The Networks’ New Season : Returning Series Hope Babies Will Deliver the Ratings

Since the memorable night in 1953 when Lucille Ball delivered Little Ricky and big ratings, networks have come to rely on births as a means of boosting their prime-time fortunes.

With a new television season officially getting under way next Monday, a handful of returning series are laboring to provide viewers with blessed events as part of their new looks for 1989-90.

Five of the 58 established series on NBC, ABC, CBS and Fox will feature episodes in which prominent characters give birth. Two other old favorites also will boast new young faces.

That may not amount to a bona-fide baby boom, but you get the idea. Infants are in this season.

Top-rated NBC emerges as the most fertile network.

In November, a sweeps month when viewership is especially critical to the networks, Ann and Stuart Markowitz (Jill Eikenberry, Michael Tucker) are likely to welcome their first child on “L.A. Law,” while psychiatrists Frasier and Lilith (Kelsey Grammer, Bebe Neuwirth) of “Cheers” are expecting a new arrival as well.

On the Sept. 18 season premiere of “ALF,” the unreliable alien’s first adventure in baby-sitting predictably goes awry when he loses the Tanners’ son Eric (who was born at the end of last season). And “The Cosby Show” has a 3-year-old scene stealer joining the Huxtable household Sept. 21.

At ABC, English professor Gary (Peter Horton) and girlfriend Susannah (Patricia Kalember) will become parents during the fourth or fifth episode of “thirtysomething.”

On CBS, pregnant Charleyne (Jean Smart) and TV husband Doug Barr of “Designing Women” prepare for the birth of their first child, with a due date in the middle of the season.

Finally, there are “Newhart” yuppies Michael and Stephanie (Peter Scolari, Julia Duffy). Wed at the end of last season, they may see their bundle of joy in January. As the comedy opens its eighth season Sept. 18, the couple will be returning from a six-month honeymoon.

Speaking of marriages, the Rev. Gregory and Thelma (Clifton Davis, Anna Maria Horsford) at long last will announce their engagement on the season premiere of “Amen,” with a two-part wedding episode to follow during the November sweeps.

Striking a more somber note, the season debut of “The Golden Girls” on Sept. 23 will center on chronic fatigue syndrome. In a seriocomic two-part story written by the show’s creator, Susan Harris, Dorothy (Bea Arthur) has a consultation with doctors who cannot find any cause for her pain and exhaustion.

In a subsequent episode, Rose (Betty White) finds a new job as the assistant to a local TV consumer reporter (Chick Vennera).

A new job, editor and home await Hannah Miller (Jamie Lee Curtis) of “Anything But Love,” an ABC comedy that has the dubious distinction of undergoing the most extensive overhaul among all returning series.

Promoted from researcher to full-time writer, Hannah and fellow scribe Marty Gold (Richard Lewis) will report to an aggressive, energetic new boss (Ann Magnuson) in charge of their Chicago magazine, now a weekly instead of a monthly. Also joining the cast are Joseph Maher as a stuffy TV critic, Richard Frank as an executive assistant obsessed with demographics and Holly Fulger as a childhood friend who rents a room to Hannah.

On Sundays, meanwhile, Angela Lansbury will continue to solve whodunits on “Murder, She Wrote.” She just won’t be solving them as often.

In signing Lansbury for the popular mystery show’s sixth season, CBS agreed to lighten her load. Consequently, she will play author Jessica Fletcher in 13 episodes. In nine other shows, she will introduce the story, leaving the legwork to other characters. Those roles will be portrayed by an assortment of amateur sleuths such as Ken Howard, June Havoc, Barry Newman and Diana Canova.

Other noteworthy prime-time changes focus on:

New Faces

NBC: When he isn’t chasing Lucky the cat, “ALF” will contend with JM. J. Bullock, the former “Hollywood Square,” who will play the brother of Willie Tanner (Max Wright).

“Cheers”: Tony-winning stage actor Roger Rees of “Nicholas Nickleby” fame portrays billionaire Robin Colcord, a corporate raider who pursues Rebecca (Kirstie Alley), prompting Sam (Ted Danson) to try to regain ownership of the bar.

“Matlock”: Enter Clarence Gilyard as a deputy sheriff who helps attorney Ben Matlock (Andy Griffith). Exit Kene Holliday, who had played Matlock’s leg man, Tyler Hudson.

“227”: Paul Winfield is the apartment building’s new landlord, the pompous Julian Barlow.

ABC: As “Head of the Class” starts its senior year, students played by Michael DeLorenzo, Lara Piper and De’Voreaux White replace Tannis Vallely (Janice), Leslie Bega (Maria) and Jory Hussain (Jawaharlal). Rain Pryor--Richard’s daughter, who appeared in five episodes last season--enrolls on a full-time basis.

“China Beach”: Ricki Lake, best known for her role in the John Waters movie musical “Hairspray,” plays a cheerful Red Cross “doughnut dolly,” with Ned Vaughn as a young doctor who befriends Boonie (Brian Wimmer).

CBS: Adam Arkin joins the cul-de-sac dwellers of “Knots Landing,” whose third episode will be the durable serial’s 250th. He’ll play a “mysterious” businessman.

“Dallas”: TV’s longest-running entertainment series adds Kimberly Foster as a fetching blond who “smells money” as the younger, unwelcome sister of April Stevens (Sheree J. Wilson); Sasha Mitchell as scheming James Richard Beaumont, the son of J.R. Ewing’s old flame Vanessa Beaumont, and Michael Wilding as an art gallery owner who takes more than a professional interest in Cally, J.R.’s nubile young bride.

“Falcon Crest”: The network’s other melodrama signs up Gregory Harrison as a wheeler-dealer and adversary to Richard Channing (David Selby); Mark Lindsay Chapman as a “charming” psychopath, and Andrea Thompson as Frank Agretti’s (Rod Taylor) sexy stepdaughter.

“Tour of Duty”: Carl Weathers (“Rocky’s” Apollo Creed) is set for six episodes as a maverick colonel who takes charge of the unit; John Dye comes aboard as a medic and conscientious objector to the war in Vietnam. (Kim Delaney, who played reporter Alex Devlin, meets a “tragic” end during the second episode.)

“60 Minutes”: Former “West 57th” reporters Meredith Vieira and Steve Kroft join the veteran staff of prime-time TV’s longest-running series, which on Sunday begins its 22nd year.

New Directions

NBC: Denise Huxtable (Lisa Bonet) is back, and “The Cosby Show” has her, in addition to her new husband (Joseph C. Phillips) and his 3-year-old daughter (Raven Symone). While the newlyweds settle in, Theo (Malcolm-Jamal Warner) decides to move out. He’ll take an apartment with his New York University pals.

“A Different World”: Coach Walter Oakes (Sinbad) takes over the Hillman College dorm, which has gone co-ed, replacing Mary Alice.

“L.A. Law”: Buttoned-down attorney Michael Kuzak (Harry Hamlin) loosens up this season. He finds a new love interest, gets involved in a major murder case and takes to the streets on a motorcycle, clad in jacket and jeans.

“The Magical World of Disney”: Two fresh series join Disney’s wheel of rotating elements: “Brand New Life,” a “Brady Bunch”-type sitcom with Barbara Eden and Don Murray as the parents of six children, and “Parent Trap,” a Hayley Mills-Barry Bostwick comedy based on the 1961 film.

“My Two Dads”: Judge Wilbur (Florence Stanley) turns departed Dick Butkus’ old diner into a chic French restaurant.

ABC: It’s the fall of 1969 on “The Wonder Years” as Kevin (Fred Savage) and Winnie (Danica McKellar) edge toward adolescence, the ‘70s and the eighth grade. The sparks will still fly between them as always, but a more mature Kevin will find time for other girls as well.

“thirtysomething”: Something called divorce still hangs over the heads of Eliot (Timothy Busfield) and Nancy (Patricia Wettig) who, as fans recall, never signed the requisite papers. That issue will be addressed in the first episode Sept. 19.

“Growing Pains”: Mike Seaver (Kirk Cameron), who proposed to his girlfriend Julie (Julie McCullough) on last season’s final episode, gets his answer on the season premiere Sept. 20.

“ABC Saturday Mystery”: The rotational series gets two new entries featuring familiar stars (and lollipops). Ex-angel Jaclyn Smith wings her way back to prime time as “Christine Cromwell,” a San Francisco-based attorney and financial adviser, and Telly Savalas is back on the N.Y.P.D. payroll as “Kojak.”

CBS: Back for a second season, “Murphy Brown” still will be plugged into topical TV stories. One finds Murphy (Candice Bergen) writing a caustic memo criticizing her colleagues a la Bryant Gumbel of the “Today” show. In another, advertisers threaten to yank their commercials from a controversial episode of “FYI.”

“Knots Landing”: The character to catch here is put-upon Olivia (Tonya Crowe), the daughter of “scheme queen” Abby (Donna Mills, who has left the show). It’s hinted that Olivia may assume some of her mom’s more conniving qualities.

“Falcon Crest”: A new production team hopes to reclaim a sizable audience for this sagging CBS series embarking on season No. 9. To that end, the show’s writers will focus on younger characters such as Lance and Pilar (Lorenzo Lamas, Kristian Alfonso). Jane Wyman will appear in the first two episodes as matriarch Angela Channing, then will resurface at midseason. Richard Channing (David Selby) deals with single parenthood in the absence of wife Maggie (Susan Sullivan), who’s left Tuscany Valley.

“Saturday Night With Connie Chung”: That’s the new title for a revamped “West 57th.” The producers reportedly are considering a one-story format that would include actors in the re-creations of events.

And waiting in the network’s wings--to the vexation of its loyal fans--is “Beauty and the Beast.” The romantic fantasy’s two-hour opener will air when an appropriate time period becomes available. Once “Beast” begins, its beauty (pregnant Linda Hamilton) will have a “reduced presence,” says CBS Entertainment President Kim LeMasters.