Heiress With Hiv Looks For Compassion
Television newsmagazines have given us many AIDS stories over the past 15 years. Tonight, “Dateline NBC” at 9 has one that shows that prejudice crosses all lines.
Jane Pauley interviews Aileen Getty, a member of one of America’s richest families. Getty, 36, is HIV-positive.
But as she tells it, her family as well as her superrich friends can’t find a way to give her something that costs nothing - compassion for someone with AIDS.
Getty says she has been virtually disowned by her family and shunned by rich friends and philanthropists who publicly say they care about those infected with the AIDS virus.
The oil heiress, who was diagnosed in 1985, also talks about growing up rich. She says her family’s wealth and power were more a source of heartache than happiness.
Also scheduled is a report on a crime that has shocked New England and the nation. Four Maine nuns in their late 60s were bludgeoned to death earlier this month.
Mark Bechard, a churchgoer with a history of mental illness, was found standing over the bodies.
Bob McKeon’s report goes beyond the killings of the four nuns, examining other violent crimes committed by the mentally ill.
Highlights
“Due South,” CBS at 8: Fraser (Paul Gross) is filled with self-doubt when an assassin out to kill a visiting dignitary taunts the transplanted Mountie with threats. Meanwhile, Ray (David Marciano) clashes with a Mexican secret-service agent (Maria Therese Rangel) over security arrangements.
“Tales From the Crypt,” FOX at 8: Country star Travis Tritt and Hank Azaria (“If Not For You”) play grave robbers in the first of two episodes of the gory HBO series.
A second “Tales” at 8:30 stars D.B. Sweeney (“Strange Luck”) as a cruel hoodlum who is paid back in chilling fashion. “Strange Luck” returns in this time slot next week. (TV grid listing above was prepared before program was announced.)
“Diagnosis Murder,” CBS at 9: Sloan (Dick Van Dyke) assumes the identity of a vagrant to catch the killers of a homeless woman murdered and mutilated by a gang that sells human organs on the black market.
“20/20,” ABC at 10: Parents who suspect that their child is having a bad year because of a bad teacher may be disheartened by a report that shows getting an ineffective teacher fired can sometimes be next to impossible.
Cable Calls
“Cape Fear” (1991), USA at 9: Robert De Niro is the beastly ex-con seeking to ruin the life of the prosecutor (Nick Nolte) who sent him to prison in this remake of the 1962 Robert Mitchum-Gregory Peck film.
The movie’s most disturbing theme - that the law can’t do much to protect citizens from someone determined to commit an act of violence - is as frightening as ever. But De Niro is too menacing for his own good, making his character more of a monster than necessary.
Juliette Lewis is riveting as the prosecutor’s daughter. Peck and Mitchum have cameos.
“The Breakfast Club” (1985), TBS at 7:05: Time hasn’t been particularly kind to this uneven drama written and directed by John Hughes.
It’s about five high-school students stuck in detention for various offenses. Their conversations are supposed to reveal why it’s so hard being a teenager.
Sometimes it works, but too often it’s stagy, predictable or simply out of touch. It’s become more of a curiosity piece, a look at the budding careers of Molly Ringwald, Judd Nelson, Emilio Estevez, Ally Sheedy and Anthony Michael Hall.
Talk Time
“Tonight,” NBC at 11:35: Singer k.d. lang and Kermit the Frog.
“Late Show With David Letterman,” CBS at 11:35: Actor Dennis Hopper, Teri Hatcher (“Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman”) and comedian Harry Hill.
“Late Night With Conan O’Brien,” NBC at 12:35 a.m.: Actor-comedian Tom Arnold.
xxxx Green River suspect “Unsolved Mysteries,” NBC at 8: Spokane resident Bob Stevens is quizzed on the alibi he provided for his brother, Bill Stevens, a prime suspect in the so-called Green River serial killings. Bill Stevens, a former Gonzaga University law student, died in 1991. New information suggests he had an accomplice who may still be at large. Also, a report on an unsolved Connecticut murder from 20 years ago. Thomas Skakel, a nephew of Ethel Kennedy, was the No. 1 suspect.