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It is too early to write off 1968-69 as the silly season. Phyllis Diller, who bombed in an ABC sitchcom two years ago, will try a variety hour for NBC titled The Beautiful Phyllis Diller Show. The format includes a twist: in one segment each week, she will interview a celebrity. But the real get-the-guest free-for-all should be ABC's Don Rickles Show. Rickles, the insult comic, will knock off a guest or two per weekly half-hour. ABC will also try TV's first weekly book musical, That's Life. For continuity, the one-hour show will have a regular star, Robert Morse, and a continuing theme, modern marriage.
Wider Spectrum. Michael Dann, CBS's senior V.P. for programming, concedes that "the true excitement must come from specials." This year NBC will offer Roberto Rossellini's impressions of Sicily, an original drama starring Paul Scofield, and shows headlined by Brigitte Bardot and Elvis Presley. CBS promises a study of the Galapagos Islands narrated by Britain's Prince Philip, a Royal Shakespeare Company production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and another colloquy with Waterfront Philosopher Eric Hoffer. ABC will screen about 45 hours of the sum mer Olympics from Mexico, as well as a Truman Capote report on capital punishment and two more Capote teleplays. In news, CBS and NBC will pioneer prime-time shows with a magazine format. CBS's 60 Minutes, to be seen on alternate Tuesdays, will widen the TV news spectrum to include the arts. Among the "guest columnists": Norman Mailer, Bishop Fulton Sheen and British Critic Kenneth Tynan. NBC's First Tuesday, a monthly two-hour program starting in January, will stress aggressive investigative reporting. The goal, says NBC News Vice President Richard Wald, is "insight, not just the slam-bang of things."
National Educational Television will range from Bullfighter El Cordobes to Conductor Zubin Mehta, and from the psychological burdens of the ghetto to drinking problems in the suburbs. This could be the season when Public TV becomes the viewable alternative.