The Imitators

The common denominator of most summer TV shows is that they are usually tired imitators of winter TV shows. But occasionally there is an agreeable surprise.

Some recent imitators, good and bad: The Duke (Fri. 8 p.m., NBC) has echoes both of Damon Runyon and all the situation comedies from I Love Lucy to The Life of Riley. Starring Newcomer Paul Gilbert as a middleweight boxing champion who has been lured into culture through a business connection with a Harvard man (Claude Stroud), the opening script (written by Hollywood's Charles Isaacs and Jack Elinson) took a fresh and inventive look at a great many stock situations. Culture-bound Gilbert turns out to be a better than adequate painter with an inclination to color bananas blue; he suffers amusingly through a stint at the opera (someone told him it was "Tristan -versus Isolde"), and brilliantly handles a pugnacious drunk at a nightclub. Allen Jenkins agonizes familiarly as the champ's trainer, and Phyllis Coates is eye-filling as a Park Avenue blonde.

Actor Gilbert, 29, was born into a vaudevillian's family in upstate New York, was early farmed out to a troupe of South American aerialists. and turned to comedy when he plunged through the safety net in a 65-ft. circus fall. An ex-fighter pilot, Gilbert sings well enough for light opera, can play five musical instruments, juggle, dance and do acrobatics. He will probably be around TV for quite a while.

On the Boardwalk (Sun. 8 p.m., ABC) is telecast from the Steel Pier at Atlantic City, and borrows its format from the Original Amateur Hour. Veteran Paul Whiteman serves as M.C., a panel of celebrities judges the performers, and each week some of the previous winners get a chance to show how much they have improved. Unlike the Amateur Hour, which runs 30 minutes, On the Boardwalk goes on for a full hour. It seems longer.

Two in Love (Sat. 10:30 p.m., CBS) borrows in all directions: from countless quiz shows, from Bride & Groom, from This Is Your Life. Frenetic Bert Parks tries to make all these elements stick together by bringing onstage a devoted couple and then surrounding them with assorted friends and relatives who give the lowdown on the romance and answer quiz questions to help pile up loot for the lovebirds.

Summer Holiday (Tues. & Thurs. 7:45 p.m., CBS) features Singer Betty Ann Grove, who used to be a TV colleague of Bert Parks and has absorbed much of his manic, eye-batting vitality. The co-star is Singer Merv Griffin. The show was created by Irving Mansfield, who last summer created almost exactly the same show for the same sponsor, but it was then called Summertime, U.S.A. and starred Singers Teresa Brewer and Mel Torme.

Sponsored once a week by General Electric, it is mostly singing and dancing, and each program pretends to visit a different U.S. vacation spot.

Droodles (Mon. 8 p.m., NBC), the brainchild of Funnyman Roger Price, has been seen in guest appearances on several winter programs. Now tricked out with the usual panel-and-M.C. format, the show has its own half-hour. Price draws diagrammatic outlines, and his panel tries to guess what the drawings represent.

Occasionally, the answers are fairly amusing, but the panel (Playwright Marc Connelly, Actor Carl Reiner, Singer Denise Lor) floundered a good deal on the open ing show and were saved only by the uninhibited Gallicisms of the guest panelist, Actress Denise Darcel.

Comment (Mon. 8:30 p.m., NBC) transfers the radio-style commentator to television and gives its audience a bumper helping of experts. On its opening show, four pundits (NBC's Joseph C. Harsch, Bob Hecox and David Brinkley, and the New York Times's Arthur Krock) stepped up and spoke on subjects ranging from Indo-China to the Army-McCarthy hearings. Last week four more experts (NBC's Richard Harkness and Romney Wheeler, the Denver Post's Palmer Hoyt and the Manchester Guardian's Washington cor respondent Max Freedman) dealt more coherently with the single subject: Anglo-American relations.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.