The Times from Shreveport, Louisiana • Page 29

i A i THE HREVEPORT IMES March 21, 1979 7-C NBC's ratings hit season low NEW YORK (AP) Despite almost constant schedule shuffling or perhaps because of it NBC's share of the TV audience seems to be shrinking by the week. The troubled network reached its lowest point of the season in the week ending March 18, listing only one program "Little House on the Prairie" in 14th place among the first 22 rated by the A.C. Nielsen Co. NBC's rating for the week was a season low of 13.6, nearly 10 points behind ABC's 22.2. CBS was second at 17.7.

The networks say that means in an average prime-time minute during the week, only 13.6 percent of the homes in the country were tuned to NBC. ABC, in fact, had the week's seven most-watched shows, and CBS claimed three of the first 10. No. 1 for the week was "Three's Company," followed by a "Three's Company" spinoff, "The Ropers," which was being aired for the first time. ABC now has been first in the ratings 10 weeks in la row, and NBC third the last five weeks.

The rating for "Three's Company" was 38.5. Nielsen says that means of all the homes in the country with TV, 38.5 percent saw at least part of the show. NBC has overhauled its prime-time schedule several times since September, and only one of the programs introduced since the start of the TV season has shown any sign of vitality. That program, "Diff'rent Strokes," was ranked 23rd for the week. Most of NBC's recent entries in the ratings competition were clustered near the bottom, "B.J.

and the Bear" in 47th place, "Cliffhangers" 49th, the ultra-expensive "Super- train" 55th, "Mrs. Columbo" 59th. Four of the week's five lowest-rated programs were on NBC, including No. 64 "Checkered Flag or Crash," No. 65 "Harris and No.

66 "Weekend" and No. 68 "Rafferty and the Highway Hustlers." The interloper was CBS' "In Search of Peace" news special, ranked 67th. Here are the week's 10 top-rated shows: "Three's Company," with a rating of 38.5 representing 28.7 million homes, "The Ropers," 36 or 26.8 million, "Laverne and Shirley," 35.4 or 25.7 million, "Happy Days," 33 or 24.6 million, "Mork and Mindy," 32.3 or 24.1 million, "Eight is Enough," 28.9 or 21.5 million, and "Jericho Mile," 28.4 or 21.2 million, all ABC; "M-A-S-H," and "60 Minutes," 28.3 or 21,1 million, tie, and "One Day at a Time," Sunday night, 27.8 or 20.7 million, all CBS. NBC ex-official accused of fraud Alleged schemes by unit managers in NBC offices around the country to skim off company funds have been the subject of a four-month investigation by RCA corporate auditors and federal The count lodged against Cox, 33, is the first stemming from that WASHINGTON (UPI) A former NBC expense account manager agreed Tuesday to plead guilty on one count of federal wire fraud. John Cox, who worked in NBC's Washington office, was accused of embezzling $4,800 in corporate funds for his personal use and with participating in a scheme to divert corpo rate funds to his boss, John Walsh.

Cox, expected to make a formal plea later this week, will be offered immunity for his testimony as part of a plea bargaining arrangement, said Assistant U.S. Attorney Harry Benner. Benner indicated the embezzlement investigation is continuing. Temptations campus in Ruston. Tickets for the concert will be $6 at the door.

The Temptations will perform in concert at 8 p.m. today in the Memorial Gym on the Louisiana Tech Syndrome' is suspenseful by JOE LEYDON Times Entertainment Editor Despite a certain naivete about the methods of reporters and the reliability of government investigators, "The China 4 Syndrome" is an interesting and often suspenseful film. Working from a screenplay he wrote with T.S. Cook and Mike Gray, director James Bridges Paper sue-' cessfully evokes a mood of mounting paranoia as he spins a generally believable tale of chicanery and deception at a nuclear power plant. A television news crew, Lemmon I .2600 Waggoner St.

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But power company officials effectively camouflage the seriousness of the incident with a smokescreen of sophistry and convince the reporter's superiors not to use film shot surreptitiously when the emergency arose. A government board conducts a cursory investigation, gives the plant a clean bill of health, and closes the book on the situation. But supervising engineer Jack Godell (Jack Lemmon conducts his own investigation when the board fails to explain a slight tremor which shook the plant at the time of the near-holocaust. To his horror, he learns that safety reports were falsified and there is a clear and present danger of unleashing "The China Syndrome" the accidental exposing of a nuclear core which theoretically could burn its way through the earth to China, but certainly would contaminate everything and everyone within miles of the plant. As you might expect in a film such as this, it doesn't take long before Godell suspects with just cause that he is being followed.

When a member of the television crew is nearly killed after Godell gives him evidence of the plant's faulty construction, the engineer realizes he must take drastic action. And take it he does. The casting of Jane Fonda and Jack Lemmon, two anti-nuclear power activists, should tip you off right away as to how much impartiality you can expect in this film's treatment of the nuclear power debate. Still, the film's obvious bias is not really that much more offensive than the efforts of most political thrillers to reduce complex issues to simple blacks and whites. A much more nagging problem is the filmmakers' insistence that objective reporting is inherently wrong, and that the feature reporter is somehow redeemed near the end when she openly advocates closer investigation of the power plant.

In addition to being a rather dangerous concept, it is also a stupid one advocacy reporters of any type end up preaching to the already converted, Most viewers would end up turning off a reporter obviously standing on a soap box. If this is silly, then the final assumption that a new investigation will make everything right smacks of naivete. The film spends nearly two hours telling us that the powers that be can hide the truth, then tries to double back and offer us a plum of hope. It does make for a happy ending, but it shatters the verisimilitude "China Syndrome" works so hard for so long to maintain. Speaking of verisimilitude, it may sound cruel to say this, but Jane Fonda looks a little long in the tooth to be playing a glamour girl of the evening news.

In real life, someone tossing out the fluffy stories Ms. Fonda does would probably be in her early to mid-20s. (Look at television news in any major city, and you will see what I mean. But Ms. Fonda still manages to be very good in the part, conveying intelligence and evidencing a believable on-camcra manner while giving her "stories." Michael Douglas is a bit smug as the cameraman who wants Ms.

Fonda to be less objective, though the fault is less his than the script's. Jack Lemmon walks off with the film's acting honors, creating a memorable portrait of a man left dazed and desperate by the realization that his lifework has been corrupted by insidious conspirators. Lemmon 's hoarse, frantic efforts to tell a television audience the truth about the conspiracy brilliantly reflect all the conflicting pulls of loyalty, honesty and horror-struck disbelief which would beset a man in his position. (Now playing at the Shreve City Twin and South Park theaters, "The China Syndrome" is rated PG "Parental Guidance Suggested." The film features some rough language and violence. I T' I 1 Fitter 3Q6 KING MOQC FlatorFitted JT REG.

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