Riot Images Provide Grist for Cable to Shine

TV or not TV. . . .

ECHOES: Fallout from the Los Angeles riots filled the TV screen with memorable images for hours during the weekend as America let off steam.

In an extraordinarily emotional passage during C-SPAN’s lengthy coverage of the “Save Our Cities, Save Our Children” rally in Washington, Peter Yarrow, from the Peter, Paul and Mary singing group, led the huge crowd in a song that used Rodney King’s recent “Can we get along?” statement as its lyrics.

The advantage of a cable channel that has the time to provide texture to an event was evident as C-SPAN stayed with Yarrow during the powerful sequence, in which he got the crowd involved in the song by repeating it until the throng joined in.

It was a display of savvy showmanship by the veteran Yarrow, who let the lyrics speak for themselves, with little, if any, elaboration. He knew he couldn’t write them any better.

The Saturday rally and the sea of faces uniting in song will not be easy to forget.

That night, meanwhile, along came another live TV event that caught the national emotion of the moment--”Comic Relief V,” with HBO’s annual fund-raiser for the homeless also providing comment on the riots.

Billy Crystal, Robin Williams and Whoopi Goldberg again were the three comic musketeers who hosted the meaningful mayhem, which was made available by HBO to other channels.

And there was, no doubt, an anti-Administration fury to much of the raucous commentary. In truth, however, there was a healthy distrust of the various presidential candidates, effectively capturing the mood of frustrated voters.

Dennis Miller noted that President Bush flew West to check out what was at the core of the rioting: “Naturally, his first stop was the Reagan ranch.”

There was a wealth of knockout performances in the inevitable mix of good and routine acts. Following the high-decibel comedy of Roseanne and Tom Arnold, comedian Louie Anderson wisely went low-key with an eloquent message about the homeless.

To watch performers such as Garry Shandling and Paul Rodriguez take off the gloves in the free-wheeling arena of pay-TV, letting loose the way they can’t on the networks, was not only great fun but also another reminder of how much scope cable has added to the broadcast world.

Both Rodriguez and Shandling were splendid. So was Don Rickles--I’ve never seen anybody top Robin Williams before. Jay Leno stormed through a solid routine. Rita Rudner was just plain wonderful. And there were many others who delivered.

As for Williams, Goldberg and Crystal, they’re so good at setting a tone of near-total anarchy in this show that they make prime-time network comedy look positively ancient.

The Washington rally on C-SPAN and “Comic Relief V” on HBO--a weekend of real television.

TUNNEL VISION: We’re still getting angry calls from viewers who want to know how TV reporters could quickly decide, amid the wildness of the riots, that looters and others were definitely illegal aliens. “Did they ask for their papers?” writes one reader.

HEALING PROCESS: Check out “Getting Along,” a timely documentary on racism from independent filmmaker Art Nomura, which airs Friday night on KCET-TV Channel 28 as part of an hour titled “Images in Motion: Asian-American Shorts.”

Nomura, an assistant professor in TV production at Loyola Marymount University, uses a pickup basketball game involving four men--an Asian, a Latino, a black and a white--as the framework for their interaction and thoughts about prejudice in the 23-minute film.

An Asian-American, he finished the film April 29, the day the riots started: “I live in South-Central, and it was very strange to have that tape in my hand as I came home that night.”

ANNIVERSARY: KCET has a big blast Sunday, the 90-minute “National Memorial Day Concert,” commemorating America’s entry into World War II half a century ago. Ossie Davis hosts the live broadcast from Washington, and participants include Gen. Colin Powell, Charles Kuralt, Mel Torme, Richard Thomas and Leslie Uggams.

Torme is scheduled to open the show and help set the mood by singing a medley of songs associated with Benny Goodman, ending up on the drums with “Sing Sing Sing,” accompanied by the National Symphony Orchestra.

“I own the drums that Gene Krupa played with Benny Goodman in the famous (1930s) Carnegie Hall concert,” says Torme, “and I’ll be using them in this concert. I knew Gene since I was 9 years old in Chicago. We lived four blocks apart. When he played the Palladium out here during the war years, I used to sit in almost every night with his band.”

Torme, a semi-regular on NBC’s just-terminated “Night Court” series, is keeping his hand in TV. He recently recorded the vocal theme for a CBS pilot from the Carsey-Werner Co., “The Little Woman,” starring British actress Miriam Margolyes as a 50-year-old, working-class woman who re-evaluates her life. Imogene Coca plays her mother-in-law.

POSTERITY: The TV academy unveils a life-sized sculpture of Johnny Carson in its outdoor Hall of Fame Plaza in North Hollywood on Friday, the day of his final “Tonight Show.”

TURNABOUT: Dan Rather’s nightly news ratings have gone up 19% since a year ago--probably in part because of CBS’ improved prime-time ratings. But he’s still No. 2 to ABC’s Peter Jennings.

IN THE MOOD: A colleague of ours wonders whether Sam Donaldson’s possible pay cut at ABC will hurt his disposition.

WAKE-UP CALL: The “Today” show now has beaten “Good Morning America” two weeks in a row in the ratings--the first time that’s happened in 2 1/2 years.

ATLANTIC CITY: Regis Philbin, who once upon a time wrote sports at KCOP-TV Channel 13, and his talk-show partner, Kathie Lee Gifford, now have a multi-year contract to host NBC’s Miss America Pageant. From Bert Parks to Regis--perfect.

BEING THERE: According to David Letterman, one of the Top 10 slogans for the 1992 Democratic convention is: “OK. We’re serious this time.”

Say good night, Gracie. . . .