Lyons’ Purr?

Is Jeffrey Lyons a softie? The PBS “Sneak Previews” critic was nice to the generally panned “Cocktail”--and positively raved about “Vibes,” which got trashed by his colleagues. Columbia’s “Vibes” ads, for example, quote him as saying, “I haven’t laughed this hard all year.”

Lyons told us: “I’ll defend that.” He adds that beyond cracking up at stars Cyndi Lauper and Jeff Goldblum, co-star Peter Falk “had me on the floor.

“I liked a movie that died. So what? It happens sometimes. Comedy in particular is subjective. I don’t understand the suggestion that I’ve done something wrong by liking a movie.”

Last spring, a Boston Phoenix piece noted that Lyons had been quoted in 97 ads last year, with Joel Siegel of ABC in second place with 94. But Lyons--calling the story a “hatchet job”--contends that those figures are misleading, because studios invariably select national reviews over local ones.

In Lyon’s defense, Martin Manley, president of the Topeka, Kans.-based statistical research firm FACTS Publishing, told us that Lyons came out “average in terms of leniency” in his company’s study of 13 of the country’s best known film critics.

Lyons’ on-air partner, Michael Medved, insists, “The frequently made charge that Jeffrey is the Will Rogers of critics--that he never met a film he didn’t like--is a bum rap.” According to Medved, he and Lyons come out “about even” in the percentages of movies they’ve liked over the past four years. “I admire the fact that he has the courage of his eccentricities.”