TELEVISION: Weekend Bender

TV can be like a tippler who stays on the wagon for weeks only to allow himself an occasional major binge. After a long dry spell, CBS and ABC last weekend went on a big, glorious bender.

The weekend opened with Comic Pianist Victor Borge, whose show was the familiar, funny and overlong romp. It closed with admirably durable Rosalind Russell once again going through the invigorating setting-up exercises of Wonderful Town. CBS gave it two hours, and the TV version of the Broadway musical turned out to be just as whackily brilliant as the original. When the camera zoomed in on Roz and Sister Eileen (Jacquelyn McKeever), huddled in their virginal Manhattan bed and wailing Why Did I Ever Leave Ohio?, the old Town never seemed more wonderful.

Among the real heroes of the weekend bender were half-a-hundred puppets, Poet Ogden Nash, Conductor Leonard Bernstein (also responsible for the Wonderful Town score) and Ludwig van Beethoven.

Art Carney Meets Peter and the Wolf (ABC) proved to be one of the most engaging shows ever to be seen on TV. Actor Carney was fine as a new character in the old fairy tale, but the wonder of the hour-long show was Bil and Cora Baird’s 50 animal puppets, who achieved something rare—a fairy tale mixed with true gaiety, a child’s world edged by real irony. That was the spirit, too, of Ogden Nash’s lyrics, notably in the wolf’s lament (“Aesop launched the slander/ I should have eaten Aesop”) and his song of thanksgiving:

For gifts of fortune, fame and food

I thank my stars for turpitude.

In the same time slot on CBS, Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic provided immense excitement with a partial performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, accompanied by one of Bernstein’s uniquely lucid music-appreciation lectures. A leaner, older-looking Lenny—part of the change was obviously due to a haircut—was in top form as conductor, showman and talker, although the grandeur of the Ninth had him reaching hard for genius-sized words. Bernstein conducted the symphony’s final movement in a brilliantly balanced performance. The Philharmonic had played the Ninth under Guest Conductor Herbert von Karajan at Carnegie Hall the week before and, said Bernstein, “I changed whatever I had to because of the differences of personal interpretation. It probably sounded very different.” Both Beethoven and Bernstein were at times almost too frenzied for the cameras to keep pace, but the show (produced by Robert Saudek and his Omnibus staff) gave a unique picture of a topflight orchestra at work and of One-Man-Show Bernstein as he shook, bounced, grinned, sang along with the score, hushed and spurred the musicians, gave cues as if blowing a kiss or throwing a dagger.

Unfortunately, having launched a top-notch series, the sponsor (Lincoln) marred it by ill-chosen sales pitches. In the midst of Beethoven’s biggest score was a commercial with slick, whiny music (written by a freelance arranger named Mitch Lee). And immediately after the triumphant choral movement, while the timpani had scarcely stopped vibrating and the listener was still under the spell of the music, an oily announcer’s voice heralded a “visit with Mrs. Igor Cassini,” who then proceeded, on film, to demonstrate the charms of the new Lincoln Continental.