SERIESFox’s reality crime show “Cops” recently returned...

SERIES

Fox’s reality crime show “Cops” recently returned from New Orleans where the Mardi Gras provided 10 days of uninhibited celebration for a special one-hour episode expected to air in the spring.

Lauren Bacall, Audrey Hepburn and James Earl Jones are set for the first three installments of “Reflections on the Silver Screen,” a new American Movie Classics cable series that premieres March 18. The series, hosted by film professor Richard Brown of the New School of Social Research, will profile and interview legendary actors and actresses who have made significant contributions to cinema.

HBO continues its move toward original programming with “Dream On,” a half-hour comedy series starring Brian Benben, Wendie Mallick and Denny Dillon that debuts in mid-1990. Film director John Landis will produce the weekly series, which follows the broken life of a neurotic New Yorker. His perspective is colored by his childhood devotion to the tube, as seen through footage intercut from long-lost T50s TV shows.

MINISERIES

Turner Network Television will turn James Michener’s best-selling novel “Alaska” into a four-hour miniseries for 1991. The 1988 novel traces Alaska’s rugged history, beginning with the migration of Eskimos, Aleuts, Athapaskans and Tlingits from Siberia.

MOVIES

Stephanie Zimbalist plays a woman presumed dead for 15 years who returns to her family shortly before a large inheritance is due in “Caroline,” a CBS “Hallmark Hall of Fame” movie scheduled to air April 29. Patricia Neal and Dorothy McGuire co-star.

Although Eddie Albert was reportedly reluctant to agree on a script, the CBS movie “Return to Green Acres,” about Albert’s efforts to save Hooterville from the clutches of greedy land developers, received the green light. The movie reunites Eva Gabor, Pat Buttram, Tom Lester and Frank Cady, all original cast members from “Green Acres,” the sitcom that ran on CBS from 1965 to 1971.

Barbara Hershey plays the perfect wife and mother, an upstanding member of the community-until her best friend is found murdered, struck 41 times with an ax. The too-perfect Hershey, taught as a small child to deny her feelings, is accused of the murder in the CBS movie “Evidence of Love,” now in production in Dallas. Brian Dennehy and Hal Holbrook co-star.

NBC’s Emmy-winning TV movie “Roe vs. Wade” took away two Silver Nymph Awards from the 30th International Television Festival of Monte Carlo last month. Honored in the television film category were writer and co-producer Alison Cross for best script and Emmy-winner Holly Hunter for the best performance by an actress. “Roe vs. Wade,” telecast May 15, 1989, is the story of the women who challenged the nation’s abortion laws.

Off-screen husband and wife C. Thomas Howell and Rae Dawn Chong, in their first screen appearance together since the film “Soul Man” in 1986, have completed filming of “Curiosity Kills,” a USA Network movie scheduled for mid-1990. The thriller also stars Courteney Cox and Jeff Fahey.

DOCUMENTARIES

“Hilary Is in Hiding,” a Lifetime Television documentary scheduled to premiere in April, focuses on the complex custody case of Dr. Elizabeth Morgan and Dr. Eric Foretich. In the bitter case, Morgan chose to go to jail for 25 months, rather than reveal to her husband where their 7-year-old daughter was being kept.

In May, Walter Cronkite will host “How to Prevent a Heart Attack,” the first of four new HBO documentaries for 1990. The other documentaries, scheduled for later in the year, will explore life in a Los Angeles Skid-Row hotel, gun-inflicted deaths and the inside of a federal penitentiary.

SPECIALS

Mimi Kuzyk and Joseph Bottoms play a brother and sister who must come to grips with their parents’ alcohol abuse in “Maggie’s Secret.” The “CBS School Break Special” is now in production in Toronto for an April 10 air date.

Katharine Hepburn, James Stewart and Helen Hayes will be the chairpersons of the NBC special ‘Night of 100 Stars III’ scheduled to air in May. Theinternational guest list of celebrities scheduled to appear at Radio City Music Hall in New York includes Joe DiMaggio, Jane Fonda, Tyne Daly, Bea Arthur, Liv Ullmann, Carol Channing, Brooke Shields, Michael Caine, Jason Robards, Tony Randall, Ed Asner, Danny Aiello, Muhammad Ali, Yue Sai Kan, Florence Griffith-Joyner, Crystal Gayle and Joan Rivers. The show will benefit the Actors’ Fund.

VIDEO

Republic Home Video will release episodes of “Car 54, Where Are You?” in April. The 1960’s sitcom, starring unlikely patrol-car partners Toody (Joe E. Ross) and Muldoon (Fred Gwynne), will come two episodes to a tape and sell for $14.95.

SOAPS

Newcomer Russell Todd will make his daytime debut on Tuesday, replacing Laurence Lau as Dr. Jamie Frame in “Another World” on NBC. Also joining the cast of “Another World” on March 13 is Dack Rambo, who will be creating the role of U.”. Senator Grant Harrison.