I'll admit it — I've always had a crush on Valerie Bertinelli. I loved her as Barbara Cooper on "One Day at a Time" back in the '70s, when we were both in high school.
I liked her on her subsequent sitcom efforts, even if I didn't like the shows — "Sydney" and "Cafe Americain" — all that much. And I watched a lot of TV movies I otherwise wouldn't have cared about simply because she was in them.
(OK, that and the fact that I had to review a lot of them.)
So Bertinelli's new role on "Touched by an Angel" can even get me to watch that show — which, frankly, I haven't made much of an effort to see in recent years.
I've always been glad that there's room on TV for a show like "Touched," but it has become formulaic — no, simplistic — over the years. When it began seven seasons ago, the guest characters, prodded by the angels, learned lessons and changed their lives. But, all too soon these changes didn't come about because of any real change of heart but because the lighting changes and someone says, "I am an angel sent by God."
Not to be rude, but the stories are less about faith in God than faith in special effects (limited as those are in "Touched").
The addition of Bertinelli to the cast isn't going to help the writing — the show's Achilles' heel — but she's so appealing she helps make up for it. And the show needs help because the ratings have dropped significantly over the past couple of years.
Bertinelli appeared briefly in last week's episode, but Sunday (7 p.m., Channel 2) is her first real work on the show. She plays a new angel, Gloria, who's supposed to be learning from Monica (Roma Downey, whose hair has taken a strange turn toward orange). But Monica's own faith is shaken — and she's tempted by Satan himself (interestingly cast as Mandy Patinkin) — when an explosion kills a number of people.
And, yes, it's the explosion staged in Salt Lake City that made the local news last month.
"Touched" is going to be around for a while — the ratings are still good, if not great. And if Downey decides not to return next season, Bertinelli could easily step in and replace her.
She's still so darn cute.
E-mail: pierce@desnews.com