THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, September 9, 1996 TAG: 9609080272
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Bonko
LENGTH: 91 lines
WITH WTKR STARTING a news and talk show at 9 a.m., WAVY expanding its noon newscast to an hour, and WGNT opening its arms to syndicated gabbers Jerry Springer and Gordon Elliott, the face of local TV changes more than a little today.
True to a promise he made soon after The New York Times Co. bought Channel 3 last year, general manager Elden A. Hale Jr. continues to emphasize local coverage by scheduling the 9 a.m. hour (``News Channel 3 Live at 9'') co-hosted by Jane Gardner and Kurt Williams. The show will be re-run for this week only at 1 p.m.
Previously, Hale added early-morning weekend news to the local calendar.
No doubt feeling the pressure to keep up, WAVY today gives co-hosts Carolyn Castleberry and Don Roberts a full hour to cover local news, sports and weather from noon to 1.
And at WGNT, with a smidgen of local news (a half-hour recycled WTKR newscast) nightly at 10, and but three nights of programming from UPN, there is plenty of room on the schedule for syndicated shows.
Channel 27 today adds nine programs. Between now and Sept. 29, three other syndicated shows will join them to complete a WGNT face-lift that's more than a tuck here and there. The new look of WGNT Monday through Friday:
10 a.m. to noon - When WVBT (programmed by the WAVY management) cut loose Jerry Springer and Gordon Elliott, WGNT picked up their shows to run in this time period starting with Springer, who was mayor of Cincinnati when he was 33. On his Jan. 16 show, Springer is promising to show Zack Strenkert, the 18-month-old Goshen, N.Y., infant who weighs 70 pounds.
2 p.m. - ``In Person With Maureen O'Boyle.'' This is a show that will look and feel like a talk show (there will be a studio audience) but will deliver its product like a news magazine. The producers, who say the key word here is ``flexibility,'' give O'Boyle the tools to cover big, breaking news as well as 70-pound infants. O'Boyle, who has roots in North Carolina, knows this genre well after doing ``Extra'' and ``A Current Affair.''
4:30 p.m. - ``Bzzz!'' With ``Singled Out'' on MTV reviving game shows in which hormones run wild, the imitators were bound to come. Here's one. ``Bzzz,'' with host Annie Wood, is about not choosing a miserable blind date. It's also not about finding somebody to sit with a 70-pound baby.
6 to 7 p.m. - Why settle for imitators when you can have the original tasteless game shows? Columbia Tri-Star has revived ``The Dating Game'' and ``Newlywed Game,'' and sold them to 220 stations. The producers added computer-age graphics, a 70-pound baby (just kidding), hyper young hosts (Brad Sherwood and Gary Kroeger) and brought Chuck Barris' game show ideas into the 1990s. Preview tapes look darn good. What next? Barris brings back ``The Gong Show?
7 p.m. - WGNT strips in ``Cops'' Monday through Friday.
7:30 p.m. - With ``Entertainment Tonight.'' ``Extra'' and ``Show Biz Tonight'' already on TV, do we need another show to cover the entertainment biz? Ready or not, here comes ``Access Hollywood'' with co-hosts Giselle Fernandez and Larry Mendte.
How will this show be different from the others covering the same beat? ``We're going to limit the use of such words as stud, hunk, sexy, sweaty and babe to no more than three times a broadcast,'' Mendte told TV writers. ``We'll have a really hot set and poke fun at each other,'' said Fernandez. What? No 70-pound baby?
10:30 p.m. - ``Real TV.'' This show could be a big hit in syndication because it's on the sensational side, showing natural and man-made disasters captured on video, plus outtakes from Hollywood's sound stages and other stuff on video they wouldn't dare show on ``America's Funniest Home Videos.'' Such as the birth of a 70-pound baby, perhaps?
On Sept. 14 at 9 p.m., WGNT will premiere ``Two,'' a drama in which Michael Easton plays a dual role - a good twin and his mysterious and nasty other twin. Driving the plot is the evil twin's desire to mess up the nice, normal, happy life of brother Gus.
The pilot episode was dark but interesting. Will the TV audience want to see bad brother Booth beating up on Gus every week? I don't think so. (Also coming is ``Two Plus,'' the story of good and evil 70-pound twin babies. Just kidding).
A week later (Sept. 21) at 9 p.m., Channel 27 unveils ``F/X: The Series,'' based on the pretty darn good 1986 flick starring Bryan Brown. Rollie Tyler bags the bad guys with high-tech gadgets and a rolling workshop. On Sept. 29 at 7 p.m., ``Viper'' comes back to TV on WGNT. Like, ``Knight Rider'' and ``My Mother the Car,'' it's a four-wheel hunk that drives this series. It's red! It morphs! It's a gas guzzler!
At Fox affiliate WTVZ, the new syndicated programming includes the first off-network run of ``Mad About You'' (weekdays at 6:30 p.m.) as well as ``Hangin' With Mr. Cooper'' (5 p.m.) and ``Martin'' (7 p.m.).
Later this month, WTVZ introduces syndicated shows with familiar heroes - the new adventures of Sinbad and Tarzan. ``Sinbad'' returns to Baghdad long before cruise missiles were whizzing overhead. This time around, Tarzan's constant companion isn't a chimp. It's a 70-pound baby. Just kidding. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photos]
TRIBUNE ENTERTAINMENT
PARAMOUNT by CNB