Not Nearly Enough Heaven In `Heaven And Hell' Saga

----------------------------------------------------------------- "Heaven and Hell: North and South, Part III," ABC miniseries, 9 p.m. Sunday, Monday and Wednesday, Channel 4. ----------------------------------------------------------------- In case you've been idly wondering whatever happened to the Hazards of Pennsylvania and the Mains of South Carolina - the two families at the heart of two previous ABC miniseries - information is at hand: ABC pursues these two families' fortunes in a third miniseries, "Heaven and Hell: North and South, Part III," a six-hour, three-part production that begins at 9 tonight on Channel 4.

The Hazards and Mains are the creation of John Jakes, who wrote the books upon which the series are based. The first saga, "North and South," focused on events leading up to the Civil War and aired in the fall of 1985. The second book, "Love and War," depicted the Civil War, and the miniseries version aired in the spring of 1986.

In case you've forgotten . . .

Eight years is a long time away from these characters, and the first few minutes of "Heaven and Hell" seem terribly confusing. So this may help: Orry Main, who grew up on a plantation, Mont Royal, in South Carolina, met George Hazard in 1842 when both were cadets at West Point. And it was there that both men incurred the enmity of Elkanah Bent, a sadistic cadet, who vowed to get even.

The Civil War put the young men on opposite sides of the war between the states but didn't destroy their friendship. George eventually married Constance and became a prosperous industrialist. Orry marries Madeline, a Southern beauty disliked by Orry's family (which included a brother, Cooper, and a sister, Ashton) because she was rumored to have a drop of black blood somewhere in her past.

As "Heaven and Hell" begins, Orry and Madeline are planning to rebuild Mont Royal, destroyed in the war. But the ubiquitous Bent reappears, killing Orry and leaving Madeline a widow to struggle on her own.

On your own

OK, now you're on your own. Suffice to say that Jakes gets enough plots going to stock several melodramas, and the story jumps about from Pennsylvania to South Carolina to St. Louis to Santa Fe to the Indian Territories - and points in between.

However, the two main couples are George Hazard, played by James Read, and Madeline Main, played by Lesley-Anne Down, and Charles Main, George's younger brother, played by Kyle Chandler (from "Homefront"), and Willa Parker, an itinerant actress, played by Rya Kihlstedt. You can't miss 'em because they all have scenes early on where it quickly becomes apparent that, at the end of the six hours, they will be reunited, no matter how many vicissitudes they face along the way.

Suzanne Clauser wrote the script from Jakes' novel - her last TV credit was an unforgettable adaptation of Danielle Steel's "Letter from 'Nam." If possible, Clauser has stuffed even more cliches, coincidences and unbelievable characters into this script than that one. An army of characters

This requires a huge cast and the credits roll off an impressive list of performers. However, many appear only briefly, such as Peter O'Toole, as a drunken actor; Billy Dee Williams as a politician; Mariette Hartley as a schoolteacher; Genie Francis as one of Orry's sisters; Cathy Lee Crosby as Orry's sister-in-law; Chris Burke as a westward traveler, and Rip Torn (who, as always, makes every second count) in a small but juicy role as an Indian trader. Also scoring in small roles are Cliff De Young and Gary Grubbs as sneering white supremacists.

In the leading roles, Chandler can make indecision seem completely appealing, while Read does the same for upstanding virtue. Down has learned to suffer nearly as beautifully as Lesley Ann Warren does, and Robert Wagner is surprisingly interesting as a scheming villain.

Under Larry Peerce's direction, Terri Garber is allowed to overact to an alarming degree as Orry's sluttish sister, while Philip Casnoff relishes playing the villain of the piece.

There are a great many other actors appearing in small roles. All do reasonably good work given the limitations of the script, which tries to do so much, it winds up doing none of it well.

The period of Reconstruction following the Civil War is a fascinating and critical time in American history, one rich with dramatic possibilities. But to tell it at all well, it would have been far wiser to have settled on one or two chief characters instead of trying to involve so many. They all wind up as stick figures about whom we never really know anything, except that they stand for qualities like Love, Virtue, Treachery, Evil, Sacrifice, etc.

Meanwhile, the plot predominates, moving these stock characters about while the story's Big Ideas - about justice, prejudice, westward expansion - are sketched out in the simplest, broadest, most basic politically correct strokes.

The result is a kind of "Reconstruction as Told by Action Comics."

Meanwhile, we can only await, with a certain amount of dread, the promised dramatization of "Scarlett," the Sequel to "Gone with the Wind," to air next fall on CBS. Surely David Bell's wall-to-wall music in "Heaven and Hell" will put you in mind of that movie - while "Heaven and Hell" will only increase your respect for the artistry of that classic.

A better choice ----------------------------------------------------------------- "Assault at West Point," 8 p.m. Sunday (also March 2, 8, 12, 17 and 20), Showtime. -----------------------------------------------------------------

More history from the same period as "Heaven and Hell," only this time based on fact rather than fiction, is to be found in "Assault at West Point."

The TV movie stars Seth Gilliam as Johnson Whittaker, one of the first black cadets admitted to West Point in the 1880s. He was attacked and injured by other cadets one night, but a military court decided Whittaker had faked the assault in order to avoid taking a crucial test! Whittaker's story was told in the book, "The Court-Martial of Johnson Whittaker" by John Marszalek and the story recently surfaced when legislation was introduced to award Whittaker a posthumous commission from West Point, denied him at the time.

The book and Harry Moses' subsequent script rely heavily on the transcript of the court-martial proceedings, so the format is often rather like a 19th-century version of "The Caine Mutiny Court Martial." And those courtroom scenes are interesting, especially when John Glover, Sam Waterston and Samuel Jackson are feuding as the lawyers involved in the case.

But a wraparound device, where Whittaker recounts his story in 1920 to a newspaperman in Oklahoma City (although historical records indicate he continued to live in South Carolina), adds nothing. A chronological telling of the story, with more emphasis upon Whittaker's life at West Point, and giving Gilliam a chance to create a more three-dimensional character, could only have strengthened the drama.

Still, "Assault at West Point" makes more points about attitudes prevalent during and after Reconstruction, and how the military was once perceived, and does so in a shorter time, than you'll find in all six hours of "Heaven and Hell."

Jackson scores as the African-American lawyer who joins forces with the well-known lawyer, played by Waterston, to defend Whittaker. But it is Glover, with his cleverness and superior attitude as the prosecutor, who steals the film and commands your attention - even when you hate him for it.