One of the Worst

Two years in the Army did more for Elvis Presley than relieve him of his 25-lb.

sideburns. His name mellowed with absence, and some people cast a friendlier eye on the new image: a clean-cut kid in khaki, his pelvis at parade rest. Last week ABC's Frank Sinatra Timex Show spent more than a quarter of a million dollars to welcome Elvis home and performed a highly useful service: it reminded the forgetful just how dreadful Elvis really is.

First briefly introduced in full-dress uniform under waving flags, amid the sound of military trumpets and carefully cued hoyden screams, he had to wait for his big moment until later in the show, just after John Cameron Swayze had pulled a heartily ticking Timex watch out of the mouth of a Miami Beach porpoise.

Wilder and greasier than the porpoise, Presley came abumping onscreen, wearing boots and a tuxedo, his double-folded forelock bobbing above his head like a Vaseline halo. As he sang Fame and Fortune and Stuck on You, his feet tapped, his hands clapped, and his hips wrestled with each other. The voice was ordinary whine, on the point of becoming vinegar.

The rest of the show was gaudy, pretentious and dull -- one of the worst TV hours in memory. Considering that it was taped almost two months ago in Miami, someone missed a major chance. As it sat on the shelf for seven weeks, some network employee -- with guts and a Zippo lighter -- could have sacrificed his job for the sake of the industry.

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