TV REVIEW : ‘King and I’ a Savvy Sales Pitch

Whether you want to call it an “entertainomercial” or the trailer to an album doesn’t matter. The fact is that “The King and I: Recording a Hollywood Dream” (at 9 tonight on KCET-TV Channel 28) is a savvy way of publicizing this new addition to the Rodgers and Hammerstein discography.

Properly starry, it features Julie Andrews (who, amazingly, had never sung Anna before) and Ben Kingsley in the title roles and certainly lends itself to such exploitation.

But if you’re reminded of another celebrated Broadway show whose recording production was documented for TV--Leonard Bernstein directing his “West Side Story”--this one bears little resemblance, although it may have been the inspiration.

There are no temperamental encounters here between conductor John Mauceri and his cast. Remember the distraught Lenny and tense Jose Carreras nearly coming to grief over the song “Maria”? Well, nothing so dramatic or memorable happens here. It all just spins along with photo-perfect moments, movie fragments spliced into the numbers as they are being sung and snappy little endorsements and encomiums spoken by the happy cast.

Kingsley, alone, has inner fears to express, never having sung before in public. He talks about the singing hurdles and how they are his “Armageddon,” how he uses breathing exercises to combat his terror, and how he must even suffer his son watching him go to pieces through the glass.

He also gets off a few provocative quips.

“There’s a giveaway in my appearance that tells you I’ve always wanted to be Yul Brynner,” he says, referring to his baldness.

For her part, Andrews looks radiantly gorgeous. Time, we’re led to be believe, takes no toll. And she sings with the same bloom in her voice as on her face. So do the others: Peabo Bryson, Lea Salonga and Marilyn Horne turn in fine musical performances.

The biggest bonus to accrue would seem to be the exposure of a current generation to this stellar Rodgers and Hammerstein score.