See It Then

By Frank Rich

Edward R. Murrow returns

Since his death in 1965, Edward R. Murrow has been canonized as one of network television's few saints. According to legend, Murrow was the man who brought seriousness and purpose to TV journalism: without him, CBS News might still be a tabloid-headline service. Certainly much of Murrow's reputation is deserved, but his career was far more varied than the mythmakers allow. Like so many TV newsmen before and after him, Murrow was not immune to the economic attractions of show business. Maybe he never fronted for a game show (as Mike Wallace did) or appeared in commercials (as Barbara Walters has), but he was not above lending his name and talent to schlock. During the years of his justly famous See It Now documentaries, Murrow conducted a celebrity interview show called Person to Person.

This summer at various times, many public television stations are airing 26 episodes of the series, which has not been seen since it was discontinued in 1959. Intended as a tribute to a TV great, this revival may actually tarnish the Murrow legend. The years have not been kind to Person to Person. As one watches Murrow pay his electronic "visits" to famous homesteads, it is hard to ignore the man's obsequiousness. He laughs at his guests' every joke; he helps plug their new books; he hypes their every trivial accomplishment. On these shows Murrow is every bit as lightweight as Mike Douglas--though at least he refrains from picking up a hand mike and belting out songs.

Murrow's silliness on Person to Person is partially camouflaged by his formidable telegenic image: his omnipresent cigarette and theatrical voice lend dignity to everything he says. The words themselves, unfortunately, are banalities. In interviews with John and Jacqueline Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Agnes de Mille, Maria Callas, Sir Thomas Beecham, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, he rarely extracts a witticism and never an insight. "Have you opened all your wedding gifts?" he asks the newlywed Kennedys in 1953. He then goes on to stock questions that permit the young Senator to rattle off his policy positions by rote. Murrow's notion of challenging Bogart, Bacall and Monroe is to ask them to name their favorite film roles. He even allows Harpo Marx to make all his responses in mime; the audience, no doubt, had tuned in with the expectation that Harpo would speak.

Though devoid of substance, Person to Person is not without curiosity value.

Made in the era of primitive television technology, the show's stagy conventions seem quaintly claustrophobic now. Many of the guests, movie stars excepted, are ill at ease before the camera and deliver their anecdotes with artificial gaiety. The famous naively show off their prized possessions -- Old World antiques and Bernard Buffet paintings. A little of this amusement goes a long way; the cumulative effect of Person to Person is depressing. It is no fun to be reminded that the spiritual father of CBS Reports and 60 Minutes was also the progenitor of Rona Barrett -- Interviews, Merv Griffin and Dinah!

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