TELEVISION Wednesday, May 3

DANNY THOMAS SPECIAL (NBC, 9-10 p.m.).* Bing Crosby joins Danny on "The Road to Lebanon," with Claudine Auger. Repeat.

ABC WEDNESDAY NIGHT MOVIE (ABC, 9-11 p.m.). The Hustler (1961), featuring Paul Newman. Jackie Gleason, George C. Scott and Piper Laurie in the poolroom's sweat and smoke.

Thursday, May 4 THE CRUCIBLE (CBS, 9-11:15 p.m.). George C. Scott again, in Arthur Miller's drama of witch hunting, with Colleen Dewhurst, Fritz Weaver, Tuesday Weld, Melvyn Douglas.

ABC STAGE 67 (ABC, 10-11 p.m.). The talking in Jean Cocteau's The Human Voice is done by Ingrid Bergman, on the telephone throughout the 50-minute drama.

Friday, May 5 THE LEGEND OF MARK TWAIN (ABC, 8-9 p.m.). Host David Wayne perpetuates the legend by dramatizing scenes from Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.

Saturday, May 6 HOUSTON CHAMPIONS INTERNATIONAL (ABC, 4-5 p.m.). Pros and amateurs from Belgium to Japan join top U.S. golfers (defending champion: Arnold Palmer) in this $100,000 tournament at Houston's Champions Golf Course. Continued Sunday afternoon at 4:30.

THE KENTUCKY DERBY (CBS, 5-6 p.m.).

The 93rd running of America's oldest continuous racing classic, live from Churchill Downs in Louisville.

THE HOLLYWOOD PALACE (ABC, 9:30-10:30 p.m.). Host Gene Barry shares billing with international Troubadour Theo dore Bikel, Australian Singer Lana Cantrell and Comedians Jack E. Leonard and Mort Sahl.

Sunday, May 7 THE CATHOLIC HOUR (NBC, 1:30-2 p.m.).

"The Struggle," Part 1 in a series that asks: "Can human life be regarded as meaningful?" Host Eugene Roche and four actors dramatize the issue through the use of graphics and readings from Buber, Camus and Teilhard de Chardin.

SOCCER GAME OF THE WEEK (CBS, 2:30-4:30 p.m.). The St. Louis Stars v. the Chicago Spurs, at St. Louis.

THE 215T CENTURY (CBS, 6-6:30 p.m.). "Standing Room Only," a look at the overpopulated world after the year 2000, and the race to find ways to feed, clothe, house and otherwise make life livable for all God's children.

ARMSTRONG CIRCLE THEATER (ABC, 9-11 p.m.). Rodgers & Hammerstein's musical Carousel, specially adapted for TV, features Robert Goulet as Carnival Barker Billy Bigelow and such brass ring-adingers as If I Loved You and June Is Bustin' Out All Over.

Monday, May 8 THE PURSUIT OF PLEASURE (NBC, 10-11 p.m.). Newsman Sander Vanocur stalks hedonists in their natural habitats from psychedelic San Francisco to swinging London, analyzing today's new morality--or lack thereof. Among the "consultants": Ralph Ginzburg and Hugh Hefner.

Tuesday, May 9

CBS NEWS HOUR (CBS, 10-11 p.m.). "The Old College Try" raises some of the questions on the minds of the 1,500,000 high school seniors trying to get into college. What is a college interview like? How hard is it to get in?

NET JOURNAL (shown on Mondays). "Every Seventh Child" studies the parochial-school system today. Filmed in churches and schools from Baltimore to St. Louis, the program includes thoughtful interviews with educators, church leaders, parents and students.

NET PLAYHOUSE (shown on Fridays). "A Mother for Janek." dramatizes the story of a boy orphaned during the 1956 Hungarian Revolution and sent to the U.S. to live.

THEATER

On Broadway

YOU KNOW I CAN'T HEAR YOU WHEN THE WATER'S RUNNING. Robert Anderson splashes sex around and raises a steady spray of humor for Martin Balsam, Eileen Heckart and George Grizzard, who develop his four playlets with insouciant grace.

THE HOMECOMING. An arid intellectual and his sex-parched wife arrive in London from the U.S. to visit his bull walrus of a father and two brothers in a house the family calls the "land of no holds barred." He eventually flees, but she stays on--with pleasure. Members of the Royal Shakespeare Company give the latest puzzle from Playwright Harold Pinter a polished, tempered performance.

BLACK COMEDY. When the lights are supposed to be on, the stage is totally dark; when the lights are supposed to be off, the stage is ablaze, allowing the audience to see Peter Shaffer's electrically amusing farce about antics in the dark.

THE APA COMPANY, directed by Ellis Rabb, offers dramatic works for every taste in this season's repertory: School for Scandal, War and Peace, The Wild Duck, Right You Are If You Think You Are and You Can't Take It with You.

Off Broadway

HAMP tries a British youth for deserting when the blood and din of World War I overwhelm him. Though innocent of evil, he is guilty of breach of duty, and must be condemned. Robert Salvio is movingly effective as the frightened Private Hamp.

RECORDS

Pop LPs

AND THEN THERE WAS LANA (RCA Victor). Lana Cantrell is only 23, but she knows the recipe for mixing sophistication and simplicity. Her range, clever phrasing and flawless execution make this first album an exciting one, as she sings hauntingly in I Will Wait for You, pleadingly in Stay, joyously in Let Yourself Go, and prophetically in Nothing Can Stop Me Now!

CASINO ROYALE (Colgems). The surest musical bet that Producer Charles Feldman could make for the theme song of his $12 million, many-Bonded movie was Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. Playing Burt Bacharach's music, Herb and the boys take the bull by the horns, while a very competent studio orchestra keeps the tail from dragging.

FOR EMILY, WHENEVER I MAY FIND HER (RCA Victor). Surrounding himself with guitars and some of the top folk songs. Glenn Yarbrough lends his easy style to the pleas, pleasures and protests of today's youth. But while he shines in the light numbers, he lacks the involvement of the Now Generation when he takes on the lyrics of such angry young minstrels as Bob Dylan and Phil Ochs.

THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE (Decca). It's the bee's knees, the cat's whiskers and 23-skidoo in the razzmatazz sound of the '20s, featuring Julie Andrews and Carol Channing from the sound track. Julie sweetens up the oldies (Poor Butterfly, Baby Face) and puts a high gloss on the show's new tunes (Thoroughly Modern Millie, The Tapioca), while Carol stamps her mark on Jazz Baby and Do It Again.

NOBODY SEES ME CRY (Columbia). Diahann Carroll lights a torch with her own special fire, which she carries into the blues. Her sensual, perfected purr is the result, she says, of "cutting away the frills." And it's pure indigo when she sings Little Girl Blue and I'll Be Around, along with a couple of upbeat songs such as Don't Answer Me and Runnin' Out of Fools.

CINEMA

NAKED AMONG THE WOLVES. The story of the concentration camps has been filmed before--and with greater skill--but the theme of the indomitable prisoners bears frequent retelling. This East German tale of the inmates of Buchenwald attempting to hide a three-year-old boy from their Nazi torturers gives credence to the hope for civilization's ultimate survival.

ACCIDENT. Screenwriter Harold Pinter and Director Joseph Losey probe the inner anxiety of a group of Oxford dons, students and wives and find more bone than flesh.

LA VIE DE CHATEAU. A farce about the German occupation of Normandy that proves that the flip side of war and the flop side of marriage can be equally funny.

ULYSSES. James Joyce's masterpiece is a short story that exploded into a summa of 30 centuries of Western culture; Joseph Strick's adaptation is merely a pictorial precis of some of the principal episodes--but a good one.

THE TAMING OF THE SHREW. Shakespeare possibly would not have recognized his comedy, but he certainly would have enjoyed watching the Burtons in Franco Zeffirelli's lusty, sensuous production.

FALSTAFF. Orson Welles may be the first actor in the history of the theater to appear too fat to play Shakespeare's "huge bombard of sack, that stuffed cloak bag of guts." In his compilation of five of the Bard's plays, some Wellesian genius flickers but does not burn brightly enough to illuminate the long dull stretches.

BOOKS

Best Reading

JUST AROUND THE CORNER: A HIGHLY SELECTIVE HISTORY OF THE THIRTIES, by Robert Bendiner. A wry, dry, lively and unsentimental recollection of the not-so-faraway time of 3.2 beer, 5-c- apples, $4-a-month domestics and the Great Depression.

LANGUAGE AND SILENCE, by George Steiner. At 38, Steiner has earned a name as one of the leading U.S. literary critics and a possible successor to Edmund Wilson. This collection of eloquent essays shows why.

MAY WE BORROW YOUR HUSBAND? AND OTHER COMEDIES OF THE SEXUAL LIFE, by Graham Greene. While sex is the name of the game in this collection of short stories, Old Pro Greene thoroughly gilds the libido with the sensibilities of an informed heart.

A MEETING BY THE RIVER, by Christopher Isherwood, limns sharply contrasting portraits of brothers--one saintly, the other venal. Esthetically, at least, sin triumphs: the evil brother ranks with Sally Bowles and Arthur Norris among Isherwood's most likable rogues.

THE CHOSEN, by Chaim Potok. Another hearty bowl of New York Jewish chicken soup, though this time the rebellion against orthodoxy is set against a background of Brooklyn in the waning days of World War II.

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF BERTRAND RUSSELL. Old (94) Mathematician Russell's own witty account of his dour and dotty early life and career never explains--but does help people understand--why he is such a conundrum.

A SPORT AND A PASTIME, by James Salter. While his characters fall in love, the author has a love affair of his own with rural France. A fine and beautifully written novel.

FATHERS, by Herbert Gold. A nostalgic search for the essence of Jewish fatherhood by a loving son who tempers sentiment with just the right amount of irony and cynical insight.

THE UNICORN GIRL, by Caroline Glyn. A rangy, clumsy 13-year-old goes off to Girl Guide camp to find a few friends but finds herself instead. Along the way, Novelist Glyn, only 19 herself, points out some of the hilariously muddled drills that the Guides perform with girlish intensity.

JOURNEY THROUGH A HAUNTED LAND: THE NEW GERMANY, by Amos Elon. A searching and compassionate study of today's Germany by an Israeli journalist who never forgets that he could have been a victim.

DISRAELI, by Robert Blake. The wiles and wit of Britain's most prodigal Victorian Prime Minister, whose life as recounted in this excellent biography proves even richer than the many versions of its myth.

Best Sellers

FICTION 1. The Arrangement, Kazan (1 last week)

2. The Secret of Santa Vittoria, Crichton (2)

3. The Eighth Day, Wilder (3)

4. Capable of Honor, Drury (4)

5. Valley of the Dolls, Susann (6)

6. Tales of Manhattan, Auchincloss (7)

7. The Captain, De Hartog (5)

8. Fathers, Gold

9. The Time Is Noon, Buck (9)

10. Tai-Pan, Clavell

NONFICTION

1. The Death of a President, Manchester (1)

2. Madame Sarah, Skinner (2)

3. Everything But Money, Levenson (3)

4. Edgar Cayce: The Sleeping Prophet, Stearn (4)

5. Games People Play, Berne (7)

6. Paper Lion, Plimpton (5)

7. Inside South America, Gunther (9)

8. The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell

9. The Jury Returns, Nizer (8)

10. A Search for the Truth, Montgomery

*All times E.D.T.

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