C+
Essentially a warm and simple family story, this TV movie (part of Showtime's monthly series of "Original Pictures for Kids") wanders too far afield. Blame those traveling shoes, a pair of magic two-tone wing tips which were given to the dying Frank (Louis Gossett Jr.) by a Gypsy woman. After Frank succumbs to cancer, his grieving 13-year-old son Clay (Robert Ri'chard) tries on the snazzy footwear and, presto, he becomes his father in 1962. The entry to the past gives Clay an opportunity to understand the strained relationship between his father and his grandfather Richard (also played by Gossett). Unfortunately it also gives the filmmakers a pretext to trot out a bunch of time-transport clichés: The kid confuses his '60s pals with his use of '90s slang, flashes his hip-hop moves instead of doing the twist and innocently disrupts a classroom discussion of "current events" by mentioning the 1963 assassination of President Kennedy. Clay eventually learns much of value through present-day, heart-to-heart conversations with his mother, Janice (Barbara Eve Harris), his grandmother Virginia (Djanet Sears) and his crusty but not totally unfeeling grandpa. He could have saved all that shoe leather.
MTV (Monday-Friday, 11 p.m. ET)
C+
Picture The Gong Show without Chuck Barris and the hanging judges, Stupid Human Tricks without David Letterman or The Joe Franklin Show without Joe Franklin. There are any number of precedents for this talk-variety spoof, which premieres June 16 on MTV after a decade on public-access cable in New York City. "Special guest superstars" (early invitees include actor Stephen Baldwin; Cosby's Doug E. Doug; and basketball player Kendall Gill, a semi-superstar of the New Jersey Nets) share an overcrowded couch with amateur performers whose talents are meager, weird—or both. Although you'll probably sit up and take notice when a "human pincushion" runs a bicycle cable through his pierced tongue, your jaded ears may not detect a significant difference between the woman who imitates a seagull and the woman who imitates a dolphin. There's a problem with relying on novelty acts: the novelty tends to wear off.
What this little circus needs is a ringmaster with comic attitude, like smirky Martin Mull on the '70s cult favorite Fernwood 2-Night. Manning the host's desk here is a geeky but sincere character called Frank Hope (played by the show's producer, Rich Brown). Like his announcer, bouncy Melissa Gabriel (her real name), he seems blind to the absurdity of it all. Frank's other sidekick, David Greene, keeps his posture rigid, his eyes averted and his lips sealed. He'd be funnier if, like Fernwood's Fred Willard, he said something stupid every few minutes.
HBO (Mon., June 16, 11 p.m. ET)
A-
With wit and honesty in abundance and pathos in moderation, this winning first-person special tells the true-life story of Steve Moore, a gay stand-up comic who refuses to let HIV get him down. Through performance footage and reenactments of funny, strange and touching moments from his past (cleverly directed by Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato), Moore recounts what it was like dating a "good girl" in his hometown of Danville, Va. (and not being disappointed by her unwillingness to "put out"), marrying a Canadian lesbian so she could qualify for a green card (and introducing his wife and her lover to his mom and dad), looking for love in Los Angeles bars and bathhouses ("My wife had a relationship)—why shouldn't I?") and "auditioning" with a doctor to get the new AIDS drugs that have kept him going. There's something inspiring about the bond between Moore and his openly unhip parents, Wilma and Skeets, whose supportive-ness extends to good-humored participation in this frequently raunchy film. But if you're easily offended, expect some discomfort.
PBS (Tues., June 17, 10 p.m. ET)
B-
Judith Helfand lacks Steve Moore's likability; that doesn't mean she has less to say. In 1990, Helfand was diagnosed with cervical cancer linked to her mother's use of the anti-miscarriage drug diethylstilbestrol (DES). After undergoing a hysterectomy at age 25, Helfand channeled her anger and sorrow into this video diary, part of the P.O.V. documentary series. Helfand's grievance is intensely real, as is her commitment to public education concerning the legacy of DES, prescribed to millions of women before the Food and Drug Administration warned in 1971 against its use during pregnancy. But she often comes across here as self-righteous, self-dramatizing and excessively camera-conscious. Though it's for a good cause, we can't help squirming when Helfand presses her mother to show more emotion for the screen.
HBO (Tuesdays, 11 p.m. ET)
B-
Since both sitcoms are on HBO, people are bound to compare The Larry Sanders Show, in which entertainment figures often appear as themselves, with Arli$$, in which sports figures often appear as themselves. Arli$$ will never profit by the comparison, partly because most sports types aren't too funny. Case in point: the second episode (airing June 24) of the series' second season, featuring San Francisco 49ers president Carmen Policy in a performance certain to be ignored at Emmy time.
We can always count on a major-league effort from the key player, Robert Wuhl, who somehow makes us root for his character, the smoke-blowing, ego-stroking sports agent Arliss Michaels. But the show as a whole lacks the consistency of a championship series. The season premiere (it airs first on June 14 at midnight and again on June 17 at 11 p.m.) is a frantic but flat outing about a baseball player who suspects his wife of cheating. But the second episode offers Arliss in peak form, scrambling to negotiate a rich contract for fictional football coach Granite Giles (Wings Hauser), whose latest bride, Sharon (Bonnie Burroughs), is a sweet Svengali well versed in the art of the deal.
Lifetime (Thurs., June 19, 7 p.m. ET)
C
This hour-long special needs to focus better, as coaches like to say. The program, second in an occasional Lifetime series on women's athletics, takes its theme from the 25th anniversary of Title IX, the law setting sexual-equality standards in sports programs at schools receiving federal aid. But it makes only a cursory effort to provide historical perspective, preferring to spend time on individual heroines: Sanya Tyler, the women's basketball coach who sued Howard University in Washington for sex discrimination; and Anne Warner, a Yale rower of the '70s who protested nude (hey, whatever it takes) to get her squad a fair shake from the university's athletic department. When the film visits this year's women's NCAA basketball finals, narrator Geena Davis fast-breaks through a series of issues without exploring them.
>destination: hope
GLAD TIDINGS
DURING HIS 10 YEARS AS A PRODUCER for CBS, Mark Honer covered such dramatic events as the siege at Waco and Hurricane Hugo. But it was the '94 Los Angeles earthquake that most unnerved him—and wound up redirecting his career. "They were carrying out dead bodies on gurneys two feet behind us," recalls Honer, 37. "My wife says I was never the same."
Long troubled by TV's emphasis on calamity and crime, Honer hit upon the idea for a show devoted solely to good news. "For every murder that happens in this country, there is somebody doing something selfless," he says. Determined to tell those stories, Honer left the network a year ago and launched destination: hope about three months later. Each half-hour newsmagazine is composed of profiles of such do-gooders as Daniel Jacobs, a power company complaint rep from Overland Park, Kans., who spends his vacations collecting Christmas presents for the needy, and Chris Rahamian, a Kansas City, Mo., high schooler who took the cash he'd been saving to buy a car and, instead, bought a van for a woman who suffers from Lou Gehrig's disease. The show also gives out Medals of Hope to do-gooders.
Now seen in 22 markets, hope consistently finishes first or second in its time slot, despite its shoestring budget (Hallmark Cards is its primary advertiser). "I've had a hard time trying to figure out the world—the injustice, racism, hate," wrote Adam, a 16-year-old Elmira, N.Y., student. "I wanted you to know that your show has made a difference."
- Contributors:
- Pam Grout.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
