Daily News from New York, New York • 33

Tuesday, April 24. 1990 DAILY NEWS 33 3 3t A A4 tit; ff recognizes 1 of Ks science r-Jid APPRECIATE HOW CAUTIOUSLY NETWORK 1 1 TV handles major issues, note the praise ladled Li onto "thirtysomething" for daring to have a charac- ter contract cancer. That this could be hailed as bold television suggests we all just landed here from the third ring of Saturn. Is there a soap opera in history, back to the dawn of radio, that hasn't milked a fatal disease? As badly as the silly "thirtysomething" is overrated, however, it did take at least one actual daring step this season. On Nov.

7, it showed two men developing an affectionate relationship that led to sex. They even talked iri bed afterward, sheets pulled up to their chests a nice traditional TV touch. Considering that this scene reflects sexual preference for about 10 of the population, it shouldn't have been daring at all. It should have mere ff i ly been showing a fact of life in a country where it's always been said that if you're not hurting anyone else, you're free to do what you want Unfortunately, where gay folks are involved, TV is only one area of U.S. media and life where this remains an abstract concept and change comes slowly.

The encouraging thing about that episode was not its fairly mild content any more than the fact ABC was willing to face the protest it could trigger. Fiction TV has, in fact, integrat- Feldshuh DAVID HINCKLEY CRITIC-AT-LARGE CLEARLY THEATRICAL: Tovah orator, Jim Luigs, have written funny new lyrics for several of the standards, and even the song for the WASP has the clever rhyme: msmmmsS At 'Forza del Des- REVIEW tino.V dear I lost my maraschino, dear." ed gays quietly. There are or have been gay characters on "As The World Turns," "Doctor, Doctor," "Heartbeat," "Tracey Ullman" and "The Wom-" "en" of Brewster Place." "L.A. Law" considered an athlete who lost an endorsement for revealing he was gay. A gay soap opera is being developed.

These remain exceptions. They are also small steps, like travel guides that now include tips for gay travelers. Obviously the material that serves Feldshuh best is drawn from the musical theater. Apart from the "Finian's Rainbow" songs, which she sings movingly, she gets great mileage from two songs Jerry Herman's "Mack By HOWARD KISSEL. Daily Mews Drama nHE MAJOR BENEFI-1 1 ciary of the death of the American musical theater has been cabaret.

If we had a healthy musical theater, a performer, like Tovah Feldshuh would not be working nightclubs. But in her cabaret debut at the Oak Room of the Algonquin, she demonstrates splendidly the virtues theater people bring to this intimate form. Feldshuh's act is clearly a theatrical one. She plays a series of characters (her singing teacher, her Jewish grandmother, a street dude) almost like a monologist, and the songs she does range from standards like "Sunny Side of the Street" and "Shine on Your Shoes" to Judy Collins' enchanting "Secret Garden" to show tunes like "Neverland" and a medley from "Finian's Rainbow." Not everything she does is persuasive. The street dude quickly grows tiresome, as does a lampoon of a WASP Princess.

But when she's on target, which is most of the time, she brings to her' work the ferocious energy' that made her a great ex- ponent. of farce in "Lend Me a Tenor. There is a wonder- -ful sense of adventure and imagination in her act. Play- ing an Italian singing teacher of the old school, she has the grande dame sing "Be-Bop-A-Loo-La" as if it were an aria, a wacky idea she brings off deliciously. She and a collab ISNT IT IRONIC? The Beautiful Woe DamcO By LARRY HACKETT Daily News Staff Writer GUY DRESSED LIKE a college football coach ranting about public policy and rotting flesh doesn't sound charming? Welcome to the ironic land of the Beautiful South.

Paul Heaton began wrapping bright, skittery pop around his militant leftist cant during his years with the Housemartins, one of the most popular bands in Britain during the mid-1980s. Looking for a richer sound, Heaton and Housemartin's drummer Dave Hemmingway formed the Beautiful South, nominally a five-member T-Jaaad but -with steady appear- itncesfrom la'; horn section 1 T1 St I ana singer Brians orngan. UIMUHWWUMllW lltWWWJWMUMllimiW riBM 1 I iililtlili i J- the sad truth is this is how it hap-pens slowly when any group faces the anger, bitterness and fear still directed at gays. To be told one has "violated God's laws," "recruits or "deserves AIDS" is strong stuff, particularly when the speakers cite religion or ethics that involve loving thy sympathetic jnedia portrayal will -change the minds of some anti-gay people, who ultimately will just have to be ignored or legally "controlled when they step into physi-; cal, verbal or professional harassment Unfortunately, this QCNC KAPPOCfl DAILY NEWS and Mabel" and the powerful "Fifty Per Cent" from the Bil- ly Goldenberg-Alan and Marilyn Bergman "Ballroom." All the arrangements (by Wally Harper) are stunningly played by David Lewis. Feldshuh has strong, easy rapport with her audience, and she moves from character to character with great skill.

Her act does exactly what a nightclub act should do. It makes you laugh and it makes you cry. Plays and musicals used to do that, too. Corrigan. Throughout the show, this trio played melody against the corrosive anger of Heaton's lyrics.

It can be bitter, brilliant stuff. The stench of death in the anti-war "Have You Ever Been Away" is "like the smell of roasted Iamb upon your father's breath" not a sentiment usually backed with a bossa nova beat "Song for Whoever" is just as sarcastic as R.E.M's "Pop Song '89" and a lot funnier live, with Hemmingway cooing his thoughtless pleas shamelessly. Comfortably proletarian, friendly and unself-righ-teous, the Beautiful South demonstrated that onstage, pop bands can break the limits set on record a truth most performers find more and more -1 4 tnf South, with Paul Heaton (second from and David Hemmingway (far IF IbiDge anncO Cuoiraey BREAKTHROUGH: Actor Brian Starcher portrayed a gay character in the soap "As the World Turns." latter group not only includes Their debut album, "Welcome to the Beautiful South," is a risky, mixed effort The joyful pop that drove the Housemartins has been substituted with lusher, sometimes treacly arrangements that sound like outtakes from a Simply Red album. Call it REVIEW a move from MTV to VH-1. So when the band ambled onto the Ritz' stage Saturday, looking like they'd just come in from doing yard work, it was a surprise to hear songs from "Welcome" delivered with far more punch and cleverness.

Backed by wiry rhythm and horn sections, Heaton's adenoidal bleat shared equal time with Hemmingway (who has left his -drum kit to sing full time) and cowards wielding baseball i 1 i i a bats, but elements of the U.S. government, like those which would ban gays from ROTC. V. The brightest hope is that a fair-minded majority may one day emerge, and the media's role is that the odds increase whenever gay people become just people. Maybe someday being gay will be incidental in terms of social rights.

Maybe someday gay jokes won't automatically have the uncomfortable effect of gay-bashing. Maybe. Meanwhile, the Gay Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) is noting some progress and regress at its first annual media awards dinner Sunday. Besides many of the shows mentioned above, praise is going to the likes of Phil Donahue, PBS' "AIDS Quarterly" several news magazine segments, publications as diverse as the Village Voice and Metropolitan Home, and Writers from several New York papers. Bob Hope has been cited for narrating a public service spot denouncing anti-gay violence.

'Jj Rebukes go to Guns N' Roses, Sam Kinison, Damon Wayans, Andrew Dice Clay, Bob Grant, Andy CHoward Stern and William Buckley, among others. TFor details, call (212) 966-1700..