New Columnist (Dom DeLuise) Goes to Movies

Call Paramount. Call Fox. Get Sid over at Universal. We’ll call it: “1985: The Movie.” Big budget. Cast of thousands. No sex. Not much violence. PG-13, maybe. Something the kids can see.

The Christmas movies ought to include at least one true story.

Start out at a Super Bowl on the campus of Stanford University, where the quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers (Rob Lowe) leads his football team to the championship, then meets the Miami quarterback (Don Johnson) after the game to buy him a diet soda.

Cut to Lexington, Ky., where the big, gruff coach from Georgetown (Yaphet Kotto) is trying to win the national college basketball championship for the second year in a row. Instead, the Villanova team misses only one shot in the second half and this little Italian guy (Peter Falk) becomes the winning coach for the first time.

At the National Basketball Assn. finals a couple of months later, the star player of the Boston Celtics (Sean Penn) leads his team to a lopsided victory in the opening game, but the L.A. Lakers come back to take the series, led by their tall, goggles-wearing center (Howard E. Rollins Jr.) and their slick coach (Jack Nicholson).

At Wimbledon, a hot-tempered American player (Matt Dillon) is expected to capture another men’s singles championship, but in an astonishing turn of events, a German teen-ager (Emilio Estevez) makes off with the trophy.

In London a few days later, a young American distance runner (Madonna) who was tripped up at the previous year’s Olympic Games gets to run another race against the even younger South African girl (Roseanna Arquette) who got tangled up with her in the Olympics. This time, the American stays on her feet and wins.

In baseball, a middle-aged player and manager for the Cincinnati Reds (Dustin Hoffman) makes a run at the all-time hit record. The owner of the team, a wealthy auto dealer (Angela Lansbury) who takes her St. Bernard with her everywhere she goes, almost loses her mind when the player attempts to break the record in a park away from home.

A scandal rocks baseball when several players admit to drug abuse on the stand of a Pittsburgh courtroom. A clever, flamboyant attorney (Eddie Murphy) attempts to get mercy for the defendant by saying he was no worse than any of the players to whom he sold the drugs, but his client still gets sent up one of Pittsburgh’s three rivers.

In New York, the tongue-tied manager of the Yankees (Norm Crosby) is not given much of a chance, and is replaced a short way into the season by the same fiery little character (Sonny Bono) who has run the club several times before. This still does not bring a pennant to the impatient owner of the Yankees (Larry Hagman), who hires still another manager (Robert DeNiro) as soon as the season is over.

Also in New York, a veteran pitcher for the Chicago White Sox (Ted Danson) beats the Yankees for his 300th victory, while in Anaheim, the sweet-swinging first baseman of the California Angels (Philip Michael Thomas) picks up his 3,000th hit on the same afternoon.

The baseball race moves along to a suspenseful conclusion. Just when it appears the Dodgers have a chance to stay alive for the World Series, their manager (Don Rickles) elects to pitch to the star slugger from St. Louis (Christopher Reeve), whose home run puts the Cardinals in the Series.

Two teams from the same state (Missouri) play for the title. It is an exciting series, during which the heroic third baseman of the Kansas City Royals (Jon Voight) dives into the dugout trying to catch a foul ball.

A questionable call by an umpire (Darren McGavin) in Game 6 keeps the Series going and sets up a stormy Game 7, in which the sourpuss starting pitcher of the Cardinals (Mickey Rourke) smashes his hand on an electrical fan, another hot-blooded pitcher (Raul Julia) attacks the umpire and the manager of the Cardinals (Kirk Douglas) says it was understandable because it was a tough game to lose.

Speaking of taking tough losses calmly, the heavyweight boxing champion of the world (Danny Glover), trying to tie the all-time record for fights without a defeat, is surprised by the light-heavyweight champion (Louis Gossett Jr.), but still insists that the longtime record-holder is not worthy to carry his jockstrap. It is a very sad scene.

By the time the football season gets going, most of the excitement is reserved for a refrigerator-sized player out of Chicago (Bubba Smith) who, for the first month at least, is not even a starting player. One nice note: Not one of his appearances on Monday Night Football is broadcast by Howard Cosell (Billy Crystal).

At the end, there’s a car chase and the guy gets the girls.

See, this is what happens to a young Midwestern sports columnist (Tom Selleck) who moves to Hollywood. Having lost touch with reality, he just keeps telling himself: It’s only a movie, only a movie, only a movie.