THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, February 1, 1997 TAG: 9701310072
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LARRY BONKO, TELEVISION COLUMNIST
LENGTH: 103 lines
MERYL STREEP, the big, big movie star with two Oscars on her mantel, says she isn't slumming when she appears in a made-for-television film on ABC during the February sweeps.
While you're not likely to catch Sandra Bullock or Nicole Kidman on TV in a disease-of-the-week flick, Streep couldn't wait to play the mother's role in ``First Do No Harm,'' which airs Feb. 16 at 9 p.m.
``The project fueled a very personal fire within me,'' Streep said when ``First Do No Harm'' was previewed for TV critics in Los Angeles recently.
It's the story of a woman who pursues unconventional treatment (the Ketogenic diet) for her 4-year-old son who has epilepsy.
The film is fiction with a basis in fact - the tortured early life of executive producer Jim Abrahams' son. (Doug Foster, a Virginia Beach computer consultant who was successfully treated with the Ketogenic diet when he was a youngster, appears briefly in the film).
``I do not apologize for having an agenda in this film. It is not purely entertainment,'' said Streep of the movie in which Lori Reimuller defies the medical establishment, including an episode in which she picked up her son and carried him away from his hospital bed.
``I bring my son to you people for help, and all you do is make him sicker.''
Streep helped to produce ``First Do No Harm'' for a selfish reason.
``If we made it into a feature film, perhaps seven or eight people would see it. Putting it on TV gives it the largest possible audience.''
She is no TV snob.
``I like working in television. It's fast. I like working fast.
``Today, the line between films and television is all but indistinct. It's no leap backward for me to do television. I'd love to think that most people know me because they flocked to theaters to see my movies on the big screen. But I know better. Most know me from seeing my movies on the small screen.''
During the February sweeps, one of three rating periods in the year when network programming elevates itself from the humdrum, Streep is not the only Hollywood heavyweight who is bringing tense drama to the small screen.
NBC on Feb. 23, will show Steven Spielberg's ``Schindler's List'' with no commercial breaks. Ford, in sponsoring the 3 1/2-hour telecast of Spielberg's Academy Award-winning film about one savior in the Holocaust, will get its message across in two minutes before and after the picture.
NBC said at press time it is still editing ``Schindler's List'' for television - the brutality of the Nazi regime is vividly portrayed - but did not say where the cuts will be made. Nazi decadence is also part of ``Schindler's List,'' as are nude scenes in the camps.
It's almost certain to carry the TV-M rating - unsuitable for children under 17. For many moments, the film is hard to watch, which is what Spielberg intended.
``I made it for the millions who never heard the word `Holocaust,' and for the shocking number of Americans who have the barest knowledge of its existence, and for those who deny the millions of murders ever took place,'' said Spielberg.
NBC's other sweeps blockbuster - ``Asteroid'' - also has its frightening moments, but even a 10-year-old will be able to see it's a cartoon come to life. An asteroid packing more than 10,000 megatons of explosive power is hurtling toward Earth at 34,000 miles an hour!
If, as scientists suggest, an asteroid crashing to earth eons ago wiped out the dinosaurs, what chance does man have to survive this hot rock? Superman is busy on another channel.
``It's not science fiction. It could happen,'' said supervising producer Peter Ware. This TV movie cost $19 million and has 265 scenes in which special effects are used.
Also upcoming during the sweeps, which you could call the Mary Tyler Moore Comeback Festival:
Mike Connors revives his Joe Mannix character in a Feb. 13 episode of ``Diagnosis Murder'' on CBS. He's called on by the Dick Van Dyke character (Dr. Mark Sloan) to help solve a murder case. CBS says it will toss in some 1970s-vintage ``Mannix'' clips. Also on CBS, Rhea Perlman's husband, Danny DeVito, visits her on ``Pearl'' Wednesday. Ted Danson drops in on Feb. 19.
What comedian makes other comedians laugh? Who's the comedians' comedian? ABC has the answer in ``Part 2: Who Makes You Laugh?'' tonight at 10. Whoopi Goldberg thinks Joan Rivers is hilarious.
Also on ABC, Mary Tyler Moore and Ed Asner are reunited in a film on Feb. 10 at 9 p.m. She's not Mary Richards, and he's not Mr. Grant here. Moore plays a witness to police brutality who is tormented by the cops she turns in. Moore and Asner have 15 Emmys between them. (Moore in mid-February turns up as Tea Leoni's mother on the NBC sitcom, ``The Naked Truth'').
You know it's the ratings sweeps when Fox breaks out a two-hour episode of ``Melrose Place,'' which is missing Jodi Bissett (Jane) who left the show to have a baby. On Monday at 8 p.m., Alison and Jake set a date for their marriage (she's eight weeks pregnant) and Amanda turns up the lust-o-meter with her boss.
Another for-sure during sweeps: Late-night talk show hosts hit the road to pump up ratings. Starting Monday, Jay Leno takes ``The Tonight Show'' to Las Vegas. Heather Locklear (Amanda on ``Melrose Place'') drops in. The woman is everywhere.
Unlike Meryl Streep, Jodie Foster is a movie queen who will not be seen in a made-for-TV project. But she will be heard. She's the voice of a talking tattoo on Sunday's ``The X-Files.'' Also on Fox, Kelsey Grammer again pops up as the voice of Sideshow Bob on the Feb. 23 ``The Simpsons.'' This time, he brings along David Hyde Pierce of ``Frasier.''
Public broadcasting, which can be blase about the sweeps because it is a commercial-free operation, isn't about to see its audience carried away by the stunt-minded networks. No, sir-ree.
On Feb. 18-19, PBS brings back the master documentarian, Ken Burns, for a four-hour study of Thomas Jefferson. ``Thomas Jefferson'' is as compelling as any Burns' project in the past, and beautifully photographed as well. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos