It just may have been an ordinary week for a comic who has built his career around the plaint, "I don't get no respect." Shortly after Rodney Dangerfield taped 31 days of material for New York Telephone's Dial-A-Joke, 170,000 Manhattan phones went dead because of a fire in the company switching station. No matter, really, because the New York Daily News, which was to run advertisements and a phone number for the feature, was shut down by a strike. Dangerfield remained calmly pessimistic through it all. Said the cut-off comic to his nightclub audience in Manhattan at week's end: "Today was a good day. I got a dial tone."

Actor Ernest Borgnine has never been in demand for romantic leads, but his get-up for The Devil's Rain, an occult thriller just filmed in Durango, Mexico, gives eyesore new meaning. In the movie, which co-stars Ida Lupino and William Shatner, Borgnine returns from the dead as a disciple of Satan--with help from a three-hour facial by the makeup experts for Planet of the Apes. The citizens of Durango have seen 65 movies shot in their town, but this one has managed to unnerve them. Because of the film's supernatural goings on, people working near the sets have blamed the devil's rainmakers for everything from bad weather to leaky canoes. They left the 6-ft. Borgnine pretty much alone. Says the grinning actor: "Guess I'm lucky as the devil."

"How much I could have done for my country had I been given just 'musical freedom,' " lamented Soviet Cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, 47, in a letter written recently to Le Monde. His claim was vindicated by his U.S. conducting debut before an audience of 2,700 at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall in Washington. Rostropovich, who had encountered growing repression in his homeland because of his loyalty to Writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn and other dissident artists, left the Soviet Union in May with his wife, Soprano Galina Vishnevskaya. The maestro's troubles seemed almost distant, however, as he guided an exuberant National Symphony Orchestra through an evening of Tchaikovsky for an audience that included another recent arrival from the U.S.S.R., Dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov. It was a rare evening. Said Washington Star-News Critic Irving Lowens: "In terms of enthusiasm and adulation aroused, about the only thing the concert can be compared to is the Second Coming."

Ben Cartwright, move over. NBC'S Columbo, the disheveled shamus portrayed by Peter Folk, has joined ranks with Bonanza and I Love Lucy reruns as one of America's top TV exports. Now shown in 75 countries, the series has just been voted Japan's most popular television show in a poll conducted by the Japanese TV Guide. Falk's international success has not come smoothly, however. When Rumania's state TV network ran out of shows, fans of the raincoated detective began to protest, and the beleaguered network cabled Universal Studios for temporary relief. Said Falk in Hollywood last week: "The Rumanian government got me to tape an announcement in Rumanian saying, 'Just be patient; there'll be more Columbos. Hold tight.' They flew here with a camera crew and gave me a piece of paper with what to say, and I did it." When Falk's pidgin Rumanian is heard back home, the crisis may be quickly resolved.

"I would like to be known as Sir Charles, not Sir Charlie," announced Charlie Chaplin, 85, shortly after receiving his long-overdue knighthood from Britain's Queen Elizabeth II. Chaplin, who arrived for his investiture at Buckingham Palace clad in morning clothes and blue suede shoes, accepted his dubbing from a wheelchair, then retired to the Savoy Hotel to accept congratulations from Prime Minister Harold Wilson and other fans. "I was too dumbfounded to talk to the Queen," confessed Sir Charles later. Less awed was his daughter, Actress Geraldine Chaplin, 30, who came to London for the ceremonies with her son Shane. Since Shane was born out of wedlock two months ago, his citizenship is in question. Mother Geraldine is of mixed American and British parentage, and his father, Film Director Carlos Saura, is Spanish. "If they can make my father a knight," protested Geraldine shortly before her arrival, "they can damn well make his grandson British."

Once again San Francisco Examiner Editor Randolph Hearst found himself printing news about one of his own daughters. And again the news was bad. While entering the U.S. from Canada, Anne Hearst, 19, younger sister of Fugitive Patty Hearst, was stopped by customs officials in Niagara Falls, N.Y., and her car and its occupants searched. Agents found a plastic bag containing a dozen amphetamine tablets stuffed in the sock of Anne's driving companion, Donald Moffett, 21, and promptly arrested the pair for possession of dangerous drugs. U.S. federal agents rushed to the scene, hoping Anne could provide information about her sister, who police suspect may now be hiding in Canada with the remnants of the Symbionese Liberation Army. The agents apparently learned nothing, and after Hearst and Moffett posted $1,000 recognizance bonds, they were released. "Twelve pills to keep awake on a 1,000-mile drive is not excessive," said Anne's father of the incident. "If it had been anybody but a Hearst, nobody would have ever heard about it."

"I had an extra ticket for the Grammys," quipped Singer-Composer John Lennon after showing up for the annual record-awards show with his estranged wife, Artist Yoko Ono. Lennon revealed that he and Yoko put their marital act back together after an 18-month breakup and have been "happily ensconced" in Manhattan for the past month. "Our separation was a failure," said John. "We knew we would get back together; it was just a matter of time. Thank God it happened."

The guest list showed stars aplenty, but most of the sparkle came from champagne after the Hollywood preview of At Long Last Love, the newest movie from Producer-Director Peter Bogdanovich. "I think we bombed in there," fretted Burt Reynolds after 500 guests of 20th Century-Fox had left a pre-supper screening of the musical in which he stars with Bogdanovich's live-in true love, Cybill Shepherd. The Hollywood elite, including Liza Minnelli, Gene Hackman, Gregory Peck, Roy Rogers, Merle Oberon and Valerie Perrine, adjourned for veal and ambrosiana amid the opulent sets used in the film. Shepherd, perhaps sensing the dour mood of the crowd, made good her getaway. "I've got another party to go to," she announced as the first dinner guests arrived, then vanished, leaving Boy Friend Bogdanovich to play host alone.

"I haven't made a dent in any of my debts yet," protested Watergate Witness John Dean last week. "I don't even know when one receives money after a lecture. I imagine it will be months before it comes in." Though he is pleading poverty, Dean has announced that he will end his five-week lecture tour on March 15. Not even offers of $6,000 per speech, which he claims to have received, will keep Richard Nixon's old nemesis from abandoning the college circuit. Instead, Dean plans to begin work on a book about Watergate and a novel "about the first black woman named to the Supreme Court"--a story, he promises, that will have some laughs.

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