ABC Offers ‘New Light’ for AIDS : Television: With lukewarm reception from advertisers, tonight’s star-studded two-hour benefit might not break even.

When ABC’s star-studded AIDS special, “In a New Light,” goes on the air tonight, it might appear that all of Hollywood--with the help of several A-list advertisers--is reaching out, imploring America to have compassion for people with AIDS and to take precautions against the disease.

ABC would not release final figures on advertising sales, but as of midday Friday, the network had sold “more than $1 million” in ads, according to Phil Beuth, ABC president of early-morning and late-night programming. Beuth, who spearheaded the effort to produce the show, said that was “almost enough to cover production costs” but significantly short of its $3-million target. He said that a late flurry of activity made the network hopeful that the program would be sold out by air time tonight.

If the program--billed as a benefit for the Design Industries Foundation for AIDS--doesn’t break even, the program will be unable to donate funds for research or care of AIDS patients, Beuth said.

Similarly, while some of the industry’s biggest names--stars ranging from Elizabeth Taylor and Dustin Hoffman to Barry Manilow, Anita Baker and Clint Black--are featured in the two-hour, variety-style special, many Hollywood luminaries stayed away, Beuth said.

“I went to some of the biggest names in Hollywood and couldn’t get anybody to help,” said Beuth, whose son, Barry, died of AIDS two years ago.

“We have not been deluged by a lot of advertisers scrambling to buy because there still is that apparent stigma about being associated with AIDS,” Beuth said. “The country is still asleep (about AIDS) and there are advertising agents who are reluctant to bring it (the show) to clients because they are afraid they will be turned down.”

The program, which airs tonight at 8, marks the first time a major network has devoted two hours of prime time to a special about AIDS.

A fast-paced show, “In a New Light” features songs, dances, readings and interviews with performers. The music runs the gamut from rap to rock, jazz and country, and includes performances from Salt ‘n’ Peppa, Gloria Estefan, Nell Carter and others.

The performers talk about their own losses from AIDS and perform some of their biggest hits, which are meant to take on new meaning when viewed in light of AIDS. Throughout, an 800-number is broadcast for people who want to volunteer to help those with AIDS.

The backdrop for the program is the start of a second tour by a Los Angeles traveling revue called “Heartstrings,” in which performers go from city to city raising awareness of AIDS through song and dance. Interwoven are scenes from the Hollywood opening of the Names quilt, the 28-acre quilt onto which people who have lost loved ones to AIDS have embroidered pictures, stories and names of those who have died.

“I can’t imagine anybody not doing something like this,” said Manilow, who said he read about the project in a Hollywood trade magazine and called the producers with an offer to help. “I’m stunned by even the suggestion that it would be detrimental.”

Manilow, who sings “I Made It Through the Rain” and “One Voice,” commended ABC for airing the special, saying it was “about time” the vast reach of a major network was being harnessed to tell people about AIDS.

“Everybody’s been dragging their feet (because) death does not get ratings,” Manilow said. “It makes you (angry) and it makes you sad, which is what this disease does, too. Personally, I have lost half my phone book over the last eight years.”

Joe Lovett, the program’s executive producer, said the network has come a long way since he first tried to talk editors into running pieces about AIDS as a young producer on “20/20” in the early 1980s. At that time, he said, editors said the disease was too localized in New York, and that AIDS patients represented “too segmented” a group in society to appeal to network viewers.

“Ten minutes before my first piece on AIDS aired on ABC, I burst into tears from the tension, because I thought it was never going to get on the air,” Lovett said.

In airing “In a New Light,” ABC takes a number of risks. The program includes a skit about condom use, in which comedian Andrea Martin urges viewers to “think of sex as Christmas in December. Just be sure to gift wrap your member.”

Nell Carter dedicates her performance to the memory of her brother, and says, “Yes, my brother was gay, and yes, he died of AIDS.”

But with the exception of Carter’s remarks and a line in a song by Salt ‘n’ Peppa that says that AIDS is not just a gay or black disease, there is little discussion of the way the disease has ravaged the gay community or mention that it was gay organizations that first joined to fight the disease.

“From an AIDS educational perspective, the program is very effective and sort of blunt,” said Nicole Russo, spokeswoman for AIDS Project Los Angeles. “But the gay and bisexual men were left out.”

Chris Fowler, executive director of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, said that by emphasizing heterosexual AIDS and AIDS in children, the network risks making it seem as if the lives of gay men are less significant.

“It’s a shame that in its effort to educate America, Hollywood is so reluctant to acknowledge the history of this illness,” Fowler said.

Executive producer Lovett said there was no conscious effort to avoid discussing gays.

“The show was not about any one community,” said Lovett, who said that after the program was finished, he, too, realized that it did not explicitly discuss gay involvement. “The show was really about the impact that AIDS is having on all of us.”

Added Lovett, who produced “Out in America” for PBS last year and was one of the first network producers to do stories about AIDS and gays:

“My job was to deliver a star-performance package, which is exactly what we did. A number of people we talk about who died were gay. We didn’t say, ‘So-and-so, a gay man, died of AIDS,’ but I think we’re beyond that.”

* A WAKE-UP CALL

Robert Koehler reviews “In a New Light.” F14