CBS’ Big Valentine to Angela

How much does CBS love Angela Lansbury this Valentine’s Day?

Let it count the ways.

On Sunday night, the last-place network, well-known for its cost-cutting methods, threw a blow-out, big-bucks ballroom bash in honor of the “Murder, She Wrote” star, who had been feeling taken for granted of late--complete with three-tiered cake and all the trimmings.

It did so even though negotiations with MCA-Universal Television are still dragging on over licensing fees, program budget and Lansbury’s hours--problems that have to be ironed out before the high-rated series will be assured of returning for a sixth season.

On Monday, the network revealed details of an agreement it had reached with Lansbury to ensure that she and her production company will have a home at CBS, no matter what happens to “Murder, She Wrote.”

Two weeks ago, the king of the network himself, CBS President Laurence Tisch, came a-courting at Lansbury’s trailer home on the set after hearing that ABC was wooing the actress in the hope that her series might become part of its new mystery movie wheel.

“He was so dear,” Lansbury recounted about their half-hour chat. “He came in and said, ‘Is this what they call a motor home?’ And I said, ‘Yes. This is where I spend my life.’ And he was very, very nice. He said, ‘We really want to work with you and your company, and we very much want you to stay with CBS.’ ”

Did the Tisch tete-a-tete have any effect? “Well, it made me feel very warm,” the Tony Award-winning actress gushed. “I hadn’t had a pat like that in a long time. It was terrific!”

More effective, no doubt, was the deal CBS came up with for her. Her family-run production company was given commitments to produce both a comedy series that will star Lansbury “the year after” her current series ends and two TV movies over the next three years, at least one of which will star Lansbury.

The size and scope of Sunday night’s party at the Biltmore Hotel, which had been whipped up to celebrate the airing of the 100th episode of “Murder, She Wrote,” reflected CBS’ determination to please the actress. She found it “rather astonishing, I must say. I didn’t expect a party this big.”

And big it was. Except for Tisch, all the CBS brass was there--from CBS Broadcast Group President Howard Stringer to CBS Entertainment President Kim LeMasters and Executive Vice President Barbara Corday, as well as MCA Television Group President Al Rush and Universal Television President Kerry McCluggage, and hundreds of “Murder, She Wrote” staffers and guest stars.

Lansbury, 63, looking like “Queen for a Day” in a regal, forest-green velvet gown, said that talks had been continuing all weekend between CBS and MCA-Universal in an effort to wrap them up in time to makethe announcement at the party that the series would return.

“I don’t think they realized that we wouldn’t have the definitive answer by now,” she said. “I can’t absolutely, unequivocally say ‘Murder, She Wrote’ will be back, but it’s very close. We have a few little problems to work out, but all things being equal between the network and Universal, we will be back. I have agreed to come back for another year.

“I have found this enormous audience, and I don’t want to walk away from it. The question is working out the details with Universal. I am ready to do it, and I will be on CBS one way or another.”

CBS’ LeMasters was just as hopeful about the negotiations, but also very nervous about them. In a verbal Valentine to Lansbury at the gala, LeMasters flubbed the actress’ name not once but twice in an obvious case of the jitters.

They were understandable. With its lackluster prime-time ratings, CBS can ill afford the loss of a series that has been among TV’s most popular since its debut in 1983. “Murder, She Wrote” ranks No. 8 among all network series this season, and is one of only two shows that CBS has in the top 20. (“60 Minutes” is No. 5.)

So, about a month ago, the network began a frantic round of negotiations with MCA-Universal to secure “Murder, She Wrote” on the schedule for another season.

At first, one of the sticking points, however, was Lansbury herself. The actress had made it clear for some time that she was tired of the daily grind of making a TV series--including 16-hour days--and wanted to concentrate her talents on TV movies and miniseries. She also let the network know in no uncertain terms that she had been feeling unappreciated all along.

“We had our moments of misunderstanding there for awhile,” she acknowledged Sunday. “I think it was just that they (CBS executives) were having so many problems that they just sort of took us for granted because we could take care of ourselves. But I always felt that you can never take a show for granted. You have to love it and nurture it and pat it and keep sending it on its way happily. You can’t just assume things.”

Meanwhile, ABC Entertainment President Brandon Stoddard was quietly making his move.

After Lansbury’s TV movie “Shootdown” aired on NBC Nov. 28, Stoddard “just called me up and told me how much he had enjoyed it,” the actress recalled. “But he never personally got me on the phone to woo me over to his network.”

In fact, Stoddard never negotiated with Lansbury or her agent directly but instead went to MCA-Universal, with a proposal to have Lansbury join Peter Falk, Burt Reynolds and Louis Gossett Jr. on ABC’s new “Monday Night Mystery Movie.”

Stoddard even went public with the talks when he told TV reporters at a press conference last month that “we’d be thrilled to have Angela Lansbury as part of that rotation. There have been some discussions.” An alternate plan reportedly would have teamed Lansbury with Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau on ABC in a new mystery wheel scheduled for the same time slot that “Murder, She Wrote” now occupies at 8 p.m. Sundays.

LeMasters on Sunday night maintained that any ABC plans to steal away “Murder, She Wrote” were impossible. “They never had a chance to get her and they couldn’t have gotten her,” LeMasters said. “We had covenants that restricted the possibility of ‘Murder, She Wrote’ and Angela Lansbury traveling from CBS for a year.”

Admitting that “Murder, She Wrote” is as “important” to CBS’ schedule as ever, LeMasters--between bites of marinated artichokes--said about the possibility of losing the show: “That’s something I don’t want to contemplate. It’s more important to me to do everything possible to maintain that schedule.”

Sources close to the negotiations have described the talks between CBS and MCA-Universal over “Murder, She Wrote” as some of the toughest ever for a television series. One reason, the sources say, is because of years of simmering discontentment over the network’s penchant for “nickel and diming” its series to death, especially since Tisch took over. But CBS is continuing to take a harder line on the show’s budget than its producers would like.