Newsday from New York, New York • 63

i I J'L 4 i 1 B3 mmimmmmmskmE marvin kitmah show 3 I Blew It Tale of the tape: No preview of finale Executive Producer Part 2 newsday Monday November 23 wa REALLY LOOKING forward to episode of (ABC 7 9:30 pm) the farewell to Bobby Simone (Jimmy Smits) a 90-minute episode that should be a classic Normally network PR people send cassettes in advance to TV critics so we can tell you good or bad My screening room is filled with advance tapes But apparently my name was on a short list of critics not getting this episode a short list consisting of one me The word was I had displeased co-executive producer and co-creator Steven Bochco in some way so the ABC flacks were under orders from him to not send me what was at the least the most important event of the November sweeps The most important since David Caruso left four years ago the resolution of medical crisis is the culmination of a powerful arc that had me on the edge of my chair all season The episode would give me a chance to say goodbye to Bobby and Jimmy in print And I was banned? Bochco must be kidding The first reason reported to me was that he was afraid I would give away the ending Supposedly I had a record for committing this crime This is absurd If anything I bend over backwards the other way barely telling plots of shows compared with other writers I usually have so many other things to say in my limited space Besides people have little enough to look forward to on TV without telling them the whole story Then I heard that he was afraid I might not like the Bhow Everybody the actors writers producers had worked so hard on this finale he was trying to protect them from my bad review he realize always the risk that I will write a good review? From everything heard the Smits finale tomorrow night is a great Bhow a powerful poignant episode Why is he penalizing the people who worked so hard? cheating Smits especially from getting a last rave been sitting mesmerized in front of ever since Bobby went into the hospital the second week of this season As a viewing experience as if been in the hospital room right there with him Especially for me someone who underwent a heart procedure (quadruple bypass) in 1989 As they say been there stunned I believe that a man of fairness and intelligence would make such a pre-judgment on me Finally the truth came out In talks with the people not sending me the cassette I learned that apparently 1 Bochco like my way of writing about him believing I attack him and people close to him personally rather than criticizing his work His office my sources say has actually been compiling a rap sheet of my high crimes and misdemeanors in print to justify the ban true I have been critical of him from time to time My basic rule of criticism is that anybody who makes $50 million (as 10-year contract at ABC guaranteed) is not above criticism $49 million is something else I like Bochco He is as I've written many times a great force for good -a leader in mak-ing quality shows Is it my fault that he has had a tendency to do bad shows in between the good? I call them as I see them He probably like my reviews of and Conveniently he has forgotten all the good thingB I had to say about South" last year And what about my passionate defense of What an irony it is that this should happen over I was one of the first to climb over the barricades and go up against the Rev Donald crusade to ban even before it went on the air in 1993 I championed in the dark days when advertisers were nervous about having their spots mixed in with the nudity and rough language Steven may be suffering from a short attention span Just because I totally thrilled with Rick being cast as replacement on the list? Bochco may have a low threshhold for criticism I can understand that being that way myself Still in my 29 years of writing about TV nobody has been stupid enough to try to prevent me from seeing their work a self-destructive trick harking back to the days when theater owners would not send opening night-tickets to critics whose opinions they like not an especially effective tactic in TV since I can watch the program tomorrow Well I suppose lucky he send Sipowicz over to arrest me Maybe Bochco is doing me a favor keeping me sing about what happens until tomorrow night i rest of the viewers Whatever is in his mind I think being petty and a bit misguided in trying to cheat me out of seeing Jimmy farewell Even if he wants to censor me I still think he is a giant in Please see KITMAN on ftge B8 ABC Photo Steven Bochco copping out i Newiday Photos Ail Mints Lea DeLaria steals the scene as Hildy Esterhazy in "On the Sailors left enjoy their last 24-hour shore leave before shipping out to World War II unassuming divertissement and a deceptively crafty slice of art-house Americana rethought production still has its mqjor claim to fame from that summer In other words it has Lea DeLaria the celebrated out-lesbian comic as an unconventional lusty trucker of a cabby named Hildy who turns this ensemble character into a scene stealing combination of Ethel Merman Rosie the Riveter and Rosie And of course Wolfe still has Please see TOWN on Page B9 the Reality? pictures were analyzed for attitudes: Were the elderly who were pictured smiling or looking glum more often than the youngsters who were pictured? Were the figures of older people less colorful than those of the young? Were the older characters portrayed with canes and other paraphernalia associated with decline? According to the results children ages 6 7 and 8 showed less negative attitudes than children 9 10 and 11 and boys showed a more negative attitude than girls But the negative stereotypes were mitigated when children drew pictures of people they knew usually a grandparent When they drew pictures of generic old people rather than someone with whom they were acquainted the art was loaded with negative stereotypes Maybe the answer to changing the image of older people is to take a page from the homosexual play book and come out of the chronological closet and proudly proclaim age until society recognizes old in the 21st Century is not what old was in any previous time Or just wait a while Professor Kolker who is a baby boomer figures that as her generation gets older attention will be paid a big market and the movie producers and advertisers will not be on insulting she said shies might drive the change Marjlyn Goldstein can be reached at Newsday 235 Pinelawn Rd Melville NY 11747-43250 or by e-mail at marigoldst aolcom but i 9.