Michael Gross is on a working vacation.
In this hiatus, I wanted to do something that didn't involve cameras. Hello there.
Julian Lennon is back on tour.
That'd be good fun, because we've been looking forward to it for a while.
Stevie Wonder is calling to say he loves you.
The feelings that I have inside me, to know that they are felt by many, many people, is a very, very exciting but very beautiful thing.
And Bob Hope is 83 today.
Thank you so much.
Thank you so much Bob and Stevie and Julian and Michael.
And thanks also to Liza Minnelli, Lionel Richie and a cast of thousands for appearing this Thursday, May 29th, 1986 on Entertainment Tonight.
Hello again everybody, I'm Mary Hart.
And I'm Rob Weller.
Two of America's outdoor summer entertainment showplaces kicked off the season last night.
The Kirov Ballet was at Philadelphia's Mann Music Center.
And Liza Minnelli was the headliner at Wolf Trap in Virginia.
Peter Kwinhakas reports on Minnelli Mania.
The start of another season at the nation's only national park for the performing arts.
That much more remarkable because this nearly all-wooden structure has risen Phoenix-like from the ashes of three disastrous fires.
But the only fire now is what's on stage.
Well-wishers were treated to masterful Minnelli, marching Marines and melodic Mancini.
It's special because the audience is kind of near you.
You know, it goes up and that means a great deal for the, when you're performing because you feel like a lot closer.
It's Wolf Trap and that's a very important place to me.
You know, it's one of the most beautiful theaters in the country.
It's always an honor to play here.
This place has the significance of being overwhelming.
This is the place to play.
Real good atmosphere here because it's not like going into a theater.
It's people coming here to have a great time and they bring their picnics and stuff.
There are certain kinds of art that are not as commercially viable as Rambo and that it's often difficult to find an audience for.
But it should be encouraged. People should be encouraged to see it.
Most agreed, Wolf Trap's a true survivor, outlasting both fires and dwindling government subsidies, opening its 15th season stronger than ever.
At Wolf Trap, Peter Koynhacius Entertainment tonight.
Two widely separated developments to report today on the music for a cause front. Don Johnson of Miami Vice will emcee Willie Nelson's 14 hour Farm Aid 2 concert July 4th in Austin, Texas.
And Russian musicians will play a benefit tomorrow in Moscow with proceeds going to the Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster Fund.
And in Beverly Hills last night, Lionel Richie and Stevie Wonder took top honors at the Pop Awards presented by the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.
Bobby Columby reports on the festivities hosted by ASCAP's president, composer Morton Gould.
The awards dinner attracted some of the biggest names in the music business. From Streisand to Richie to Wonder.
Even Prince was there to get into the swing of things.
This is the third year ASCAP has handed out these awards. Awards that are earned, not voted on.
The songs that are honored are based on the amount of airplay in different mediums. For the third year in a row, Lionel Richie was named Songwriter of the Year.
It really means that radio is interested in what you do because you have to get through radio to get to the public.
And then the compliment of life is that you finally get it to the public and the public says we like it after all that hard work.
Prince made two trips to the stage to pick up awards and Barbra Streisand was there on behalf of the late composer Harold Arlen.
Song of the Year honors went to Stevie Wonder for I Just Called to Say I Love You.
I'm very, very happy to know that the feelings that I have inside me come through and to know that they are felt by many, many people is a very, very exciting but very beautiful thing.
Oh my heart, oh my heart. Bobby Columby, Entertainment Tonight.
There were more awards afoot last night from honors for songs that make your toes tap.
We ankle on over to prizes for movies that scare your socks off.
Science fiction, fantasy and horror films long spurned by the Oscars have statues of their own.
In Los Angeles last night the 13th annual Saturn Awards were handed out.
Back to the Future won for best science fiction movie and also earned Michael J. Fox a Best Actor award.
Look, telling destiny has brought you together.
Fright Night, the story of a modern day vampire was named best horror film.
Welcome to Fright Night.
If Philippe has done his job I can kill the bishop now or never.
And Lady Hawk, the magical medieval adventure received the Best Fantasy Film award.
Ron Howard was named best director for his movie Cocoon.
Carl Brown won the Best Actress award for her portrayal of Alice in Wonderland in Dream Child.
And Brown's husband, Vincent Price, was honored with the Saturn Life Career Award.
Soap operas have long been the staple of daytime television, now as Jean Wolf reports they're becoming a staple of book publishing as well.
So often as an actress on a soap opera I'm stopped in whether it's an air terminal or on the street or in the grocery store,
someplace by people who walk up and say, how did this happen to your character?
I mean, how did you get to the point where this could happen to you?
Today I'm changing my name, my life, but nothing will ever change the way I feel about you.
I'm a widow. I was widowed for ten years.
About to marry the senator who was deeply in love with me, who had finally gotten himself freed from his agoraphobic, possessive, slightly crazy wife.
Legally he was about to marry me. She had already shot me once.
He was shot on our wedding day and I found myself tremendously attracted to a mysterious new man in town,
didn't understand why I felt like I did about this man, who turns out now to be my dead husband come back to life.
Well, how do you explain that to a lady in the grocery store?
Now in the grocery store there are books that tell the whole stories of your favorite soaps.
They're written in novel form and they take you back to the beginnings of all those complicated plots.
These soaps and cereal books will help new viewers understand the past history of all that turmoil they're tuning into.
Long time viewers will be able to relive special memories of their favorite characters.
And the publishers feel some people will read these books just as good, juicy romance novels.
Are the books sexier than the TV versions?
We have a guideline during the novelizations. That is, anything you can't see on TV we cannot do in our books.
So it makes it easy to write the books because it's a very clear-cut guideline as to what we can get away with.
But the art of suggestion has always been one of the most sexy things in daytime drama years ago and in today's soap opera.
Don't you feel a little bit guilty? I mean, this is kind of a guide to addiction.
You're going to hook all these new people. Don't you feel a little bad about that?
No, I don't feel bad about it at all. It's a slice of life and it's great entertainment. So no, I don't feel guilty.
The comic opinion polls surveying the comic book and TV cartoon favorites of 300 cartoon aficionados is hot off the press.
Tied for first place with 14 percent of the vote each, the Flintstones and the Jetsons.
Bugs Bunny was runner-up at 12 percent, followed by Bullwinkle, Daffy Duck and Johnny Quest.
Not to be outdone by comic critics, 37 television critics have come up with their opinions on television's best and worst shows.
The good news first, the best series, The Cosby Show with Moonlighting number two, St. Elsewhere three, Cheers four and The Golden Girls number five.
Now for the bad news, according to the poll, the worst TV series, Hollywood Beat, second worst, The A-Team, third, The Insiders, fourth, Charlie and Company
and in a tie for the fifth worst television show, The Colby's and The Red Fox Show.
That list from the trade magazine Electronic Media's poll of 37 TV critics.
Next, Julian Lennon and the secret value of touring.
And ahead on vacation, Michael Gross leaves the family behind.
403 years before the birth of Christ, work began on the Great Wall of China.
For the next 2000 years, it repelled invading hordes, but it didn't stop rock and roll.
In the words of the Associated Press, hundreds of Chinese rock fans went a little crazy yesterday when the Icelandic group Strax held forth in Beijing.
No injuries, but dancing aplenty in the aisles.
The big rock news here in the West, Julian Lennon is all set to tour America.
Elaine Gannick reports.
What's your body? What's your mind? Why are people so unkind?
With one platinum album already under his belt, Julian Lennon appeared to be more confident at his final rehearsal in the Miami Convention Center prior to the kickoff of his second cross-country tour.
I feel a lot more confident these days, you know.
Obviously, first of all, when I get on the stage, it's a bit nerve-wracking, but I'll try and settle in as much as I can.
But it'll be good fun, because we've been looking forward to it for a while.
He expects this tour to boost album sales of his current LP, The Secret Value of Daydreaming, which after eight weeks has barely broken into the top 40.
Have you read any of the reviews of the current album?
Yeah, some of them mixed, very mixed.
Do you pay any attention to reviews? Do you care?
You know, once or twice they can annoy you or really depress you, but I try not to pay too much attention.
It's not worth worrying about. I know I did a good job, so that's all I'm caring about, you know.
Being able to do what I want to do and enjoying it and making the public happy at the same time.
If that's what success is, being recognized in that way, then give me more, you know, because I'll do as much as I can.
In Miami, Florida, Elaine Gannick, Entertainment Tonight.
American moviegoers spend $850 million a year at the concession counter.
Popcorn, of course, got the most bang for the buck.
On the sweet side, Raisinettes, 14 million boxes of them sold last year alone.
And to turn her up, red licorice Twizzlers.
Well, Leonard Maltin is a man who has eaten more than his share of all of the above.
He now shares his thoughts on Poltergeist II.
I loved the original Poltergeist. What a roller coaster ride.
And a simple story that made sense.
A family moves into a house inhabited by spirits.
Why are the spirits unhappy?
Because the house, it turns out, was built on their desecrated graves.
Now someone comes along and insists on doing Poltergeist II when there's no more story to be told.
So what we get is a kind of a rehash with lots and lots of special effects.
There's nothing to be afraid of.
What are you doing?
Robbie!
What in the hell? Won't you leave us alone?
Pretty wild, but the best thing about Poltergeist II is the cast.
JoBeth Williams and Craig T. Nelson are terrific.
This is a family we care about.
People worth spending time with.
But what they get involved with looks more like a sequel to The Exorcist than Poltergeist.
All I really need to tell you is that someone gets billing in the credits as the vomit creature.
Got the idea? I'll say this.
I wasn't bored with Poltergeist II.
You can't get bored with some of those effects.
And the cast is good.
Will Sampson plays an Indian shaman and Geraldine Fitzgerald is radiant as usual playing JoBeth Williams' mother.
So I'd say Poltergeist II is okay.
A lot of gobbledygook, but okay.
And I'll give it a 7.
But it's nowhere near the original movie.
I'm Leonard Maltin. Entertainment Tonight.
Only one new movie joins the summer box office lineup this weekend.
It's an action adventure film called Jake Speed.
There's plenty of competition for Mr. Speed.
We asked ticket buyers across the country what they thought of films currently in release.
Here on a four-star rating system, four being the best of course, are the results of our movie track exit poll.
Family Ties, television's number two situation comedy is on a production break.
And Michael Gross, as Al Owens reports, says father knows best when it comes to hiatus time.
In this hiatus, I wanted to do something that didn't involve cameras.
Hello there.
It felt good to be doing something and playing to an audience instead of a lens.
It needs something.
I beg your pardon?
It needs something. Garlic, lemon juice, I don't know, a bit of interest.
Like many television series regulars, Michael Gross has chosen to work during his vacation this summer.
Los Angeles audiences will be seeing him in two plays.
Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing and Ibsen's Hedda Gabler.
After three years of doing almost exclusively things in front of cameras, Family Ties, television movies, that sort of thing,
I think one can't help but come back to a vehicle like this where you have to sustain a character for two, two and a half hours.
And what I've got to prove to myself in a sense that after several years of being away from this, I can still do this.
So in a sense, this is more important.
Do you have any pre-show rituals? How do you prepare yourself?
People better not block the bathroom door. That's my pre-show ritual.
No, I get very nervous.
And especially for the first preview of The Real Thing, you know, there was a tread worn in the rug back in front of the bathroom.
It's terrible.
Maybe tonight we'll shoot some baskets or tomorrow.
You don't have to let me know now. Think it over.
There's a great deal of certain expectations for you to move up the line when you get your television series
and you're supposed to get your mini-series and more television movies and then do a lot of features.
And I don't know. I'm tremendously happy to be doing this.
It's where I came from and it feels very good to be back.
I wonder if this sort of thing is common with young wives. Do you think?
Witnesses to the boating accident that killed Francis Ford Coppola's son, 23-year-old Giancarlo Coppola,
say Griffin O'Neill was at the wheel, contrary to what O'Neill reportedly told police.
The accident, in which their boat hit a tow line stretched between two other boats,
occurred Memorial Day on the South River near the shores of Edgewater, Maryland.
No charges have been made. Police say O'Neill was not under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
And actress Jean Simmons has entered the Betty Ford Center in Palm Desert, California.
A spokesman for the 57-year-old actress said she is being treated for alcohol abuse and will be leaving the hospital next month.
Eric Burns with his home video, Best Bets, when we return.
Coming up tomorrow on Entertainment Tonight, from London, three new musicals from Andrew Lloyd Webber,
the man behind Cats and Jesus Christ Superstar, and 20 shows that Change TV examines the powerhouse CBS Evening News.
And check your local listings for the correct time this weekend, as Entertainment This Week goes on an adventurous location with Cliff Robertson and Loretta Switt.
Goes solo with Duran Duran's John Taylor.
Goes one-on-one with Bill Cosby.
And learns the right moves from the Karate Kid's Ralph Macchio.
This weekend on Entertainment This Week.
Celebrating birthdays today.
Lisa Welchel is 23.
Latoya Jackson is 30.
Reeby Jackson is 36.
Anthony Gehry is 38.
And Bob Hope is 83.
Memorial Day holidays are becoming Sylvester Stallone weekends. Last year it was Rambo against the Viet Cong.
This year it's Cobra against the Vermin.
And on videocassette, Rocky versus the Reds.
Eric Burns has that video news and more action in this week's home video preview.
I didn't like Rocky IV all that much when I saw it in a theater.
Are you nuts?
Maybe, but now that it's out on home video, I just don't think I can honestly recommend it.
Are you nuts?
Maybe, but Rocky IV was so much like the other three.
It's a skillful job of packaging, but what's in the package has been recycled too many times.
Hey, what about my money?
There are more fisticuffs in Black Moon Rising.
In which Tommy Lee Jones plays the man behind the wheel of an ultra-high-tech car.
The suggested retail price of this video is $79.95.
You'd be better off using the money as a down payment on a Ford Escort.
If you're old enough to remember Victory at Sea, you may be pleased enough to buy or rent it now that it's out on home video.
It's an award-winning series of documentaries about World War II that originally aired on NBC in 1952.
There's a new video by the heavy metal group Judas Priest out this week.
Maybe in Rocky V, Rocky could take on these guys.
If he does and wins, I promise to recommend it.
This week though, the top recommendation is Darling, a 1965 theatrical release for which Julie Christie won an Academy Award for Best Actress.
What a good idea.
That's it for this week.
Next week, one of the most star-studded movies ever made comes out on video, as does a Goosebump-raising documentary and a much underrated thriller.
See you then.
Eric Burns, Entertainment Tonight.
Chuck Beres wants you.
If you work on Wall Street, game show producer Chuck Beres has placed an ad in the Wall Street Journal seeking stockbrokers, investment bankers, Wall Street attorneys, secretaries, clerks, or anyone else working for a Wall Street-related firm.
No, he's not seeking financial advice.
He's looking for performers for a new special.
The Gong Show goes to Wall Street.
So if you're from the business world, I guess this is a chance for some money market fun.
I know a fellow with a great bull and bear act.
I should have him look him up.
Tomorrow on Entertainment Tonight, off to London to check out three big new musicals by Andrew Lloyd Webber.
And right back here is Peter Strauss and 20 shows that change TV goes back to the beginning of the CBS Evening News.
In the big broadcast of 1938, a new song was introduced.
And to hear him tell it, it saved the career of a young actor.
The young actor is 83 today.
Here with Shirley Ross is Bob Hope.
And thanks for the memory.
Thanks for the memory of rainy afternoons, swingy Harlem tunes, motor trips and burning lips and burning toast and croons.
How lovely it was.
Thanks for the memory of candlelight and wine, castles on the Rhine, the Parthenon and moments on the Hudson River line.
How lovely it was.
Many is the time that we feasted.
And many is the time that we fasted.
Oh, well it was swell while it lasted.
We did have fun and no harm done.
So thanks for the memory.
Tomorrow at 4 on Hour Magazine, meet the final viewer of the Hour contest winner, Myrtle Parris.
Plus, award-winning soap opera child actors, a visit by David Selby and more, all on Hour Magazine.
Now stay tuned for the Cosby Show.