Hartford Courant from Hartford, Connecticut • 9

l)f Hartford ourant CONNECTICUT LIVING SECTION SATURDAY APRIL 15, 1989 B2 TELEVISION B6-7 COMICS B8-20 CLASSIFIEDS Taking one's conscience off the hook p. Sartorial splendor on New York runways Stage set for --ft Courant file photo MORTON DOWNEY JR. He's the pit bull of the airwaves, the piranha of TV." From "Blue Collar King" Music, lyrics by David Lloyd Downey uses his big mouth for singing, too By ROGER CATLIN Courant Rock Critic he last time Morton Downey Jr. was in New Haven, he delivered a knockout performance. I.itorallv Stephen Dunn The Hartford Courant How can the outspoken syndicated talk-show host, whose melee in an August show at the Palace Performing Arts Center 'made people-in-the-news headlines -across the nation, possibly top 1 i li 1 1 Evening gowns from Carolina Herrera's fallwinter collection are displayed in the ballroom of New York City's Plaza Hotel.

This multicolored vest, worn beneath a short coat, is part of the Perry Ellis collection. y4 checkerboard suit is revealed from beneath a short overcoat. Both designs are by Carolina Herrera. Combined Wire Services was a happening first, with fashion playing a secondary role, when Marc Jacobs introduced his first collection for Perry Ellis in SoHo's historic Puck Building Monday night before an audience of 1,200. About 700 all luniseii wueii lie reiurus were tonight? By singing.

Yes, to help promote his newly released "Morton Downey Jr. Sings" album, he'll probably be crooning the unsubtle rock 'n' roll of "Hey Mr. Dealer." Which goes a little something like this: Hey Mr. Dealer, You drug puskin' S.O.B. Messin up the minds of the kids of America Just to make your fat expletive ric.

You 're the sleaze bag of the country The garbage of our Or maybe he'll do this reasoned little ditty: Hey Mr. Politician, here we go again Ya promise us this and ya promise us that Ya win our votes with your B.S. garbage Then we find you're just another ly in' bureaucrat "Morton Downey Jr. Sings," just out on tiny Compose records, is a slapdash work of tough-talking anthems, mostly written by his longtime associate David Lloyd in standard country styles. Some of them are sung; others have their topical lyrics spoken over the music, in Downey's inimitable mad-dog See Morton, Page B3 They say women are intimidated by technology, and for a long time I believed them.

But lately I've realized that what I once took for fear might actually be a form of courage. for example, a lifelong victim of math phobia and science phobia and most-things-mechanical phobia, routinely rise up and vanquish pert haps the greatest technological giant of all. And I do it simply because I so often have no use for it. I take my phone off the hook. I don't mean for occasional or brief periods, and I'm not talking about simply turning down the bell or switching on one of those fool, answering machines.

I mean every single day, for hours at a stretch, I initiate total and complete electronic disengagement. -This infuriates would-be callers; "It's been busy since yesterday," they hiss, insinuating that I might be so completely irresponsible and rude and inconsiderate as to have purposely thwarted their attempts at communication. I used to be cowed by these menacing tones and their insulting implications. I used to feel guilty and lie and say I'd actually been on the phone conducting marathon business discussions or immersed in intensive cathartic conversations with my loquacious sisters as a result of some mysterious family crisis. Or and this was really deceitful I'd feign surprise and cuss about one of those darned kids using my bed for a trampoline again and crashing into the night table again and knocking the receiver off the hook again, darned kids.

But I've gotten more and more audacious about revealing the truth of the matter. I didn't feel like talking to anybody, I now say with stunning candor. Frequently, there is silence on the line. The increasingly bald and untimely intrusiveness of fund-raisers and poll takers and bill collectors has certainly helped incite me to rebellion. It's all gotten so incredibly predictable.

Right when the spaghetti's boiling over and the baby's screeching and her brothers are going for blood with baseball bats and hockey sticks, right then is when the intruders mount their assault. "Hello. This is Michelle. What brand of cigarettes do you smoke. "Good evening.

This is Dave. Are you the head of the household. And the worst no salutation, no mock personalization, just a disembodied: "Hold for Bank One. Hold? They've got to be kidding. I don't even hesitate anymore.

Click. They're outta here. If they managed to get through at all. Sometimes I feel sorry for the poor folks not the hired canvassers or programmed voices but the colleagues and acquaintances and friends and other real people who do somehow make contact. i I've been so hardened and emboldened by the relentless rudeness of the rest that I find myself instinctively greeting perfectly legitimate and welcome callers with an air of suspicion.

"Coach? Coach who?" I won't even say who I am or whether I'm home until I determine who wants me and why. -And I shudder to think about aD the people whose calls have been stymied by a small child mumbling something about being right in the middle of "Knight Rider" and "No, sorry, Mommy can't come to the phone because she has a boo-boo Ah, well, if they know us at all, they probably called back later. And got a busy signal. I don't mean to make this strictly a gender thing, but from my narrow and subjective perspective, men do seem to have a very different, milch more dependent kind of relationship with the telephone. Women tend to use the phone to talk, communicate, keep in touch, as the commercial intones.

But I've known an awful lot of men who really seemed to define themselves, in some essential way, by how often and urgently they needed to pull off the road and duck into a phone booth for a five-second chat with who knows who. A Superman complex? I wonder. Perhaps we tend to view the telephone and its vast array of offshoots and offspring in mere functional terms. Technology isn't romantic to us, it's necessary. And when it exceeds the limits of necessity, we aren't afraid to take swift, sure action to return it to its rightful bounds.

I've opted for a time-honored guerrilla tactic. I simply cut the line. things in the showroom," said Saks Fifth Avenue's national fashion director, Ellin Saltzman. Bergdorf Goodman's fashion director, Andy Basile, called the collection "very, very American." "It's Marc's version of the L.L. Bean catalog," he added, referring to the suede jeans, the parkas and down vests in bright pink or lime satin; the skirts or vests in sequined buffalo plaids (those red and black checkerboards used in rugged flannel shirts); and, most obviously, the twin-bedspread-sized cashmere shawls in Jasper Johns-inspired stars and stripes (which will retail for more than The collection, actually, is schizophrenic, a totally disjointed grouping of some of the best of Jacobs' signature items from past collections under his own name (notably his big turtleneck sweaters, hand-knit tweedy cardigans and hooded knit ponchos) as well See Eclectic, Page B2 standing and frequently breaking out with whistles, cheers and applause seemed to be Jacobs' nearest and dearest friends.

The event was the beginning of this spring's round of New York fashion shows, which introduce the fall and winter lines of women's clothing. Models carried the ebullient 25-year-old Jacobs down to the end of the runway at show's end, smothering the designer with hugs, kisses and flowers. Retailers then went backstage to pay him homage, but their comments later were more guarded than enthusiastic. "There are some absolutely wonderful A fWTIC News at 10' off to an uneven start nil i Ittt James mm unarsi ON TV Iff 4 1 'i Iff Sheehan, who has been faulted in the past for being something of a stiff on camera, has warmed up considerably. And co-anchor Beth Carroll, formerly of Springfield's WWLP (Channel 22), complements him nicely.

Many viewers will no doubt appreciate the fact that the WTIC news team goes light on the small talk and personal observations. Sports director Rich Coppola displayed little in the way of the loud, boisterous and opinionated banter sports anchors often indulge in. From this vantage point, that's a blessing, but maybe die-hard sports fans like the loquacious approach. They also may want more time than Coppola has in the broadcast. (His report on the death of boxing great Sugar Ray Robinson was particularly thin, though I liked his feature on a Hamden baseball player who's headed for the big leagues.) And I would personally like to thank weatherman Roger Griswold for not having "weatherwatchers" around the state, as do many of his local news counterparts here and around the country.

However, I am waiting to be convinced of the significance of the station's "Doppler radar," which, as Griswold explained Monday, "is different from all the rest and the first and only Doppler radar in the state of Connecticut." See 'News, Page B3 I Starting a news operation is a lot like hang gliding for the first time: You have to have some nerve, you have to have wings and you better know what you're doing before you take a flying leap off that cliff. Independent station WTIC (Channel 61) got its ''WTIC News at 10" off the ground this week, aided undeniably by the comfortably familiar presence of former WFSB (Channel 3) anchor Pat Sheehan in front of the camera, former ABC news executive Vin Burke behind the camera and the dream-come-true enthusiasm of station owner Arnold Chase. And though Sheehan's on-air maiden voy-. age with a whole crew of new faces was generally steady-as-she-goes opening night, the half -hour local news show's strengths and weaknesses became more distinct as the week went on. First the good news: The team Everything is fine up front.

Lii Rolando Otero The Hartford Courant The "WTIC Naw at 10" tam is mad up of, clockwls from left, Pat Sheehan, Roger Griswold, Rich Coppola and Bath Carroll. They have finished their first week on Hartford's only 10 p.m. TV news show..