Picks and Pans Review: The Hal Linden Special

UPDATED 04/16/1979 at 01:00 AM EST • Originally published 04/16/1979 at 01:00 AM EST

ABC (10 p.m. ET)

Linda Lavin, Bonnie Franklin and Cathryn (Soap) Damon sing and dance winningly while tracing Linden's rise from singer-saxophonist to eminence in Barney Miller. The premise is mawkish, but Linden's warmth makes his first special painless.