Review

Shower of Stars: After getting his second Emmy of the evening at the award ceremonies last week (see above), Jack Benny asked a prophetically rhetorical question: "Wouldn't it be funny if my next show was lousy?" Shower succeeded in reducing its stars (Janis Paige, John Raitt, Betty Grable) to micrometeor magnitude, often seemed an accidental parody of an early '30s movie musical, lacking only the traditional aerial views of chorus girls sprawling in living floral patterns. Jokes and Chrysler commercials sometimes had interchangeable parts. Cooed Barbara Nichols, playing a scrub girl in a carwash emporium: "Gee, isn't he [Raitt] cute! He can put his Imperial on my wash rack any time!" Jack Benny had the embarrassed air of one trapped in a cold Shower that could not be shut off.

Kraft Theater: In an effort to halt the long decline of TV's oldest continuous program, the Kraft Co. last month hired Talent Associates' David Susskind to put on a series of works by topnotch authors (among them: Robert Penn Warren, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway), gave the new executive producer full rein. Susskind's first venture was a package of three one-act plays by Tennessee Williams, written back in the '30s when the grocer called him Tom and the postman brought him rejection slips. Moony's Kid Don't Cry was a peek into the frustration of a onetime lumberjack hooked by big-city humdrum, was acted by Ben Gazzara with such manneristic Method (except during one tender love scene played with Lee Grant as his wife) that the poverty-stricken dreamer often appeared a little paranoid. In The Last of My Solid Gold Watches, Actor Thomas Chalmers was ruggedly convincing as an oldtimer shoe salesman who hides his fear of death and lack of security behind passionate tirades against the new world's lack of manners and tradition, almost managed to mask the fact that the play was little more than a monologue. This Property Is Condemned was another disguised monologue, touchingly acted by a 13-year-old ballet hopeful, Zina Bethune. As an abandoned child living in the tortured, twisted glories of her past, she bore a remarkable resemblance to her older but equally demented sister, Blanche DuBois of Streetcar fame. Tennessee's three were clearly the first drafts of a talented author's later work. Their distinction lay in the fact that the talent was clearly there. For viewers, they provided a few moments of poetic depth rare on TV--and for Kraft, a much-needed artistic boost.

Shirley Temple's Storybook: "I'll return safely, and with Silverbud as my bride!" cried Abu Ali, the son of Aladdin. "Farewell! I leave for Samarkand!" In as delightful a piece of fluffy nonsense as Storyteller Temple has presented this season, Abu overcame the opposition of a smoke-breathing dragon and two villainous Oriental princes, won the princess' hand and heart. The Land of Green Ginger--a flying oasis that whimsically flitted about with its roots dangling--was satirically spoofy enough to entertain adults, was tricked up with a passel of fantastic gimmicks to bewitch children. Items: a magic carpet so aerodynamically proper that it would not fly when overloaded, a boy genie (his father was in the bathtub) who spun into view from nowhere when Abu rubbed the magic lamp. As the gallant hero battling his way along the zigzag road to Samarkand, young (23) Kashmir-born Kuldip Singh was dashing and princely, sang with a mellow, Kuldipped voice that charmed tots as it has previously entranced bobby-soxers. Crooner Singh's career was launched in 1956, when he appeared on Groucho Marx's TV quiz show as a contestant. Groucho persuaded him to croon a ballad; the mail response was so enthusiastic that Kuldip decided to forge into show business.

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