The Houston Chronicle
August 25, 1992, Tuesday, 2 STAR Edition
SECTION: HOUSTON; Pg. 1
LENGTH: 1124 words
HEADLINE: Scenery is best part of "Covington Cross'
BYLINE: ANN HODGES, Houston Chronicle TV Editor; Staff
BODY:
""Covington Cross,'' a show with family values for all
seasons, is ABC's choice to lead the herd home this fall.
This medieval swashbuckler arrives, with swords drawn, at 9
tonight on Channel 13. Two knights in armor are mixing it up in the
great hall.
""How many times have I told you lads, not in the castle? ''
thunders Sir Daddy. ""Sorry, father. We were only having a little
fun,'' says one member of that high-spirited pair.
That touche to the en garde is the tip-off that ""Covington
Cross'' is not just another ""Robin Hood. '' This is the show that
ABC would just love to have us dub ""Covington Cross 90210. ''
""When we first developed this show, a lot of people looked
at us as though we were crazy,'' ABC Entertainment President Robert
Iger admitted in Hollywood this summer. "" "How could you put a
show about knights in armor on the air? ' everybody said. Somebody
called it ""1400something. ''
""But everything about it appealed to us. It's well-cast,
fast-paced, a lot of fun and very different. We've got to try to do
things that are different . . . ""Covington Cross'' is as different
as any show on television. ''
It is different, all right.
ABC is trying to sell it as the first premiere of the new
fall season. But that one is really stretching a point. By ABC's
scheduling strategy, fall's new entries will be launched over the
next five weeks. But you do have to stretch to figure it ABC's way.
Tonight's ""Covington Cross,'' you see, also is being called
a ""preview,'' and there will be two repeats of this same episode,
on Sept. 11 and Sept. 19. When it does finally settle into the
weekly time slot, it will be on at 7 p.m. Saturdays.
""Covington Cross'' is the first se ries in 30 years, dating
clear back to ""Robin Hood'' with Richard Greene, to be produced in
England by Americans for American TV. It's also being sold abroad,
of course; but if ABC hadn't bought it, it wouldn't be in business.
Gil Grant is the creator and executive producer. Among his TV
credits are such hits and misses as ""Eight Is Enough and Hull
High. ''
As Grant explains, this medieval derring-do is the English
equivalent of the American western, and this medieval family faces
many of the same problems families face today.
""It's a frontier family moved back 500 years, with no guns,
just swords, and with problems that could be from the '90s,'' Grant
said.
The family consists of Sir Thomas Gray (Nigel Terry), widower
and lord of the castle; his lovely daughter, the liberated Lady
Eleanor (Ione Sky); his three lively sons (you can't tell one from
the other, but one of them is Glenn Quinn, Becky's old boyfriend
from ""Roseanne''); and Sir Thomas' attractive live-in mistress,
Lady Elizabeth (Cherie Lunghi).
It's Lady Elizabeth's design to cross-stitch her way into
being the lady of the castle one of these days. Lady Eleanor
prefers the crossbow to cross-stitch.
Sir Thomas is a good guy, and, of course, there is a bad guy.
Sir John Mullens (James Faulkner) is ""a cross between Vlad the
Impaler and Wile E. Coyote,'' Grant said. Mullens owns the castle
up the road, and he wants Sir Thomas' castle, too. He plans to get
it by marrying off his dastardly son to Lady Eleanor. His son,
Henry of Galt, gets his jollies by burning up the countryside.
Eleanor, however, is definitely a lady ahead of her time. In
this family, she wears the pants -- literally, too. And she's not
about to be the bartered bride of horrible Henry. In those days,
arranged marriages were all the thing. But Eleanor wants to marry
for love -- and she's already in love, with a portrait painter, a
young hunk of some talent, but no titles at all.
Sir Thomas' sons are too busy playing around and locking the
friar in the privy to pay much attention to their father's
problems. But when push comes to shove with Sir John and son Henry,
those boys will be men, and Lady Eleanor will be right out there in
the front lines between them.
Such bravery in battle is almost enough to compensate for
this family's terrible table manners. But what they do to suckling
pigs is a right-sickening sight to see.
Skip the banquets and feast your eyes on the scenery, is my
advice. Those great English locations -- real castles and all --
are a definite upgrade from the usual Hollywood back lots.