Dial File — Steve Bornfeld: The good, the bad and ‘The Strip’

Friday, Oct. 8, 1999 | 9:35 a.m.

Steve Bornfeld is the Sun features editor. His television column appears Fridays. Reach him at steveb@vegas.com or 259-4081.

Fall unfolds. ... Let's lock and load:

"The Strip" (debuts 9 p.m Tuesday on UPN): Ignorance gets a bum rap.

For example: Thanks to Cox Cable -- which doesn't carry UPN -- most Las Vegans probably won't watch "The Strip."

Ignorance has never been more blissful.

This neon nightmare, posing as an action-drama about two maverick cops-turned-hotel security enforcers (maverick cops -- what a maverick idea!), is good-looking, hip-sounding, testosterone-addled trash.

With a cheesy, sleazy undercurrent that conceals Vegas' complex character while exploiting its brassy M.O., "The Strip" wallows in showgirls-'n'-slots imagery and careens from hotels to escort services to pointless desert explosions with little purpose other than to strut and swagger with empty-headed machismo. Its lead actors lack the classy charisma that Robert Urich brought to "Vega$," infusing the glitz with heart and soul.

Certainly Vegas' surface sizzle is here: The pilot episode is a whirlwind romp from the Eiffel Tower and Paris balloon to Caesars Palace and its Forum Shops to Binion's Horseshoe and Fremont Street to drive-by sightings of Bellagio, Mandalay Bay and New York-New York. And our trademark neon floods nearly every frame, even artificially reflecting off car windshields and shimmering off rain-slicked streets (somehow they missed the floating Fords and sinking sedans along washed-out D.I. after a brief spritz).

But the series' snide attitude about its host city is summed up in this line, spat out by co-star Sean Patrick Flanery, who plays a cop cloyingly named Elvis: "If it sounds too good to be true, you're probably in Vegas." And this one, uttered by Joseph Viterelli as a casino owner: "This city does things to people. Warps their dreams, makes them do things. ... twisted, violent things they'd never even contemplate in their real lives."

Guaranteed to make non-Las Vegans feel superior about being non-Las Vegans, "The Strip" is an hourlong smirk, condescending to a city that deserves better.

"Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" (9 p.m. Mondays, NBC:) As a spinoff of one of the greatest shows in TV history, this is a disappointment. And yet, as a spinoff of one of the greatest shows in TV history, it can't help but at least be solid television.

Mostly missing the courtroom conundrums that make its half-cop/half-lawyer predecessor such a richly textured debate on legal and moral questions, "SVU" focuses on the hunt for brutal sex crime perpetrators in standard cop-show mode but, unlike the original "L&O," tosses in just enough of its cops' personal lives to pique curiosity -- but not enough to matter. It's like a halfway house between "NYPD Blue" and "L&O," ultimately packing neither the personal punch of the former or the professional punch of the latter. And the cases seem less complex and more obvious than those on the finely nuanced "L&O."

Creator Dick Wolf said he wanted to franchise "L&O" as the late Gene Roddenberry did with "Star Trek," but while "Star Trek: The Next Generation" leapt from familiar blueprints into a total original, "L&O: SVU" feels like a Xerox, with a few words and pictures rearranged. But it's a Xerox of a masterpiece -- gritty and hard-boiled, with TV's most telegenic star: New York City.

"Once and Again" (10 p.m. Tuesdays, ABC): TV doesn't come any better than this sensitively acted, maturely written and deeply felt series about two divorced fortysomething parents lurching toward a relationship. Vulnerable and immensely likable, Sela Ward and Billy Campbell are the most watchable couple in a couple of decades. Built on grown-up writing -- what a rare joy! -- "Once and Again" absolutely nails that sense of midlife confusion, rife with disappointment, yet tentatively optimistic.

Everything feels achingly true: the confessional black-and-white monologues to the camera that strip the characters to their inner essence; the sometimes bumpy bonds between the divorced parents and their resentful children; the tension between the ex-spouses; the fear between new lovers who don't know quite what to make of this giggly blush of new love amid the adult burdens of their lives. Nothing here is typical TV caricature; everything is real, from their fumbling first-date plans to their hesitant first kiss to their initial lovemaking, fraught with such intense insecurity and passion that it was the most purely human piece of television in many seasons.

Emotionally, "Once and Again" is state-of-the-art TV.

"The West Wing" (9 p.m. Wednesdays, NBC): His politics be damned -- Martin Sheen is the man. Authoritative, funny and magnetic, his President Josiah Bartlet is larger than life, a breakout TV character. And his limited screen time only enhances the anticipation and appreciation of his considerable presence.

He's surrounded by equally intoxicating players, among them: John Spencer, one of the most likable actors on TV since his "L.A. Law" days; and Rob Lowe, doing his most mature work. The ensemble is everything here -- all stirred with the fizzy dialogue of Aaron Sorkin. Mixed into a magnetic setting -- the White House, with its dizzy dynamic of perpetual motion -- and played against the natural soap opera of national politics, "The West Wing" is frazzled, frenetic and fabulous.

"Cold Feet" (10 p.m. Fridays, bumped by baseball this week, NBC): An awkward hybrid of clever sitcom and drippy drama, this lightweight relationship hour can actually be quite entertaining -- and highly forgettable. (By the time Rikki Cheese and Co. hit the air at 11, you'll be hard-pressed to remember it.) Telling the tales of three couples -- two of them hitched -- in various stages on the relationship time line, it features characters who are sketches instead of portraits, with quirks instead of characteristics, spouting witticisms instead of insights (for the triple reverse, see "Once and Again"). It even rips off "Ally McBeal"-ish fantasy moments. But the cast -- especially the radiant Jean Louisa Kelly -- is zippy and fun. Not Must-See TV. More like Kinda-Sorta-OK-To-See TV.

"Freaks and Geeks" (8 p.m. Saturdays, NBC): What "Once and Again" is to adults, "Freaks and Geeks" is to teens. Literally a rebuke to all the beautifully bogus adolescents overrunning prime-time, "F&G," as its title suggests, paints a painful portrait of what teen life was for most of us -- a clash between the bullies and the bullied, emotionally and physically.

It's all here: the lunchroom terrors, the schoolyard humiliations, the peer group pecking order, the crushing social rejections -- and the tentative steps toward conquering our fears to become the people we will be. Realistically, the adults and teens are equally clueless about each other. As Lindsay, whose good sense keeps bumping into her budding rebelliousness, Linda Cardellini is a standout among a top-notch cast of young actors.

Like "The Wonder Years," this is TV that captures teen angst for both today's teens and the former teens now raising them, tapping into the commonality of adolescent uncertainty to which anyone from 13 to 103 can relate. For a change, "Freaks and Geeks" is TV as teen truth -- not wish fulfillment -- declaring: Cool is for fools. Real is the deal.

"Snoops" (9 p.m. Sundays, ABC): TV titan David E. Kelley claims that his current creation is meant to be "escapist" fare, minus the character quirkiness and incisive insights that grace his other shows. He wasn't kidding. "Snoops" doesn't measure up to "The Practice" or "Ally McBeal" or "Chicago Hope" for depth or richness. Gina Gershon and Paul Marshall as gorgeous gumshoes headline a more stylized, feministic "Charlie's Angels," frilled up by jump-cut camera work, a hip soundtrack, MTV-style transitions, "Miami Vice"-style pastel shadings and scenes that overlap each other during fade-ins and fade-outs. As escapist TV, it passes. As Kelley TV -- a much higher calling -- it fails.

Croon a Tune: Many thanks, Tune Crooners, for your warm welcome-home messages last week as Croon a Tune rejoined Dial File. I missed you, too.

Before we resume, a few responses to readers re last week's column about the list of the 25 most recognizable TV themes:

On the up side, caller, your Great Wait is over: Last week's tune by theme legend Lalo Schifrin signaled the weekly run-'n'-gun fun of private eye guy Joe "Mannix." Solving the case were Peter Green, Linda Magri, Robin Skelley, Tony Varchetto, Andrew Hatcher, Lyna Reyes, Joe "thank you for playing my favorite show" Lacy, Kelly "I can't recall the star's name but I can see his face" Warburton (Mike Connors, mi amigo!), Rich Kackstetter, Daniel Brown, Dan Ryan and Rahim Muhammad, who called twice and triumphed after a bout of self-doubt: "At first I thought it was 'Mannix,' but now I think it's 'Cannon.' ... I am too smart for myself. It is 'Mannix.' "

Always go with your gut, Rahim.

For this week, let your fingers do the walking over 259-4012, then let your ears take it from there. Name it this week, get named next week. ... Name, then fame -- which we all crave, don't we? And if you've never experienced the global recognition of shouting "Hi, Ma!" or making a rude finger motion or just acting goofy in front of the "Today" street-side window while being jostled by indifferent Manhattan pedestrians and ignored by Matt and Katie, this is the next best thing.

Closing credits: E! Exploitation Television -- uh, make that E! Entertainment Television -- home of such highbrow masterpieces as "The E! True Hollywood Story" (last week had TWO hours on late porn princess Savannah -- did you know she had breast implants and committed naughty acts?) and "Mysteries and Scandals" (catchphrase: "Fame -- ain't it a bitch?") is busily concocting "Hollywood Off-Ramp," which trade magazine Electronic Media describes as "a fictional anthology series of bizarre Hollywood tales."

Fictional? Must be bizarre Hollywood tales of stars who DIDN'T have skyrocketing careers followed by drug-fueled descents into detox hell followed by clean-and-sober ascents to the comeback trail followed by hollow-sounding warnings to others not to do drugs followed by their latest lapse into rehab.

Now that's bizarre.

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