Monday, July 17, 2000

TV critic survives first week of press tour

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        PASADENA, Calif. — Marooned far from home. Deprived of sleep. Muscles aching from countless hours sitting in primitive, stiff conference chairs. Welcome to my world, the Television Critics Association's annual 2¹/₂-week summer press tour.

        More than 150 hearty souls have been subjected to 15-hour days previewing new fall TV shows, or interviewing TV stars and producers, at a remote California campsite called the Pasadena Ritz-Carlton Hotel.

        To sum up my first week, I'll paraphrase Survivor: Seven days, 61 TV previews, and one TV critic suffering from information overload.

        It's impossible to detail all 61 shows, so in slick Survivor style I've edited a week of press conferences, interviews and cocktail parties into one tidy little package. If the voyeuristic Survivor cameras had stalked the hotel hallways and ballrooms, you would have seen and heard:

        • Comedian Jonathan Winters, the subject of an Aug. 13 PBS pledge special, recalled his encounter with the Rev. Billy Graham backstage at Jack Paar's Tonight Show:

        “We had something cold to drink, and he said, "Jonathan, may I ask you a question: Are you a Christian?' I said, "Oh, yes, yes, I am — so far,' ” says Mr. Winters, an Episcopalian.

        When Dr. Graham pressed on, asking, “Are you reborn?,” the Dayton, Ohio, native replied: “Oh, I got it the first time. Yeah, they only did us once.”

        • Edward Mechenbier, a Vietnam War veteran held captive by the North Vietnamese for nearly six years, came all the way from Dayton to promote PBS' The American Experience film (Nov. 13) about Vietnam War POWs. He could not escape without talking about — what else? — CBS' Survivor.

        “I watched about three seconds of it and said: This is hokey. It's one of those made-for-television things,” said Mr. Mechenbier, vice president of Science Applications International Corp.

        • Comedian Bob Newhart, to be profiled by A&E Biography this fall, said his favorite comedy routine was his 1960s classic about Abraham Lincoln's press agent talking to the president.

        Mr. Newhart's spin doctor told Lincoln: “Abe, Abe, please read the biography, will you? You were a rail-splitter, then an attorney! Abe, you wouldn't give up your law practice to become a rail-spliter!”

        • Rock and Roll Hall of Famer David Crosby was embarrassed to blank out when asked a question about his Stand Up and Be Counted documentary (Aug. 22-23, The Learning Channel) about Live Aid, Farm Aid and other concerts for a cause.

        “What did you ask me? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember now,” he said. Then he added: “I really was in the '60s. Really was.”

        • Minutes after Survivor concluded Wednesday, critics congregated in the hall outside the ballroom sharing their amazement that Gretchen — not Gervase, Rudy or Susan — had been voted off the island.

        “I feel so sorry for Gretchen!” said one upset TV critic.

        • Historians Carol Berkin and Keith Arbour, consultants for the History Channel's November Founding Fathers miniseries, said they'd flunk Mel Gibson for all the inaccuracies in The Patriot.

        “Mel Gibson had a plantation in South Carolina that grew corn, and the black workers on the plantation were, apparently, participating in a profit-sharing system as opposed to being slaves . . . Those are just a few of the small problems with the movie — although it's nice to see that he won the Revolution single-handedly,” Dr. Berkin says.

        Adds Dr. Arbour: “It takes hundreds and hundreds of hours of more serious programming to make up for the errors.”

        • To promote They Nest, a July 25 movie about a cockroach-infested Maine island, USA cable prepared a snack fit for a Survivor — fried crickets seasoned with dried ants.

        “Whether you know it or not, you've all eaten bugs before,” says chef David George Gordon, author of the Eat A Bug cookbook.

        “Our own Food and Drug Administration allows a certain level of bugs that are in some of our everyday foods . . . In things like peanut butter and preserves and ketchup, for example, there are lots of bugs.”

        • Deborah Forte, executive producer of PBS' Clifford cartoon debuting Sept. 4, boasted that the Clifford, The Big Red Dog books by Norman Bridwell had sold more than 80 million copies.

        “To put that number in perspective: That's 10 times more than Harry Potter,” she said.

        • We'll close with Jonathan Winters' disappointment with CBS' Survivor participants:

        “I thought they'd be more like Baywatch,” he said. “You know, prettier people.”

        Enquirer TV Critic John Kiesewetter is reporting from the Television Critic Association's summer press tour.

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