If you think Roseanne's personal life is a mess, wait until you see Fox's made-for-TV movie about Roseanne's personal life.
"Roseanne: An Unauthorized Biography" (7 p.m., Ch. 13) is beyond bad. It's dreadful.And, surprisingly, it's not because of its subject. It's because of terrible writing, atrocious directing and editing and lousy acting.
This teleflick accomplishes the impossible - it takes a story known to anyone not living in a cave for the past few years and manages to muddle it up. And make it boring beyond belief.
"An Unauthorized Biography" opens with Roseanne dumping her first husband, Bill Pentland. He threatens, "I will sue your (expletive deleted) all the way back to Salt Lake City if I have to," when she locks him out of their house.
Then, suddenly, we flash back to 1968 Salt Lake City where Roseanne is wandering around in traffic with a blanket over her head until she's hit by a car in an unintentionally funny sequence. (The movie's only other humor is also unintentional - a scene of Roseanne and second husband Tom Arnold
brawling.) The movie, which was shot in California, makes little reference to Utah other than the fictional Roseanne's comment that, as the "only Jewish child in Salt Lake City" she had to sing the Dreidl Song at the Christmas pageant and explain why she wasn't Christian.
This movie suffers from flashback-and-flashforward mania - it makes 19 jumps in time.
And we're not talking about a single flashback and then a linear progression. Believe it or not, this "Unauthorized Biography" starts in 1989, jumps back to 1968, jumps forward six months, jumps forward about a year, jumps ahead 17 years, jumps back 17 years, jumps ahead six years, jumps ahead 11 years, jumps back nine years, jumps ahead nine years, jumps back six years, jumps back seven years, jumps ahead seven years, jumps back seven years, jumps ahead a few months, jumps ahead three years, jumps ahead two years, jumps ahead one year, jumps ahead two years, and - finally - jumps ahead three years, ending with Roseanne throwing Arnold out.
What a mess.
All the salient points are addressed in the most fleeting of ways. Roseanne's teenage pregnancy, her marriages, her career as a prostitute, her career as a comedian, her battles with the producers of her show, her battles with her family.
If, by some chance, you don't already know her story, you certainly won't figure it out from this.
Perhaps the oddest aspect is that Roseanne's allegations of sexual abuse by her father are treated as a mystery for the first three-quarters of the movie, with vague references and strange subtlety. And then treated as a big
surprise. There are bad performances all around, but Denny Dillon deserves singling out for her portrayal nightclub imitation portrayal of the title
character. The movie opens with perhaps the oddest disclaimer in TV history: "Certain characters and some events in the following film have been fictionalized. In those instances only, any similarities to real persons and events is purely coincidental."
And any similarity between this movie and entertainment is impossible.
"THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE": While Fox's "Roseanne" movie represents the worst television has to offer, PBS's "The American Experience" consistently represents the best.
And "FDR" is no exception, as this two-part, four-hour documentary is beautifully produced, enlightening and entertaining.
Tonight's first installment (8 p.m., Ch. 7) looks at Franklin Delano Roosevelt's early years, his trouble fitting in, his marriage to Eleanor and the difficulties in that marriage, his fight with polio and his eventual elections as governor of New York and president.
It's not about his policies but about him. About what made FDR the man he
was. The conclusion on Wednesday deals with the last 12 years of his life - his presidency, the Great Depression and World War II.
This is great stuff, well worth sitting down for - and setting the VCR
for.
"NYPD BLUE": Last year's most controversial show returns with another excellent episode, setting the stage for the departure of John Kelly (difficult actor David Caruso) in three more weeks.
Tonight, Licalsi (Amy Brenne- man) goes on trial for murder, and not only does Kelly lie for her on the stand but he decides he's still in love with her. And Kelly's actions prompt Internal Affairs to investigate him.
Meanwhile, Dennis Franz proves he deserved his best actor Emmy for his portrayal of Andy Sipowicz. Andy not only tries to protect a battered wife, but has been attending Alcoholics Anonymous. One problem - his sponsor (Peter Boyle) doesn't think Andy is ready to resume his relationship with Sylvia (Sharon Lawrence).
Tonight's season premiere contains no nudity, and proves it doesn't need to pander in that way. When Kelly and Licalsi enter his apartment and close the door, there's not mystery - and we don't need to see them in bed.
If only the producers could remember that every week.