Twin Peaks Television Program

Someone had to ask The Question. Russ Tamblyn and Richard Beymer are sitting around a set for the ABC series "Twin Peaks," discussing their current work on the David Lynch/Mark Frost production and looking back at their co-starring roles as Riff and Tony in the 1961 film classic "West Side Story." "So, Russ," says Beymer, deadpan, "what was it like to work with Natalie Wood?"

For a series so widely acknowledged as a television landmark, David Lynch's "Twin Peaks" has received conspicuously shoddy treatment on the home-video front. The eight-episode first season was released in 2001 without the pilot; the second (and final) season arrived on DVD only last spring after extensive delays.

"We wish you God's blessing," he told viewers of his regular Christian television program. Then, after praying, the fatherly televangelist with the silver hair broke into a smile and began chuckling, as if recalling a private joke. Someone on the set had just spoken the name of a famous TV character, and the mere mention of this name triggered an unexpected reaction from this renowned saver of souls. "Bart Simpson," the man said, shaking his head as he chuckled again.

"Twin Peaks" burst onto the television scene in 1990 with more heat than a cup of damn fine coffee, launching that phrase and the burning question "Who killed Laura Palmer?" into the national lexicon. "Peaks freaks" sipped coffee and munched cherry pie at viewing parties, made pilgrimages to the town of Snoqualmie, Wash.

ABC's two-hour season premiere of "Twin Peaks" finished behind an NBC "Perry Mason" movie Sunday night in big-city overnight ratings, pulling only 20% of the audience despite a major promotional buildup. National ratings are due today. When "Twin Peaks" debuted earlier this year with a two-hour special, it attracted 33% of the national audience. The big winner was Fox's "Married . . .

Now comes another twist in the saga of "Twin Peaks," the cult soap opera that was blanked in major categories presented on Sunday's Emmy Awards telecast. According to three panelists on the jury of peers that selected best director of a drama series, the question of whether the blockbuster two-hour pilot of "Twin Peaks" should have been included in the same category as four regular one-hour episodes of other series was discussed.

Ratings for ABC's "Twin Peaks" remain dismal; it attracted only 17% of the audience watching TV last Saturday night--causing concern among its fans that it's headed for early cancellation. That's unlikely for three reasons. One is that show's core audience, although relatively small, is dominated by the young, big-spending viewers sought by advertisers. Also, ABC reportedly has promised to relocate "Twin Peaks" should its Saturday night time slot prove lethal. Finally, aborting the series before December almost surely would leave the mysterious murder of Laura Palmer unsolved and, as a result, frustrate and enrage the show's viewers.

A lot of "Twin Peaks" fans were complaining Thursday about the season-ending episode that failed to provide a definitive answer to the question of who killed Laura Palmer. Instead, it left most of its major characters in cliff-hanging situations that won't be resolved until fall. The producers and ABC--which hyped Wednesday's program with ads promising "the shocking finale"--maintained that they had never said the mystery would be resolved this season.

This was serious detective work. On a recent night I rendezvoused with three tape editors at a post-production facility in Hollywood--I can't tell you which one--where we spent the better part of an hour replaying the seemingly crazed ending of Sunday's season premiere of ABC's "Twin Peaks," written by Mark Frost and directed by David Lynch. The tape editors have no connection with "Twin Peaks," which resumes at 10 tonight on Channels 7, 3, 10 and 42.

It was spitting rain, but the lines formed early at the Shochiku Central Theater near the Ginza. By 11 a.m., it was standing room only for the opening of the hottest film property in the country, "Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me." This David Lynch film, a prequel to his defunct television series detailing the last days of Laura Palmer, has found a far kinder audience than it did in Cannes, where reviews were decidedly mixed. Rather than screening to boos, the movie is a phenomenon in Japan.

For a while, fans of the quirky but ill-fated TV series "Twin Peaks" believed they'd have one last taste of the town's famous cherry pie, coffee and inbred relationships, in the form of a big-screen movie version. That was the hope, at least, after ABC-TV canceled the prime-time soap opera in May. But on Thursday, creators David Lynch, Mark Frost and their Lynch/Frost Prods. said that the movie version is off.

A series of off-beat commercials for the ABC-TV show "Twin Peaks" that posed the much asked question, "Who Killed Laura Palmer?" walked off with the West Coast's most prestigious advertising award Wednesday evening. The win marks the first time in the 25-year history of the annual Belding Awards competition that the coveted "sweepstakes" prize for the best TV advertising campaign was not won by an agency. The 1990 prize was claimed by ABC Television's on-air promotion unit.

They blew in on the gust of a wintry storm only to find it was standing room only in the Mar T Cafe. Old men in parkas and work boots, British travel agents in tweed coats, teen-agers in leather jackets, sneakers and T-shirts--all of them waving off menus because they knew exactly what they wanted. "Cup of joe and cherry pie, please," they chirped to a busy team of waitresses who knew that already. "We call 'em 'Peakers,' " said waitress Susie Graves, 34.

David Lynch and Mark Frost, creators and executive producers of the weird and meandering--and low-rated--"Twin Peaks," called upon what remains of the show's loyal fans Friday to call, fax, write and otherwise cajole ABC into returning the series to the air--preferably on Wednesday nights.

"We wish you God's blessing," he told viewers of his regular Christian television program. Then, after praying, the fatherly televangelist with the silver hair broke into a smile and began chuckling, as if recalling a private joke. Someone on the set had just spoken the name of a famous TV character, and the mere mention of this name triggered an unexpected reaction from this renowned saver of souls. "Bart Simpson," the man said, shaking his head as he chuckled again.

Some things are just too important to miss or enjoy alone. Like tonight's season finale of the cult TV series "Twin Peaks," which will screen for Cypress College student Julia Martin and 15 or so fellow addicts in her living room. Party invitations depict "Twin Peaks" denizen Nadine--the one with the eye patch and an obsession for silent curtain runners--telling her husband: "Oh Ed, last episode! I guess I won't finish the drapes!" It's "Twin Peaks" fever.

I'm asleep. I'm dreaming that "Twin Peaks" is a dream, that there is no such ABC series, that TV's only true mystery is merely a sequence of images and sensations passing through my mind, that Laura Palmer, FBI agent Dale Cooper, Sheriff Harry S. Truman and the other bizarre characters in this picturesque logging town known for intrigue, coffee and cherry pie do not exist. In my dream about a dream, two mysterious men are walking toward my bed. Now they are standing over me.

Mr. Peaks speaks. . . . ABC's baffling, frustrating, exasperating, irritating, bewitching, teasing "Twin Peaks" finally made good on its promise to reveal the identity of Laura Palmer's killer Saturday. And yes, just as I thought: Laura was murdered by Bob, the evil alter ego of Laura's father, Leland Palmer.

Ratings for ABC's "Twin Peaks" remain dismal; it attracted only 17% of the audience watching TV last Saturday night--causing concern among its fans that it's headed for early cancellation. That's unlikely for three reasons. One is that show's core audience, although relatively small, is dominated by the young, big-spending viewers sought by advertisers. Also, ABC reportedly has promised to relocate "Twin Peaks" should its Saturday night time slot prove lethal. Finally, aborting the series before December almost surely would leave the mysterious murder of Laura Palmer unsolved and, as a result, frustrate and enrage the show's viewers.