The Baltimore Sun from Baltimore, Maryland • Page E1

Section www.sunspot.nettoday TODAY Thursday, September 19, 2002 Fall TV 1 Kevin Cowherd They've been there before; so have we Two new series feature nearly identical plot lines about going back in time Bel-Loc Diner a throwback to simpler, calmer times SOME YEARS ago, at the end of an evening that included a few too many cocktails, I sat down with a piece of lined composition paper and penned the immortal "Ode to the Bel-Loc Diner." It was a tribute to the legendary retro eatery that squats like a giant, shimmering glass-and-chrome toad just off the Beltway in Parkville, at the corner of Loch Raven and Joppa. With very few brain cells operating, I ticked off all the things I loved about the joint: the omelets the size of manhole covers and the thick milkshakes served in the tall, stainless-steel shakers, the red vinyl booths and the little jukeboxes with Sinatra tunes at each table, the waitresses in their crisp white uniforms who called you "Hon" and moved through the aisles, their arms laden with plates of food, with the righteous swagger of Green Berets. God, I loved that poem. For about seven hours. Unfortunately, as so often happens when you mix prose and peppermint schnapps, the poem did See Cowherd, 3e JED KIRSCHBAUM SUN STAFF PHOTOS By David Zurawik SUN TELEVISION CRITIC One of the fascinating things about television is the way that mediocre series often can still have something important to tell us about ourselves.

Even the worst can be a useful window into the national psyche. That's the case with three new network fall series premiering tonight and tomorrow night series that are worth thinking about even if you are less than dazzled by the pilots. They say lightning never strikes twice. But, then, they haven't yet seen That Was Then, a new drama on ABC, and Do Over, a sitcom premiering tonight on WB. One of the weirder aspects of a decidedly weird and largely uninspired lineup of new series is the remarkable similarities between these two shows.

Each deals with going back in time and starting over, but the real deja vu is in the details. Each series features an unhappy and relatively lonely salesman (one sells doors, the other paper) in his 30s who suffers a freak accident that involves a huge jolt of electricity shooting through his body. Instead of getting electrocuted, though, both men are transported back in time to high school on the eve of making a big speech at an all-school assembly. The first time around, each of them blew the speech and lost the girl of his dreams, and they both feel it has been downhill ever since to what they think of as middle-aged failure. The nearest we come to any difference in the two series is that one takes place in 1980 and the other 1988.

What are the odds of this all being a coincidence? Granted, Hollywood has no shortage of brain-dead thieves who will steal even a bad idea if they think it will get them a pilot deal. Still, the identical concept of these series seems noteworthy, especially as it links up with other messages about "starting over" seen elsewhere on television these days. You can't help but think these series might be speaking to or feeding off of something audience members are feeling or, at least, network executives think American viewers are feeling. Jordan Levin, the entertainment president of WB, has been quoted as saying, "In times of uncertainty, we seek nostalgia," and his network seems to have a very clear idea of where the audience is one year after the 911 attacks. In addition to Do Over, Levin's network has another series exploring the notion of starting over: Everwood, a Monday drama starring Treat Williams as a renowned neurosurgeon and father of two "whose life is changed forever the day his loving wife dies," in the words of the WB promotional campaign.

He quits his Manhattan practice and moves himself and his kids to Colorado in an effort to reconnect with what remains of his family. New series are often about See TV, 5e Theater Column Avi Decter stands in the area soon to be filled with an exhibit on Jewish life in small-town Maryland. DISPLAYS OF ENTHUSIASM At the Jewish Museum of Maryland, director Avi Decter articulates a clear mission: to preserve and provoke. Andre De Shields is guest of honor for an Arena Players bly unfamiliar with both Decter and his little-en-gine-that-could of a museum in East Baltimore. Under Decter's direction, past or future exhibits include such unusual subject matter as Jewish vacations, Jews of small-town Maryland, and Baltimore's grand old, mostly Jewish-owned department stores.

Most outre of all, however, was an exhibit in 2000 titled Tchotchkes! That one, about the kitschy knickknacks collected by Jewish families, even had some members of Decter's board of directors wondering about his judgment when he first posed the idea. "I thought it was below By Michael Ollove SUN STAFF Avi Decter has been doing some thinking about Jewish mothers lately, and that has led him to an arresting conclusion. "You don't have to be Jewish to be a Jewish mother," the voluble director of the Jewish Museum of Maryland observed recently. "You don't have to be a mother to be a Jewish mother. You don't even have to be a woman to be a Jewish mother." An amusing and insightful notion, to be sure, but one that wouldn't have come to much had it occurred to most of us.

A wit Glad to be 50: Arena Players triumphs over its struggles Jewish Museum of Maryland curator Melissa Martens prepares an artifact for a future exhibit on Jewish vacations. our dignity," said Ira Askin, the former president of the museum board. But Askin now happily admits that he was ultimately won over by the exhibit's combination of fun and scholarship. It helped that museum attendance began to climb with Tchotchkes! after a period of renovations that See Decter, 3e ticism at the dinner table perhaps, or maybe an e-mail to a friend. Either way, a flicker of an idea quickly expired.

Luckily, though, the thought occurred to Decter, and because it did it will enjoy a rather more substantial airing. In fact, because it occurred to Decter, it will be given attention both serious and whimsical at his museum in a major exhibit on Jewish mothers tentatively slated for the fall of 2004. Those surprised that a staple of Jewish comics would be considered museum-worthy are proba Julio Oscar Hechoso (left) and Pablo Santos star in WB's "Greetings From Tucson." By Mary Carole McCauley SUN ARTS WRITER When Andre De Shields was growing up in Baltimore in the 1950s, black people who wanted to act and sing and dance were often looked down on by their community. In a segregated city in which black audiences weren't welcome at the major performing arts venues, he says, it smacked too much of a minstrel show, of shuffling and jiving for the white folk. That's why the Arena Players was so important.

"It was a place where black people appearing before a black audience See Theater, 5e From found objects, artist found redemption Tom Miller's creative work showcased in a new exhibit mous tribute to Miller. Tom Miller: Changing Spaces presents 17 of the artist's signature painted furniture pieces, including one-of-a-kind tables, chairs, desks, cabinets and sculptural screens, that have been lent to the museum by local collectors. Many of the collectors' personal responses to their pieces have been reprinted in the exhibit's wall labels and texts. Miller created more than 200 works during his most active period, between 1985 and 1995. His works were exhibited both locally and in several national touring shows, and he is widely credited with creating the "Afro-Deco" style, whose strong patterns and vibrant colors blend the European modernism of Picasso and Matisse with the traditional subject matter of African-American art.

Almost all of Miller's work was fashioned from found objects discarded furniture he picked up in thrift shops or rescued from streets and alleyways which he lovingly reconstructed into jewel-like artworks that were both decorative and See Miller, 5e By Glenn McNatt SUNARTCRITIC Despite a burden of troubles that might have disheartened a lesser artist, Baltimore native Tom Miller managed to create works that were full of joyful whimsy. The trademark of his style was a smile, expressed through gentle good humor that poked fun at life's pain even as it acknowledged it. Miller's career was tragically cut short in 2000 when, at the age of 54, he died after a protracted struggle with AIDS. By then he had become a beloved figure among local collectors, who often waited up to two years to purchase examples of his exquisite fancy. Now the Baltimore Museum of Art, which organized a major retrospective of the artist's work in 1995, has mounted a posthu INSIDE Today's TV: The Survivor franchise moves to Thailand for the new challenge.

Page 4e Dear Abby: A plea for organ donation. Page2E Liz Smith: Gore Vidal's '80s best seller Creation is being re-released with the deleted material restored. Page 2e Comics 6e Crossword 6e, 7e Movies LIVE Television 4e Horoscope 4e Bridge 4e AMY DAVIS SUN STAFF "A Bird in Hand is Worth Two in the Bush" is featured in the Tom Miller exhibit. The artist died in 2000 from an AIDS-related illness..