The Orlando Sentinel from Orlando, Florida • Page 41

7 art- The Orlando Sentinel 60 Minutes' has another fine hour in ratings, E-8 THURSDAY, February 6, 1992 Daily press, tabloids are Vt? i -a Ly i i I 8 IS .4 i Greg Dawson 1 TELEVISION uneasy kin Big-city papers don't like to admit they're in the same family with supermarket sensationalists, but on some stories the resemblance is unmistakable. By Paul Galloway ft 1 i .1 CHICAGO TRIBUNE This is not a pretty story. It concerns a difficult, deeply troubled, off-and-on relationship between mainstream newspapers and supermarket tabloids. The following is an exclusive excerpt from a secretly recorded session that a well-known big-city daily newspaper recently had with its therapist. Paper: I feel so ashamed.

I thought it was over. I thought I could stay away. But then Therapist: Then what? It's important to talk about it. Paper: Then I went back Therapist: To the Enquirer? Paper: No, it was the Star this time. They had all this stuff about Bill Clinton, and I just couldn't resist.

They used me. I feel so dirty. What will my readers think? Therapist: You think you're better than the Star. Paper: I know I am! And the Enquirer and the Globe and the Sun and the whole sleazy bunch! All they care about is trash and gossip and rumors and weird stories about space aliens I'm sorry, I didn't think I'd break down like this. Therapist: It's OK Here's a handkerchief.

Please continue. Paper: Anyway, they're all so superficial and sensational and manipulative. All they talk about is sex and movie stars and Princess Di and Elvis. Therapist: But don't you both often write about the same things? You both covered the Willie Smith trial, didn't you? And the Mike Tyson and Jeffrey Dahmer stories? Those are very sensational. You also write about movie stars and the British royal family.

But you talk as if you and the tabloids aren't in the same business. Paper: We're not, not really. Don't you see? We're serious, and they're not. They don't care about Truth and Justice. They just want to titillate and make money.

Therapist: And you don't? Paper: Well All right, readers. Do you see the problem here? Whenever embracing a story that appears first in a', supermarket tabloid, mainstream papers believe that, they're being unfaithful to their principles, that they're committing journalistic adultery. The issue that drove the big-city daily paper to its therapist's couch, of course, was its decision to write about Gennifer Flowers' account of her alleged love, affair with Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton that was un-; veiled in the Star. To understand the conflicting emotions of the big-, city newspapers, you have to understand the tabloids.

i First, there are tabloids and there are tabloids, which is to say that some, to put it kindly, are 5 v' 'x Bia WITSBERGERSENTINEL for iids ills cal cfh9 not con panic By Susan Figliulo HEALTH FITNESS NEWS SERVICE A mid the papers and notices a child hauls home from school day care, those demanding Revamped 6 newscast is full-tilt show biz Channel 6 now has the only newscast in town that could force an anchor to call in sick with a sprained ankle. It simply wouldn't do to have new anchor David Wittman hobbling over to chat with Mike Storms in the sports "attic," or Michelle Muro leaning her crutches against Pamela Kister's big-screen weather monitor. Somehow it's appropriate that when WCPX unveiled its frenetic wanderlust format on Monday, the top story was about a circus. Kelly the perambulating pachyderm would have been right at home on the new Channel 6 set. But even Kelly (R.I.P.) would have stepped aside at air time, lest she be trampled by Wittman or Muro charging onto the set from the wings with hot, breaking news.

The revamped Channel 6 news, with more venues than the Winter Olympics on a set that looks like a cross between Pee-wee's Playhouse and Max Headroom, is unquestionably a better show than the broadcast it replaced. Whether it's also a better newscast remains to be seen. But the presence of Wittman, imported from Boston to replace Glenn Rinker, who was relieved of his duties in October, is a step Jots of steps, in the new scheme in the right direction. The station hopes that direction is upward from its current third place among the three local network affiliates. A polished news reader with obvious command of the material before him, Wittman lends a weight and gravitas that were missing when Muro anchored alone.

(Wittman and Muro's broadcast airs weekdays at 6 and 11 p.m., and on WKCF-Channel 18 at 10 p.m.) The new setup has Wittman and Muro standing at a heart-shaped desk at the center of the newsroom and hoofing it to various far-flung crannies to visit with Storms about sports or Kister about storms. Sometimes, a reporter drops by to chat about a story in the works, plopping down on the nearest desk. Shepard Smith put one leg up on the desk in a Ralph Laur-enish pose, while Ed Trauschke favored the football coach position, with both legs flopped over the side. In a taped piece that aired Monday, WCPX general manager Mike Schweitzer said the new look was an attempt "to break down the walls, so they viewers can gain a sense of the personality of the news, and the people that put it together." Note that Schweitzer said nothing about improving the quality of the newscast. -We're into show biz and gimmicks here, and as a gimmick, this isn't a bad one.

The effect is to have taken an indifferent newscast that said to viewers "Take us or leave us" and transformed it into one that cries, "Watch us!" but in the next breath, "Catch us if you can!" There's certainly nothing so sacred about the 6 o'clock news that it requires anchors to remain chained to a desk; most viewers probably don't sit still to watch it anyway. Nearly everyone can remember a beloved college professor who paced the stage and employed theatrics while imparting information more profound than the tragic story of a circus elephant gone berserk. Clearly, there have been some opening week jitters. Wittman and Muro are in the paradoxical position of wanting to exude the chemistry of old friends while at the same time playing on his newness. There have been awkward moments of silence, and just awkward moments.

Wittman probably has committed more verbal blunders in one week than he did in a month in Boston. Introducing a story during President Bush's visit to Central Florida, he nervously merged "Mary" and "message" for a comical gaff: "Mary Hamill is live at an Orange County grocery store to tell us more about the president's marriage." In Boston, Wittman had a reputation with critics as a solid, if undynamic, news reader and reporter, and he seems hesitant to come out from behind his objective armor to be a "personality." The first two installments of his "First Impressions" series were disappointing because they gave us few impressions of David Wittman. What we got was Wittman dutifully reporting the impressions of others and not very original ones at that. Perhaps future installments of "First Impressions" will showcase the witty and eclectic David Wittman who sat for an Orlando Sentinel interview recently. Please see DAWSON, E-6 Please see TABLOIDS, E-6 strep bacteria, Berkelhamer said, although staph infection may also produce boils or blisters around the sore, while the presence of strep can lead weeks later to nephritis, or inflammation of the kidneys.

"That's unusual, and it's never been conclusively proven that treatment of impetigo prevents nephritis," Berkelhamer noted. "But many doctors believe treatment lessens the probability." Because either bacteria can be treated with antibiotics, Berkelhamer said, "a culture to identify the bacteria often is not performed because a nhysician will recognize the sores on sight." Treatment may be an oral medication or a cream or ointment applied to the sores. "Once a child has been on a treatment for 24 hours, it's generally OK Please see KIDS, E-2 In addition, Berkelhamer said, "when a child starts day care or school especially an oldest child who may have been a little sheltered the child is likely to get sick more often than they did before. As they go through enough of these illnesses, they're building up a 'memory bank' that will eventually allow them to be more resistant." Meanwhile, parents need to know what to watch for in each of these "group diseases." One common factor: Although each has its own particular symptoms, any of them may be caused by staph or strep bacteria. Impetigo appears as "sores that do not heal as promptly as others," Berkelhamer said.

"There's more redness and some crusting, which often has a yellowish color. The sores frequently are around the child's nose or mouth, although they may spread anywhere on the body." Generally impetigo is caused by instant attention start: "A case of (fill in the blank) has been reported in your child's classroom." Sometimes the disease is strep throat, sometimes it's pinkeye, sometimes impetigo. All are contagious, all sound a little scary, all seem to require vigilance and an eventual, if not immediate, trip to the doctor. But none is cause for panic, said Jay Berkelhamer, M.D., who is professor of pediatrics at the University of Chicago and a spokesman for the American Academy of Pediatrics. In the first place, the fact that one child has an illness doesn't mean everyone else in the child's day-care group or classroom will get it.

Showing affection is a touchy subject for families. Family learning: Being prepared with the 'Boy Scouts Advice from Marguerite Kelly. Resource guide. I WU mi "ilJ'ip i Banality buries comedy in 'The Cemetery Club' By Elizabeth Maupin mm SENTINEL THEATER CRITIC i Mr this TV-sitcom clone of a play. And I must admit, too, that I was in a minority.

Most members of the Civic's audience that night most of them close to the ages of the sixtysomething characters in the play were in stitches just about all the way from beginning to end. "It's so nice to see a play that doesn't challenge you," the man in the back row said as the lights went At the opening-night performance of Tfie Cemetery Club, there was a man in the back row with a very loud laugh. It was so loud a laugh that it caused the people in front of him to look at each other and roll their tlViijiU ,11 7 i 'Pfin'" i eyes. And it was so loud .1 Hj 1 up. auJ Nice, I don't know a laugu uidi it, emu fillers like it, managed to V' TOM BURTONSENTINEL about.

But he got the part about challenge exactly right. The Cemetery Club, which ran for only seven weeks on Broadway in 1990, is about three Jewish widows who meet once a month to visit their husbands' graves. For Doris, who is still mourning her husband, the visit is the high point of her month; for Lucille, who talks of men non-stop, the time has come to abandon the cemetery and move on. Ida is torn between the two of them: She thinks she's ready to resume her life, but she feels guilty about even thinking about it. That plot, although it turns mawkish before play's end, is largely an excuse for obscure the fact that a few people in the theater weren't laughing at all.

The Cemetery Club, presented as part of Civic Theatre of Central Florida's Second Stage series, is that kind of show. Some people think it's the cutest, funniest thing they've ever seen. Others think it's a silly, hackneyed, incompetent excuse for a play. I must admit that, at Cemetery Club's opening-night performance, I was one of the people who weren't laughing. I may have smiled a couple of times.

But on the whole I would rather have been home watching television than sitting through Anne Keidel (left), Mattie Wolf and Terry Hill play widowed friends in the Civic Theatre's Second Stage production of 'The Cemetery The Golden Giris-style jokes about diges- popular entertainment of all kinds), The tion, doggie bags and buying on dis- Cemetery Club never shows you anything count, but mostly about sexagenarians you don't already know. It's all about having sex. Like a lot of popular TV comedies (and, for that matter, like a lot of Please see CEMETERY, E-4.