And Now, Heeeeere's Alan!

By Richard Stengel

THICKE OF THE NIGHT, Weeknights, Syndicated, 11:30p.m. E.D.T.

Half past eleven. Yawn. Brush teeth. Ready for bed. Let's see, what to watch, what to watch? There's always Johnny. Wonder who's on? Not Charles Nelson Reilly and Charo again. Nightline? Nope, too heavy. Kojak rerun? Nah, seen that one. What's this? Thicke of the Night! What kind of name is that? Oh, yeah, isn't he that Canadian guy who was supposed to challenge Carson? A comedy-variety show. Hmmm. Let's have a look.

Beginning last week late-night viewers across the country had the chance to do just that. Delivered by satellite five nights a week to a syndicate of 124 stations, Thicke of the Night is a dizzy 90-minute circus with Alan Thicke as an amiable ringmaster. Heavily hyped in print ads and on billboards, the show was put together by ex-NBC President Fred Silverman, who is betting that Carson's bedside manner is growing passe for children of the TV generation.

The format devised by Silverman and Thicke seems designed to be all things to all young people. It attempts to combine the insouciance of David Letterman with Carson's unflappability, mixed with generous helpings of Saturday Night Lives repertory company and rock music, plus the shtiks and skits of SCTV. The show's symbolically apt set, with its crisscross scaffolding, tacky colors and potted ferns, is a hotel-lobby hodgepodge.

Thicke, 35, who settled in Los Angeles in 1970, is a man of many hyphens: comedy writer-producer-singer-songwriter. Until last December, he still commuted to Vancouver to tape his highly popular Canadian daytime talk show. Thicke is a performer who can do everything, kind of. On his new show he sings and plays the guitar like a grownup Rick Springfield. As a conversationalist he can be gently witty, without Letterman's sting or Carson's quickness. "I'm cool in the McLuhan sense," he says. Describing himself as an Everyman, he is uncomfortable with the label of comic: "I'd rather be the genial host at the party."

Between all-too-predictable guests last week (Joan Collins, Erik Estrada), Thicke unveiled his regular troupe of sketch performers. Except for the razor-sharp cynicism of angular Richard Belzer and the loudly self-absorbed improvisations of Gilbert Gottfried, they came off as Not-Ready-Even-for-Late-Night Players. More promising are such regular features as Pipeline, a takeoff of Nightline, which last week examined a prison that had gone condo, and Flick of the Night, which overdubs old film clips with irreverent irrelevancies. The bookings may also improve. Already taped are interviews with less overexposed celebs like Lana Turner.

Filling up 90 minutes nightly is a Sisyphean task. Several times last week the final 15 minutes degenerated into a painful post-mortem of the previous hour and 15. Early shares in selected cities averaged about 8 compared with Carson's 20. Advertisers apparently remain confident: according to Silverman, national spots are already sold out through March. But to relieve late-night audience ennui, the show must first cure its own schizophrenia. Notes Thicke: "It will take about six to eight weeks to find a groove that is comfortable. Variety is fine, but we have a little too much variety."

--By Richard Stengel This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.