Is Victoria departing Dallas on principle?
Is an acting career gonna find Ray Charles?
Is Platoon making war memories pass in review?
Is Gibson for Hartman good for Good Morning America?
Entertainment Tonight answers the opening bell for Thursday, January 29th, 1987.
Hello again everybody, I'm Mary Hart.
And I'm John Tesh.
ABC has a new Good Morning Man.
Ending a three month search to replace David Hartman,
Charlie Gibson today was named co-host of Good Morning America.
Gibson is not a household name, but ABC is banking on the veteran TV news correspondent
to bring GMA back to number one in the morning show ratings war.
And it is now 844. We have with us this morning...
Regular viewers of Good Morning America are well acquainted with Charles Gibson.
He's been a replacement for David Hartman for several months.
I found Charlie to be somebody who I had an instant rapport with,
who is incredibly bright, has a very quick wit, which keeps us all entertained,
and we really enjoyed that, and who became a very, very fast friend
and a very good co-worker so quickly, I was very impressed with that,
and I am absolutely delighted that he's gonna be a hit at half of the team.
It's the first news for people for basically 12 hours of the day in television.
They may see the early evening news, a few of them see the 11 o'clock news, whatever,
but a lot goes on overnight, and we are really basically the morning news show.
The ABC news veteran is confident that he's got the credentials for the job.
It's really an extension, I think, of what I've done for 20 years.
I've done news for 20 years, and I don't think this is gonna be that much different.
Gibson will start his new job on March the 1st, and we'll have his work cut out for him.
Last week, the Today Show beat Good Morning America
and the Morning Show ratings race for the 17th straight week.
Today had an average Nielsen rating of 5.6, topping GMA's 5.0 weekly average by more than half a point.
CBS and the new morning program finished well behind with an average rating of 2.9.
Now, each rating point is roughly equivalent to 874,000 television households.
When a principal decides to leave a hit television series, it almost always is a traumatic event.
When the hit series is Dallas and the principal is Victoria, that trauma becomes big news.
Bobby, it was awful. When I woke up, I thought that you were dead.
When Pam Ewing awoke from her much-publicized dream earlier this TV season,
Bobby was back in place, but the Ewing household is about to be disrupted again.
Victoria Principal has announced she will depart the show at the end of this season.
How can you do this to me?
Cliff, this doesn't have anything to do with you.
Principal has been with the show since its inception nine years ago,
and her character is one of the most popular, but the actress is said to be negotiating for her own series.
I'm sorry, Bobby. I know how much this hurts you, too.
Principal did release this statement, quote,
My longtime association with Dallas was one of the most rewarding experiences in my life.
During the past nine years, I looked upon myself as one of the family whose day-by-day relationships I will sorely miss.
I wish each and every one of them continued success in Dallas.
No word from the producers of Dallas on how or if Principal will be replaced on the series,
or how the Pam Ewing character will be written out of the show.
Dallas does have another problem as well.
Susan Howard, who played Donna Culver Krebs on the show for seven years,
is leaving the series at the end of the season.
She'll be written out in an episode featuring the breakup of her marriage to Ray Krebs.
Platoon is the number two movie in the country, and climbing.
Perhaps that's due in part to a need in Americans to remember and learn about
the most divisive period in American history since the Civil War.
It took Oliver Stone ten years to write Platoon, and another decade to bring it to the big screen.
Now there is a phenomenon building around his movie being touted as the way Vietnam really was.
Platoon is seen through the eyes of the infantryman.
I hate it already, and it's only been a week.
Based on the real-life experiences of writer, director, and Vietnam veteran Oliver Stone,
Platoon has created a sensation beyond his imagination.
I don't even know what I'm doing.
We thought the film would get some critical attention,
but we were not sure that the American public was really in the mood to see Vietnam, a war movie.
We were quite taken aback.
We opened in a limited release to test the waters, and the demand was enormous in all the theaters.
There were lines around the block for five, six weeks now, and they still haven't stopped.
I understand it's supposed to be a very accurate account of what actually went on in Vietnam,
and that's why I'm here.
We always stop our history classes right before the Vietnam War starts,
and we just don't know very much about Vietnam.
Well, I'm a 1968 veteran of Vietnam,
and I've had some difficulties and flashbacks in thinking about it, and I need to see this.
From box office totals, it's becoming apparent that many Americans feel a need to see Platoon.
It's brought in over $16 million in five weeks,
and this week alone averaged over $15,000 per screen.
We're going to lose this war.
Come on.
You really think so?
I don't think it's depressing.
I think it's uplifting in the sense that the main character survives,
and he survives in a very positive way.
He makes it out of there, and I think that, after you've seen the reality of the war, is enough.
And I think people are responding not only to that, but I think they want more truth.
I think they want more reality in their movies.
I think Rambeau sort of whetted their appetite to know more about what really happened.
Certainly the teenagers are interested in the history of the war.
They don't know about it.
I was probably the closest thing I've seen so far,
the closest movie I've seen to my own personal experience.
What is unhealthy about it is that a lot of young kids out there that know their fathers served in Vietnam
are going to look at this movie and say, this is what daddy did.
I don't want my children to think that that's what I did in Vietnam.
Whatever reaction moviegoers are having upon seeing the film, they are reacting.
It's a film that touches raw nerves and triggers past emotions.
A lot of bitterness comes up that you just got to deal with that.
I don't feel good about it.
I thought it was pretty sad, the things that, if it really happened that way, it was pretty bad.
My compliments to Stone.
Oh, man. Is that what I think it is?
Welcome to the now. Follow me.
By the way, Platoon is being included on almost every list of likely Academy Award nominees
to be announced on February the 11th.
In the movie business, the director is the boss.
Yesterday, the Directors Guild of America named some of the best bosses of the year,
namely their nominees for best feature film director of 1986.
On that list, Platoon's Oliver Stone, also nominated Woody Allen for Hannah and Her Sisters,
Stand By Me's Rob Reiner, James Ivory, director of A Room with a View,
and Randah Haynes, Children of a Lesser God.
She's the first American woman ever to be nominated by the DGA.
With only three exceptions, the DGA winner has gone on to capture the big prize, the Oscar.
The DGA Awards will be handed out in early March.
Coming up next, the world's most populous country gets an English lesson from the Living Room TV.
And ahead, Ray Charles. When you live life with soul, acting is no problem.
¶¶
17 years ago tonight, on Thursday, January 29, 1970, this was the prime time lineup on NBC.
At 7.30, Lowell Thomas in New Guinea, an NBC News special.
At 8.30, Ironside starring Raymond Burr and Don Mitchell.
At 7.30, Dragnet starring Jack Webb and Harry Morgan.
And at 10 o'clock, the Dean Martin Show musical variety series.
China, with a population topping one billion people,
has the largest potential television audience in the world.
With a shortage of TV sets, however, TV watching can get a little crowded,
but they're making do and learning at the same time.
Every day in China, a phenomenon is growing. Call it English fever.
Where are we?
I don't know.
Excuse me.
It isn't far.
It isn't far.
It's all because of a BBC program called Follow Me,
a unique language study program that mixes comedy sketches and basic English lessons
and draws an estimated 50 million viewers every night, seven days a week.
I'm Betty and this is Nigel.
Oh, yes.
You're the honeymoon couple.
Try to remember, I like the way she smiled.
In fact, Follow Me has become so popular that every Sunday,
hundreds of Chinese in Beijing pay to enter this park just to practice their English with one another.
I came to the English corner to practice my spoken English.
I watch them, Follow Me.
For beginners, it's very good.
I always watch it. First, you say, I like English.
I study English, so I always watch there to practice my English.
In Britain, Follow Me is produced in England by the BBC for their own English by television series,
then repackaged by China Central Television and co-hosted by English woman Catherine Flower.
A lot of people do come up and speak to you in the most beautiful English,
which they've learned on their own in the most remote villages with a battered old textbook and with the TV programs.
And you feel, you really feel quite humble because, you know,
they've put so much effort into it and they've got so much out of it.
Hello, good morning.
Why has this BBC program become so important to the Chinese?
Demand in China for learning English was growing by leaps and bounds
because people realized that that was the passport to the outside world.
There seems to be no slowing down to this nightly phenomenon.
With TV viewing in China on the rise and very much a shared activity,
Not Only May Follow Me soon become the most popular show in China,
it might even become the most watched daily program in the world.
Oh, I'm late. Sorry. Bye-bye. Where are you going?
I'm meeting my girlfriend.
50 million Chinese watch the BBC program, a large number expected to increase.
But that's still just a drop in the bucket compared to the success of an American TV series,
such as The Cosby Show.
The hit NBC sitcom is seen by at least 63 million Americans each week
and in over 60 countries around the world on every continent except Antarctica.
In 1969, the Children's Television Workshop and PBS changed the way kids looked at TV
when they introduced Big Bird, Ernie, Bert, the Cookie Monster and other residents of Sesame Street to a receptive audience.
Well, the workshop's newest project, which debuted this week on PBS, takes kids back to Square One.
It has a show opening reminiscent of Saturday Night Live,
song and dance numbers,
and math lessons disguised as video games.
It's called Square One and it's designed to teach 8- to 12-year-olds a subject traditionally not considered fun,
but with mathematical ability in this country falling far short of that in other countries.
The Children's Television Workshop thought it was worth a shot.
I remember from my own experience that I just couldn't understand how algebra would fit into my daily life.
I did it well enough to pass it, but I couldn't wait to get it behind me.
And we, it is to be hoped, are showing how math can be applied in your daily life.
We elected to use a television parody format with Square One TV
on the premise that every child out there is totally literate in television.
My name is Monday. I'm a mathematician.
Square One is packed with as much production as mathematics
in an attempt to persuade children that math can be every bit as hot as MTV.
What we want to do is, as we have done with other shows, is change not the medium, but the message.
You'll never reach infinity, you'll just go on.
It looks as if Square One is right on target.
The Children's Television's Workshop reports initial responses enthusiastic from parents, teachers, and most importantly, the kids.
Coming up tomorrow, a behind-the-scenes look at an arresting new film, Tom Hanks in Dragnet.
And this weekend on Entertainment This Week, a look back at a TV classic, Dark Shadows,
and a visit with the great pretender, rocker Chrissy Hynde.
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Action is the key word at video stores across America.
According to Billboard magazine's list of top rentals, Stephen King's maximum overdrive is in the fast lane in fifth place.
Poltergeist II scared up enough business for fourth.
Indiana Jones in the Temple of Doom swung into third.
Cobra slithered into second.
And Short Circuit had enough energy to remain the top videocassette rental in the country.
A completely different picture comes into focus on the sales side of videocassettes.
According to the Billboard chart, Secrets of the Titanic rests comfortably in fifth place.
Sleeping Beauty awoke in fourth.
Indiana Jones is in third place.
As two Jane Fonda cassettes work themselves into great shape, landing in the number one and two spots on the sales chart.
Action, comedy, adult themes. Those are the usual sections you find in video stores.
Some stores, however, categorized by stars, with Humphrey Bogart films among the most popular.
In fact, one of the oldest movies on Billboard's current video sales chart is his 1943 classic, Casablanca.
The Oscar-winning film is on the list at number 20.
More bogey news now from Eric Burns and this week's video preview.
Eric.
Here's a Bogart riddle for you, John.
What did Humphrey Bogart say when he found out that Ted Turner had the desire and the ability to colorize old black and white movies?
Now you are dangerous.
This is the classic detective movie, The Maltese Falcon, out this week for the first time in color.
It's one of two best bets this week.
The other being The Dollmaker, one of the best TV movies ever made, starring two Academy Award-winning actresses.
All my life I've been doing what I was told.
You go your own way, always, Clovis, and I've had to go too.
Well, these dolls, this is all that's beating our young'uns now.
And they're mine!
One of last summer's biggest hits in theatrical release comes to the cassette machine this week,
and it answers the question, what's the easiest way to chop that big piece of ice into martini-sized pieces?
This is The Karate Kid, Part 2.
And these, in brief, are some other movies just out on video.
Wise Guys is a comedy that has its moments.
Big Trouble in Little China is an adventure film that doesn't.
Labyrinth is a fantasy directed by Jim Henson that is best appreciated by somewhat older kids.
And Club Paradise is a comedy that is almost unappreciatable by anyone.
That's it for this week.
Next week, well, next week is such a bad week for home videos.
Let me do this. Let me tell you about something to watch on television instead.
The TV is a friend, cause I can choose the show with a happy ending that never ends, forever and ever more.
After almost 40 years in the music business, Ray Charles has very little to sing the blues about.
I've been very blessed. Even when I was coming up in this business, I never had to do anything that I didn't like.
I mean, the record companies that I was with, fortunately for me, trusted me enough to let me do the things I wanted to do.
Something else he wants to do these days is act. Tell us about your new acting career, Ray.
Forget it.
Remember it.
Next week, Charles makes his TV acting debut on two shows, St. Elsewhere, on which he plays a street person.
God damn, this place smells like death.
And Who's the Boss, on which he plays himself.
What about if I play something I wrote myself?
I'm not an actor. I know that. I don't pretend to be. I don't try to be. A good actor can become... he can go out of himself.
I cannot go out of myself. You understand what I'm saying?
In other words, you couldn't play a 15-year-old white kid growing up in an affluent neighborhood.
No.
Forget that.
It's dead.
Do you have a desire to do some more acting?
If I could do, say, to be in two or three things in a year...
Ah! Oh, shut up. That would be fine. That was my watch going off. Sorry about that.
Your watch talks?
Yeah. And it's accurate, too. Forget the fact that it talks. I mean, that ain't the important thing. It keeps time.
And here's something else that's accurate. Ray Charles may not be Dustin Hoffman, but he doesn't need to sing the blues about the way he acts, either.
You have to go outside.
The man with the talking watch will be on Who's the Boss Tuesday and St. Elsewhere Wednesday.
Mary, make sure that your watch tells you when these dates are so you don't forget.
Ha ha! Thanks, Eric. You're the one with the talking watch.
The bull market gets a visit from Snow White. Fatten more when we come back.
Celebrating a birthday today, actress and talk show host Oprah Winfrey is 33. Actress Angélion is 37. Magnum PI's Tom Selleck is 42.
The Colby's Catherine Ross, 44. Actress Claudine Lange, 45. Dynasty's John Forsythe is 69. And actor Victor Mature is 71.
In today's People Post scripts, Roger Mudd, co-anchor of the canceled NBC News program 1986, has ended his affiliation with the network and moved on to PBS.
What I feel is enthusiasm going to work for McNeil Lair. I think that's a terrific group of people. I think that I leave with no regrets.
I think that I'm going to be a great actor. I'm going to be a great actor. I'm going to be a great actor.
I think that's a terrific group of people. I think that I leave with no regrets. I think what I did here was made a contribution to NBC.
I think that very talented staff that we assembled for our weekly broadcast did a first-class job.
The regret is that we didn't have longer to prove how good we were.
Actor William Hurt was treated and released for alcoholism at the Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage, California.
Junior James Ingram became the proud father of a daughter in Los Angeles Tuesday.
And Jerry Lee Lewis and sixth wife Carrie became new parents to a son in Memphis on Wednesday.
There's another birthday in the news. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the world's first full-length animated feature, turns 50 this year.
And to celebrate, Snow White went looking for Prince Charming on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
Snow White, the Seven Dwarfs, and the Walt Disney Company were celebrating the highest first-quarter revenues in the company's history by opening trading on the New York Stock Exchange.
How the world will live, how the world will live.
Snow White was the film which turned around Walt Disney's fortunes half a century ago.
Its box office success saved the Fledgling Company from bankruptcy.
The capper to the golden anniversary celebration will be a simultaneous screening of the film in 60 different countries.
Tomorrow on Entertainment Tonight, Tom Hanks signs up as the sidekick to Joe Friday in a dragnet movie. Just the facts, ma'am.
We're gonna leave you with more of Ray Charles singing,
Wish You Were Here Tonight from his 1983 country album of the same name.
Take care, everybody. See you tomorrow.
If I make believe you on the show
You're the lover that says she has to go
And I end up wishing you were here tonight
My love is all imagination
Just a dream without you to make it real
And baby I got a dream burning inside
And all I ask about is just you and I
Love it in the fire that made us so right
And I wish you were here tonight