TV REVIEW : ABC’s ‘Daddy Can’t Read’ Takes a Predictable Look at Adult Illiteracy

In 1986, the ABC and PBS television networks launched “Project Literacy U.S.,” a public-service campaign to fight the abysmal literacy level in the United States. “Daddy Can’t Read,” the “ABC Afterschool Special” airing at 3 p.m. today on Channels 7, 3, 10 and 42, is part of that effort.

Incredibly, in 1986, U.S. literacy ranked 49th in the world. Thirteen percent of adults are illiterate, we learn in this sobering but predictable film, produced and directed by Gilbert Moses.

Cheryl Arutt, a delicate-boned, appealing young actress, plays teen-ager Alison Watson, whose involvement in an after-school reading tutorial program for adults leads to the disturbing discovery of her own father’s illiteracy.

Edward Albert is Alison’s likeable dad, who finds his responsible blue-collar position threatened when management decides to bring in a computer system.

Chris Whitesell’s teleplay, based on a story by Paula Sweeney, James Pirone and Gloria Gonzalez, comes to a neat and expected conclusion. Although Albert’s character seems fairly happy-go-lucky, we hear about his embarrassment at being a “slow” student and at his lifetime of shame and concealment. Crises pile up, including a dangerous mix-up with his youngest daughter’s medicine.

Things get a little murky here--there’s curiously little aftermath over what could have been a fatal accident. Dad doesn’t seem to hold himself seriously accountable enough, and Mom (Marcia Strassman) is just as protective of him as she was before. Finally, however, Dad decides to go public and attend his daughter’s class.

Although Cathy Rigby McCoy toils thanklessly as an unsympathetic gym teacher, most of the cast, including Richard Roundtree as the compassionate reading teacher, fare well enough in roles that are not particularly fleshed out. We get the message.