SERIAL POWER MONGER

By GINIA BELLAFANTE

It is hard to imagine where Jim Profit might have received his M.B.A., but whatever the school, it was a place where he learned the art of downsizing all too well. Profit, an intensely focused executive at Gracen & Gracen, the 15th largest company in the world, eliminates manpower with the sort of effectiveness AT&T's CEO Robert Allen might admire. When Profit wants someone out of the way, he might have him framed for selling contraband chemicals to Saudi terrorists or set him up for the murder of a subordinate who died of a heart attack--or both. And no outplacement counseling.

Profit, an incomparable thriller that debuted on Fox last week (Mondays, 9 p.m. EDT), is perhaps the first show on television to build itself entirely around a character so resolutely insidious. Even J.R. Ewing would be impressed by Jim Profit's cunning (and Dallas was more an ensemble piece). Played with a slippery chill by Adrian Pasdar, Profit is a young man of untrammeled ambition and unfathomable turpitude. What he's up against, the labyrinthian universe of Big Business, may be just as pernicious.

Creators and writers David Greenwalt and John McNamara have done their best to imbue the show with a mythic ethos. The drama takes place in a gray, unnamed city (it's shot in Vancouver). Profit, a junior vice president, blackmails, murders and manipulates to remove obstacles and enemies, but his ultimate goal is unclear. While his urge to control is maniacal, he appears to want powers even grander than a mere title like CEO could bestow. The operations of Gracen & Gracen, "a family company," are shrouded in mystery. They simply "acquire"--businesses, information and, of course, souls.

Profit, though, is not without wry wit. Jim's mean father kept him in a box where Jim watched TV all day. And see how the boy turned out? As a grown-up he sits in front of a computer plotting against rivals. Indeed, technology can alienate--Profit is TV even the Unabomber could appreciate.

Getting Profit on the air was no simple feat. Part of the credit for rescuing the show from a lengthy development hell goes to executive producer Stephen Cannell, who funded the pilot and was able to persuade initially reluctant programmers at Fox to pick it up. Over the years Cannell has mounted an incredibly wide range of dramas--everything from Wiseguy to the less cerebral The A-Team and Silk Stalkings. Initial ratings for Profit were weak, but Cannell thinks he can maintain his track record. "I broke all the rules with The Rockford Files,'' he says, referring to his first big hit. "I had an antihero the networks hated for being a coward." The Rockford Files ultimately hit No. 1--and Jim Rockford never looked as sexy in a suit as Jim Profit.

--By Ginia Bellafante. Reported by Jeffrey Ressner/Los Angeles

With reporting by Jeffrey Ressner/Los Angeles