NEWSDAY, Sunday, April 11, 1993

ABC's Two-Show Wonder

by MARVIN KITMAN

A SCARY THING happened to me the other night. I was watching a new network TV comedy and I burst out laughing. People came running from all over the house to see what had happened. I don't usually laugh at new TV comedies anymore. Oh, some of them may get me to smile. That's cute the way they handled that tired old situation. But to laugh out loud? For what? Especially ABC comedies. The government has declared the ABC comedy department an official disaster area after its launching of "Getting By," "Home Free," and "Camp Wilder" in one season.
          It happened five other times during the show. I felt like I had become a human laugh track.
          The comedy that scared the dickens out of my loved ones and me was "This Just In," which opens a short run on ABC tonight at 7:30. The series ends with a second episode on Monday, April 26, at 8:30.
          It's a 30-minute newscast, "The CNB Nightly Evening News Tonight with Morton Swanson," which is also about the adventures of a handsome ambitious anchorman on the air and off. ABC calls it "an irreverent spoof of network newscasts." They think it's a parody. That's one of the jokes. In the real world, this Mort Swanson is how they really are.
          The show mixes the experiences of Mort the gum-chewing anchorman (played by Peter Keleghan) who is a pompous, silly air cadet, with actual news footage and added commentary and reactions.
          What I like most is that it has a lot of news you don't get anywhere else. The second newscast leads with the news that in the wake of the success of the public's voting for the Elvis stamp, the Post Office is planning to have us vote on a new Michael Jackson stamp: Do we want the stamp with the picture of Michael as a white person or Michael as a younger black?
          There is a plan, it is reported on tonight's news, to air-drop George Steinbrenner behind the lines to end the Yugoslavian war.
          There are compelling scenes of Bob Hope doing his holiday shtick, entertaining the 400 Palestinian extremists expelled from Israel. And exclusive footage of George Bush applying for unemployment insurance, and Iraqi troops on a spring break. It's news you can use.
          The news, of course, is broken by commercials. There is one for Trident, the submarine and the chewing gum, Dr. Kevorkian's suicide patch, and the newest Taster's Choice installment, which advises "Drink Taster's Choice . . . and wear a condom."
          "This Just In" is funnier than "The Eyewitless News" on WABC / 7. It's so much better than 39 out of the 42 sitcoms I've seen this season.
          It's not necessarily for everybody. It is not necessarily for people who enjoy laugh tracks or who want to see living room couches or dysfunctional families. If "Home Free" or "Getting By" knocks you out, stop reading now.
          "This Just In" is no breakthrough comedy. It's created by John Moffitt and Pat Tourk Lee, the producers of HBO's "Not Necessarily the News." I guess you would call it a spin-off of "Not Necessarily the News," except that was a spin-off of the BBC show "Not the Nine O'Clock News," which was a spin-off of "Weekend Update" on "Saturday Night Live," which itself was a spin-off of "That Was the Week That Was," which was a spin-off of Thucydides' "History of the Peloponnesian War."
          Actually trying to trace the origin of TV shows is a funny endeavor itself. Basically, what they are all based on is the idea of fast-cut bits. You could just as easily say they're all based on "Laugh-In" or the arrivals at McGuire Air Force Base on a busy day. It's old wine in news bottles.
          "Not Necessarily the News" began in an easy time for satire, during the Reagan administration, when the media was still playing footsie with the White House. It was not necessarily Ron and Nancy's favorite news show.
          Moffitt and Lee brought to the zenith - JVC and Sony, too - the art of using newsreel footage that others threw away, the stuff that was too boring or too embarrassing. "NNTN" specialized in taking a speech out of context, adding words which would make a sound bite bark.
          Over the years "NNTN" got old and tired. The three main writers - Matt Neuman, Larry Arnstein and Lane Sarasohn - were there from the beginning, and they hadn't changed as much as the times. They still got giddy when they thought of a Nixon joke.
          Whatever it is, the change of venue from cable to prime-time network, the decline of bean sprouts as a staple in L. A. pizzas, I don't know. But the "NNTN" news team has gotten a second wind at ABC.
          Unlike "NNTN," "This Just In" does not use a repertory company. Besides Keleghan, as the sleazoid anchorman, there are only a producer and two associates in the control room trying to hang on to Mort's ego as it floats out to Catalina. Downsizing is "in" in the 1990s. Also a vote of no confidence from the comedy department that gave us the not-ready-for-prime-time players of "Camp Wilder."
          Still, it has to be the most daring thing they've done in comedy at ABC since the special that launched "America's Funniest Home Videos" in 1990. This one is more for news junkies than video junkies. I mean you have to have heard of Yugoslavia or Dr. Kevorkian and his death machine to get the jokes.
          "This Just In" would have been even better with more character development and interplay between the staff and Mort. But then you wouldn't have enough time to give all the news all the time, would you?
          The commercial breaks capture the flavor of real commercials, with a fair share of tedious ones. But others are on target. The PSA for the NSRA (National Semi-Automatic Rifle Association) alone should win ABC a Peabody.
          The show is a little weak on Clinton humor, so far. That's because it's hard to satirize a man who seems to be satirizing himself. "We're still getting used to having a president," as Washington newswoman Chris Nolan put it, "who reminds everyone of a three-year-old kid at his birthday party."
          But the way it sometimes turns the real world on its head is what made me laugh so hard.
          This just in:
          Apparently in Michigan there is a woman named Mary Sandusky who is the first person to purchase the rights to a TV movie on which she planned to base her own life. "I just thought the movie was really exciting," she told the "This Just In" reporter. "First the custody battle thing, then the sex and the murder for hire all mixed up together. I want my life to be like that."
          The shows I saw came without laugh tracks, the reason I could hear myself laugh. The public at large will not be so lucky. There are no plans to make "This Just In" into a series. Why? You jest. (Insert laugh track here.) On the basis of these two pilots, I'd order a squadron.