Old Boys," which premieres
Sunday night at 8.
by CNB