CBS Axes 8 Series to Go For the Laughs

CBS has pulled “Cagney & Lacey,” “Kate & Allie” and six other series from its schedule to clear the decks for a new group of shows dominated by half-hour comedies which the network hopes will bring young viewers back to CBS in the fall.

Also gone from the roster are “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour,” “Jake and the Fatman,” “Eisenhower & Lutz,” “My Sister Sam,” “Simon & Simon” and “High Mountain Rangers.”

CBS Entertainment President Kim LeMasters, speaking to reporters on both coasts in a satellite news conference Thursday from the company’s Los Angeles headquarters, said that only the 6-year-old “Cagney & Lacey” drama series and “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour” will not return to the schedule at a later date; the others may resurface later in the season.

And, although “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour” will not return, the network plans to bring Tom and Dick Smothers back in a situation comedy at some point, LeMasters said.

The new half-hours include an as-yet-untitled effort to star Mary Tyler Moore; “The Dick Van Dyke Show”; “Murphy Brown,” featuring Candice Bergen as a TV reporter; “TV 101,” about a group of students; “Close to Home,” about a teen-age girl and her father, and “Dirty Dancing,” which is based on the hit movie.

LeMasters said that none of these comedies could be described as “dramedies.” Several shows of that laugh track-less comedy-drama genre, including “Frank’s Place” (CBS), “The ‘Slap’ Maxwell Story” (ABC) and “Hooperman”(ABC) and “The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd” (NBC) were among last season’s critical hits, although they foundered in the ratings. But the Mary Tyler Moore show will be a one-camera filmed show with no laugh track, LeMasters said.

CBS, which ended the 1987-88 season in third place for the first time, was the fourth to announce its new fall lineup. NBC and Fox Broadcasting Co. announced their fall schedules last week and ABC revealed its lineup earlier this week. CBS had been scheduled to announce its roster Tuesday, but was delayed, LeMasters said, simply because it was a tough slate to schedule.

LeMasters refuted rumors that surfaced earlier this week that he had wanted to remove “West 57th” and “48 Hours,” the network’s two low-rated news magazine shows, from the prime-time schedule, but had been pressured to keep them on the air by CBS news chief Howard Stringer, based in New York. “It was not a coastal war,” LeMasters said. “I invited Howard Stringer to our West Coast entertainment meetings in Los Angeles; we sat down and discussed it rationally.”

The renewals give CBS three hours of prime-time news programming, including the popular “60 Minutes,” which ended the season in the Top 10. LeMasters also denied that the decision to retain three news hours was predicated by the continuing Writers Guild of America strike. Unlike entertainment programming, all three of those hours require no guild writers.

LeMasters said that if the strike ended now, the network could put a full schedule of new fall shows on the air by mid-October; CBS already announced that its fall season would most likely not begin until late October.

He added that, although the writers’ strike had not affected the network’s choice of shows for fall, continuation of the strike could delay the start of the season indefinitely. The network already lost “The Dictator,” a mid-season comedy series this season, because of the strike and decided against putting the show on the schedule for a future date. “If we can’t get the scripts written, we can’t produce the shows,” he said. “The networks would probably be damaged by this. You would see the network (audience) shares decline.”

In the event of a lengthy strike, LeMasters said the network would rely on its inventory of movies and miniseries, and consider purchasing third runs of its shows. “The war chest is not empty,” he said.

Along with “West 57th” and “48 Hours,” which ranked 96th and 88th, respectively, out of 105 prime-time shows, several low-rated entertainment shows also were picked up. Among them: “Frank’s Place,” the first-season dramedy” that ranked 62nd; “Tour of Duty,” the Vietnam War drama, which ranked 72nd, and “Wiseguy,” a first-season action drama about an undercover agent starring Ken Wahl, which ranked 67th. “Wiseguy” was temporarily removed from the schedule at the end of March but has since returned. It has received some praise for its inventiveness along with some criticism for its weekly dose of graphic violence.

LeMasters said he believes that neither “Frank’s Place” nor “Wiseguy” had gotten a fair shake last season because of bad time slots and vowed to find better ones for them. “Tour of Duty,” he said, was renewed because CBS thinks it has a loyal core audience and because the network has a commitment to presenting a quality show about the Vietnam War.

The network also renewed its three long-running night-time soaps--”Dallas,” “Falcon Crest” and “Knots Landing,” despite steadily declining ratings for serial dramas in the past few years. (ABC also earlier renewed its only prime-time soap, “Dynasty.”) “Dallas” ended the season in 22nd place. “Knots Landing” came in 31st and “Falcon Crest,” 42nd.

LeMasters said the network will not proceed with previously announced plans to make these shows episodic, rather than serialized. He said major changes were in the works for “Dallas,” but “We’re going to try to keep it secret until it’s advantageous to let it out.”

“Coming of Age,” a mid-season show about life in an Arizona retirement community starring Paul Dooley, was among the Tuesday night comedies CBS yanked at the end of last season after three episodes due to poor ratings; the network reinstated a movie on that night. But “Coming of Age” is back on the fall schedule, although another mid-season comedy, “Trial and Error,” about two Latino brothers, is not.

The new shows include:

“Murphy Brown”: A half-hour comedy from Warner Bros. starring Candice Bergen in the title role as a television reporter on a “60 Minutes”-type investigative news program in Washington.

“Almost Grown”: An hour drama about the relationship of a New Jersey couple through three decades, starring Tim Daly and Eve Gordon and featuring plenty of nostalgic pop music from the ‘60s through the ‘80s.

“TV 101”: A half-hour comedy from GTG Entertainment about a group of students and their young faculty adviser who each week prepare a videotape version of their high school newspaper for local cable broadcast.

“The Dick Van Dyke Show”: A half-hour comedy starring Dick Van Dyke and his son, Barry, in the story of an award-winning Broadway performer who decides to help his son run a struggling theater company.

“Mary Tyler Moore”: A half-hour comedy featuring Moore as Annie Block, a divorcee who works in the Manhattan borough president’s office. Edward J. Moore co-stars.

“Paradise”: An hour drama about an 1890s gunfighter who unexpectedly inherits his sister’s four children, starring Lee Horsley.

“Dirty Dancing”: A coming-of-age story set at a summer resort in the mid-’60s, starring Patrick Cassidy, Melora Hardin and McLean Stevenson.

“Close to Home”: A comedy starring James Naughton and Royana Black as a father and daughter left alone to develop their relationship when wife and mother Bonnie deserts them.

Here is the complete CBS fall prime-time schedule:

Monday: “Newhart,” “Coming of Age,” “Murphy Brown,” “Designing Women,” “Almost Grown.”

Tuesday: “TV 101,” CBS Tuesday Movie.

Wednesday: “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” “Mary Tyler Moore,” “The Equalizer,” “Wise Guy.”

Thursday: “48 Hours,” “Paradise,” “Knots Landing.”

Friday: “Beauty and the Beast,” “Dallas,” “Falcon Crest.”

Saturday: “Dirty Dancing,” “Close to Home,” “Tour of Duty,” “West 57th.”

Sunday: “Murder, She Wrote,” CBS Sunday Movie.