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- January 2, l984VIDEOBEST OF '83
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- Cheers (NBC). Now in its second season, this barroom sitcom has
- found its saucy stride and, in stars Ted Danson and Shelly Long,
- has created a mismatched pair that could give Tracy and Hepburn
- a run for their moxie.
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- Faerie Tale Theatre (Showtime). These slightly fractured but
- never completely Grimm tales, produced by actress Shelley
- Duvall, give a hip, witty twist and dreamy visual style to
- storybook classics.
-
- The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby (Mobile Showcase
- Network). Even squeezed to fit the small screen, the Royal
- Shakespeare Company's epic entertainment still ranked as a
- unique theatrical treat. The nine-hour drama preserved 150
- great performances in a format Dickens would have loved: the
- mini-series.
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- Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever (NBC). A stirring video
- jukebox of the most memorable sounds of a quarter century of
- soul, from the still irresistible Temptations through the
- stylized showmanship of Michael Jackson.
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- Nickelodeon (Warner Amex Satellite Entertainment Co.). A
- channel devoted to children without being childish. Among its
- most notable enticements: the Pinwheel puppets for preschoolers,
- and Livewire, an exuberant variety talk show for early teens.
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- NBC News Overnight. "Being best is not enough," rued NBC News
- Chief Reuven Frank in canceling this late-night paragon after
- 17 months. Insomniacs will miss Overnight's tough reporting, its
- sprightly sense of the absurd and especially its Queen of Tart,
- Co-Anchor Linda Ellerbee. The first nightly news show good
- enough to warrant reruns.
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- Special Bulletin (NBC). Gripping in a way that The Day After
- was not, this docudrama presented a fictional nuclear crisis as
- a news event actually in progress. The result was a dark parody
- of the pontifical way in which the networks package disaster.
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- Sunday Morning with Charles Kuralt (CBS). Light but never
- lightweight, this 90-minute eye opener demonstrates that
- long-form magazine shows can work, and that Kuralt is as nimble
- off the road as on.
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- Swan Lake, Minnesota (ARTS). Swan maidens in tutus riding bales
- of hay up a conveyor belt? This poetic, disarmingly simple
- adaptation of the classic ballet inventively mixed a
- country-and-western twang with Tchaikovskian lyricism.
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- Viet Nam: A Television History (PBS). With its painstaking
- marshaling of detail, this 13-hour documentary was television
- as the first draft of history. It was, by turns, poignant and
- chilling and never blinked.
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