ABC Poised for Ratings Stranglehold

TV or not TV . . .

FULL HOUSE: A strong prime-time showing next season would give ABC a lock on most of network TV.

ABC already is No. 1 with Peter Jennings’ evening news, the pace-setter again with “Good Morning America,” and is bidding for late-hour dominance with Ted Koppel’s “Nightline.”

These are all key prestige areas. And ABC, a leader with the 18-to-49 audience preferred by most advertisers, has the potential to win total viewers as well behind such prime-time heavyweights as “Home Improvement” and “Roseanne.”

After a slip last year, when NBC’s “Today” came back strong with Katie Couric joining Bryant Gumbel, “Good Morning America” quickly recovered and now has been No. 1 again for 31 consecutive weeks.

“Nightline,” meanwhile, has made a real move on NBC’s “Tonight Show,” as Koppel suggested it would after Johnny Carson’s departure. Following a strong first quarter this year, “Nightline” also has been the top-rated late-hour series for the three weeks ending June 11.

With the upcoming series of David Letterman on CBS and Chevy Chase on Fox expected to siphon off some of Jay Leno’s “Tonight” audience, “Nightline”--as a distinct alternative--could well be the chief ratings beneficiary and improve its competitive position.

“Nightline” is now 13 years old. It debuted in March, 1980, growing out of a series of late-night reports on the Iran crisis that ABC began running in November, 1979.

SOPHIA’S CHOICE: Estelle Getty created a memorable television role as the sharp-tongued Sophia in NBC’s “The Golden Girls,” and, the way things are going, the character may be around indefinitely.

After the demise of “The Golden Girls,” Getty stayed on for a new CBS version of the series called “The Golden Palace.” And with the cancellation of that show, the Sophia character has been picked up again for the fall season--this time by NBC’s “Empty Nest.”

The addition of Getty and Marsha Warfield (“Night Court”) as an inner-city doctor are aimed at giving new life to the slipping “Empty Nest,” a onetime powerhouse that stars Richard Mulligan and Dinah Manoff but was weakened by the departure of Kristy McNichol.

Not long ago, “The Golden Girls” and “Empty Nest” were back-to-back Saturday entries for NBC, so Getty’s move is a natural, especially since both shows were set in Miami--as was “The Golden Palace.”

NBC says that in “Empty Nest,” Sophia “will move back to her former Miami neighborhood and pay regular visits at the home” of Mulligan, who portrays a doctor.

BALANCE OF POWER: It’ll be a real dogfight this fall in the early Thursday time slot where “The Simpsons” helped destroy NBC’s dominance by neutralizing the old “Cosby Show.”

With “The Simpsons” and the new “Sinbad” sitcom leading off the night from 8 to 9, Fox figures to have a popular tandem. But NBC is countering with two of its own top shows, “Mad About You” and “Wings.”

CBS and ABC, meanwhile, are taking a different tack--targeting older viewers. The CBS 8 p.m. entry is Carroll O’Connor’s always-competitive “In the Heat of the Night.” And ABC has Daniel J. Travanti in “Missing Persons,” a drama about a bureau of the Chicago Police Department.

MAIN MAN: The Bulls and Suns put on a swell TV show and Michael Jordan was great when he had to be, but if I’m building an all-time pro basketball team, I still start with Magic.

MARCH OF TIME: When you hear old TV shows like “Dennis the Menace” and “Gilligan’s Island” referred to as classics, you know we’re heading south.

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: “Doing ‘The Tonight Show,’ ” Jack Paar once wrote, “was like shoveling smoke.”

SECOND THOUGHTS: It looked like a great idea at the time, but moving “Designing Women” and “Major Dad” to Fridays really took the sizzle out of CBS’ steak. The Monday lineup from which they were moved never was the same, and both shows died after the switch.

DRAWING BOARD: Ron Reagan, now a regular on the Fox newsmagazine “Front Page,” which debuts Saturday, is one of six correspondents the series expects to employ. One of the planned stories by the son of the former President contrasts two high schools in the same area--”one in the inner city, the other suburban. What’s apparent is that not only are the kids not even on the same page, they’re not in the same library. But they’re in the same school system.”

SUMMER SUMMIT: That big Aug. 2 conference here about violence on TV is expected to draw more than 400 members of the broadcast and cable industries to the all-day gathering at the Beverly Hilton Hotel.

“Our hope,” says producer Marian Rees, a principal in the meeting, “is that, following the conference, every person who participates in it will do his or her part to tone down the level of violence portrayed on television.”

NOW AND THEN: Stand-up comedian Brett Butler, whose new, fall ABC series “Grace Under Fire” is being touted by Madison Avenue as a strong entry, once did a turn as a writer for Dolly Parton’s ill-fated variety show. The experience “is best forgotten,” says Butler, who stars as a working mother in her half-hour sitcom.

WHO’S THE BOSS?: Tony Danza is co-executive producer of boxer George Foreman’s new, fall ABC sitcom, “George,” in which the fighter plays a family man who starts a youth center. Before starring in “Who’s the Boss?,” Danza played a struggling boxer in “Taxi.”

BEING THERE: “I moved to Minneapolis, where it was cold. I figured I’d keep better.”--Rhoda Morgenstern (Valerie Harper) in “Rhoda.”

Say good night, Gracie . . .