Garbling History

By Frank Rich

THE TRIAL OF LEE HARVEY OSWALD ABC, Sept. 30 & Oct. 3

Even by the often slippery standards of TV's other so-called docudramas, this two-part made-for-TV movie is preposterous. In four mindless hours, it purports to resolve the major mysteries surrounding John F. Kennedy's assassination. To do so, Trial garbles history with wild abandon, but unlike ABC's similarly reckless Washington: Behind Closed Doors, it never entertains.

The movie is basically a speculation about what might have happened if Oswald had lived to stand trial. The first half dwells prosaically on the accused assassin's marital problems, his sojourn in Russia and his activities just prior to Nov. 22, 1963. Though Star John Pleshette creates an intriguingly neurotic Oswald, the man remains a cryptic figure. The trial itself, which dominates Part Two, is--well --trying, with fictional lawyers (played bombastically by Lome Greene and Ben Gazzara) wrangling endlessly over their case's voluminous ballistics evidence, Perry Mason-style.

Writer Robert E. Thompson has studded his script with references to most of the conventional Kennedy assassination theories. While he eventually arrives at a verdict on Oswald's guilt (which ABC is keeping secret until air time), so confusing and arbitrary are his data that the verdict might as well be drawn out of a hat. All this Trial really proves is just how effectively television can trivialize even one of the most surefire historical dramas of our time.--Frank Rich

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