Television Review : ‘Mayflower Madam’

“Mayflower Madam” (Sunday at 9 p.m., Channels 2 and 8), is CBS’ answer to NBC’s “Poor Little Rich Girl.” It’s about an ex-debutante who was so poor, she had to become a madam to pay the rent.

Or so says this dramatization of the autobiographical book by Sydney Biddle Barrows.

We see Barrows (Candice Bergen, looking swell--and a decade too old for the role) fired from her job in the fashion industry because of her scruples. So what’s the next job Miss Principles accepts? Dispatcher for a sleazy escort service. From there, it’s a quick step up to full-time pimping.

No hint of a psychological motivation for her career change is allowed (Barrows herself associate-produced). She does it for the money--and to protect her “girls” from worse exploitation.

In some respects, Barrows’ approach to her business is distinctly hands-off. She doesn’t meet, let alone sleep with, her clients. “Recreational sex has never appealed to me,” she wrote in her book--yet the movie doesn’t include even this much self-revelation. Nor did writers Elizabeth Gill and Charles Israel detect any irony in the gap between Barrows’ personal ethics and her source of income.

Her detachment from the nitty-gritty allowed director Lou Antonio to make a movie about prostitution without showing any sex--which no doubt pleased the CBS censors. Viewers with prurient interests, or those who might like to chuckle over some of Barrows’ clients’ peculiar tastes, or those who want an honest depiction of what happened--may not agree.

Instead, we see Barrows as a sorority house mother with an entrepreneurial bent. Venereal disease--what’s that? Only briefly, when a boyfriend (Chris Sarandon) and then when a busted call girl confront Barrows, does the movie “get real” (to quote the call girl) or dramatic. It isn’t enough.