The Daily Herald from Chicago, Illinois • Page 16

2 Saturday, November 26, 1977 THE DAILY HERALD Today on TV Diane Mermigas Hobbit comes to life on TV special Bilbo Baggms, the hobbit creation of J.R.R. Tol- kien's imagination, once was content smoking his pipe and gorging himself on good food in Middle- earth, believing that "adventures make one late for dinner." Somehow, that did not stop him for accompanying 13 dwarfs and Gandalf the Wizard on a quest to recover treasure from the Lonely Mountain. Not even a hobbit can resist a good crusade, and thank goodness for that. Otherwise, there might not have been a "Hobbit" or a "Lord of the Rings" or any of the strangely enchanting creatures that Tol- kien left to the world before his death at 81 in 1973. SOME MIGHT INSIST Tolkien's fantasies are largely the treasures of a particular cult, but television's first attempt to give "the Hobbit" animated life is a labor of love for the masses.

The television team of Arthur Rankin Jr. and Jutes Bass that traditionally has produced animated holiday specials like "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Rain- deer" and "Frosty, the Snowman," has been working on a condensed, 90-minute version of Tolkien's Hobbit" for 10 years. The most integral part of the production was drawing the characters and assigning them colors, movements and characteristics that were true to Tolkien's work, Rankin said. The task was given to Arthur Rackham, a turn of the century artist who created the original illustrations for "Peter Pan" and other fairy-tale classics. THE ANIMATION was in the amking for four years.

Rankin said. In all corners of the world including Japan. Los Angeles and New York, experts worked on different aspects of animation. "It represents the fullest animation since Disney," he said. "The project includes hundreds of thousands of individual drawings by more than 200 artists, animators, continuity and layout artists, background designers and painters." Tolkien's physical description including the color of the dwarfs' beards, 'he shape of their swords and even the color of their buckles and shoelaces, were followed faithfully.

To please the purists, and there are an estimated 13 million Tolkien fans in the country today, Rankin and Bass were careful not to change anything in the hobbit's story. "Tolkien wrote a very detailed and involved story, ami we wanted our script to capture the essence of thiit Rankin said At Tolkien had given flight to his own fantasy with paintings that interpreted his writings. Jehu Wayne and the War movies But. as with all folk and fairy tales, the characters, dialog and situations are best left to individual pretation. The animation applied to "The Hobbit," which airs at 7 m.

Sunday on Channel 5, is hardly the cartoon variety. The special, sponsored by Xerox Corp. shows what marvelously grown up things can be done with animation. The characters are truly three-dimensional white their movements border on the surrealistic. BILBO BAGGINS appears as a typical 30-year-old hobbit (if there is such a thing) an ordinary sort who is beardless, shorter than a dwarf, content to live in a hobbit hole built by his father, "inclined to be fat in the stomach," dresses in bright colors, has a good-natured face and a hearty laugh just as Tol- kien ordered.

Baggms sounds like your typical suburbanite, who is a homebody out of habit but an adventurer at heart. Nothing seems disturbing to Baggins. He happens upon a magical ring that, with one rub, allows him to disappear and reappear in seconds. The trinket, along with a charmed sword that is a predictable element to any good epic, prove useful to Baggins as he encounters a weird parade of creatures from other lands. SMAUG.

AN ALL-powerful, fire-breathing dragon with a gargantuan voice, roars like thunder one minute and speaks in modulated tones the next. Elf King, leader of the woodelves, is a stern, angry and greedy fellow, while Klrond is chief of the elves and a "noble, fair of face, wise as a wizard" kind of guy. Thorin Oakenshield, leader of the dwarfs, is pompous and bossy while Gollum, creature of the darkness, lives alone in a cave and punctuates his words with a creepy, swallowing sort of sound. They are a nice bunch of creatures to be sure, but don't worry about remembering the Old World names. Once the Tolkien fantasy begins to unravel, it's easy to forget who you are, or what you've been worrying about all week as the story engulfs you like a dream like sleep.

THERE ARE SEVERAL interesting sidelights to the television "Hobbit." The voices of Tolkien's brainchildren belong to an ensemble of distinguished artists. Richard Boone plays Smaug, Hans Conreid plays Thorin, motion picture actor and director John Houston plays Gandalf, movie director and producer Otto Preminger plays Elf King, Cyril Ritchard plays El- BIOwBaggiBsIs "The Hobbtt" rond and night club monologist Brother Theodore plays Gollum. Familiar game chow panelist and stage actor Orson Bean is a perfect vocal match for Bilbo Baggms. Bean, who received a lot of press coverage a few years ago when he and his family went through a "hippie" stage selling all their possessions, likes to think of himself as a "hobbit" type. "I FEEL A little like Bilbo Baggins.

If you set goals for yourself like he did and like I did, and you do whatever is necessary to achieve them, it works. Goals don't have to be what everyone else thinks they should be," Bean said. One of the most enjoyable features of "The Hobbit" production is the musical score, a collaboration between Maury Laws and Bass, much of which is sung by balladeer Glenn Yarbrough. Yarbrough's wavering, earthy voice sounds like its coming from Middle-Earth and adds to the mystique of the story. Tolkien's affinity for Angle-Saxon and general English folklore like "Beowulf' and the Arthurian legend "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" is present in "The Hobbit." Adults, more than the children, will find themselves mesmerized by Tolkien's tale of "One morning long ago in the quiet of the world and probably will plead for more of the same.

If the ratings are good, Rankin and Bass will find themselves working on Tolkien's trilogy "Lord of the Rings" for television animation, they said. TV HIGHLIGHTS: ABC's been making "Tabitha" a regular on Saturday nights at 7 p.m. on Channel 7 with little fanfare in a low-keyed attempt to switch around and replace series that are not doing well in the ratings. Tonight the daughter of Samantha, on the old "Bewitched" series, finds herself falling for a ski instructor. Class 5-A football playoffs of the Illinois High School Assn.

air live from Illinois State University at 7 p.m. today on Channel 9. Chicago film critics Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert review "Heroes," "Equus" and "Bobby Deerfield" in today's "Sneak Previews" at 7 p.m on Channel 11. Alfred Hitchcock's recent thriller "Family Plot" is a tale of two greedy couples who kidnap and contact the spirits at 8 p.m. today on Channel 5.

Lily Tomlin and James Taylor share the hosting duties on "Saturday Night Live" at 10:50 p.m. on Channel 5. Archie finds himself pitted against his son-in-law when he joins a force of local vigilantes who think of Mike Stivic as an annoying liberal in "All in the Family" at 7 p.m. Sunday on Channel 2. Robert Redford is a CIA researcher searching for the link between his job analyzing spy codes and the murder of six of his colleagues in "Three Days of the Condor" at 8 p.m.

Sunday on Channel 2. The Duke offers a look at how Hollywood covered all the wars from Pearl Harbor to V-J Day in "Oscar Presents the War Movies and John Wayne" at 8 p.m. Sunday on Channel 7. A cartoon version of the Pulitzer Prize-winning comic strip, "Doonesbury," airs as a half hour special at 8:30 p.m. Sunday on Channel just before the "1977 Miss World Beauty Pageant" at 9 p.m.

Errol Flynn starts in the swashbuckling tale of a Caribbean pirate and his band opposite Olivia de Havilland, Basil Rathbone and Robert Barrat in "Captain Blood" at 10:30 p.m. Sunday on Channel 9. Chicago Ballet starts to show quality by LYNN ASINOF The pieces are starting to fail into place for the Chicago Ballet, the youthful company that has been promising to turn into a quality ballet troupe for the past three years. There still are lots of rough edges, but the company's November program, which opened at the Medinah Temple Friday, showed that the troupe is getting its act together. The new faces in the company are filling many of the holes so painfully obvious last year, and new choreography is giving the troupe greater depth.

"Yerma," a powerful new piece by Domy Redter-Soffer, is an example of the challenging new choreography the company is tackling. A stark, dramatic ballet, "Yerma" is based on the tragedy of a childless woman who kills her husband as part of a fertility ritual. KATHLEEN SMITH, a new addition to the company, portrayed Yerma with a drama that gave the piece both emotion and texture. Formerly with the Irish BaHet, Smith has a fine technical edge that enables her to concentrate on interpretation instead of choreography. The Medinah Temple stage, although big and barn-like, gives the company an opportunity to stage its ballets.

That is a luxury the troupe did not enjoy in its old home, a tiny chamber theater at 1016 N. Dearborn St. The extra space gave added dimension to Frederic Franklin's "Tribute," a company favorite choreographed to the music of Cesar Franck. The piece, a lyrical ballet, was a showcase for Cynthia Ann Roses, who still has to put more phrasing into her movements before she win be able to handle such demanding roles. THE COMPANY'S MEN.

however, have developed more stage assurance since the number was performed last. Gregory Begley stood out with clear strong lines in his jumps and leaps. Guest artists Starr Danias, formerly of the American Ballet Theatre, and John Meehan, new addition to ABT, made an all-too-brief appearance in the "Spring Waters" pas de deux. A one-minute explosion of dance, the piece is so short that it left the audience wondering why the dancers bothered to put on costumes. The audience got a longer look at the two in the "Raymonda" pas de dix, a Chicago Ballet staple that is a good barometer of the dancers' technical skills.

OF CLASSICAL combinations, poses and lifts, the number quickly shows all the company's flaws. Catlike in both quickness and Review stretch, Danais and her partner John Meehan displayed A polish missing in the rest of the troupe. But the Chicago dancers handled their variations with style, playing up to the audience with their youthful good nature. More im- portant, the dancers were able to tackle the technique that once left them looking like they were over their heads. Chicago dance fans, who have waited patiently for three years, are finally seeing the company make good on its promise.

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