Fans come to the rescue of Western: Network brought series back after effort by viewers

LOS ANGELES - "The Magnificent Seven" can be found at theintersection of the Old West and the new frontier - the Internet.

The CBS series, loosely based on the 1960 movie of the same name,is riding again in part because of viewers who lobbied the networkonits behalf. This time it was the mouse, not the gun, that won theWestern.

There's a certain irony that one of television's most traditionalgenres should be rescued by technology. Fan Patti Kleckner, part ofthe effort to save what she fondly calls "Mag-Seven," was gratefulfor the electronic firepower."It's impossible to judge the impact (of the campaign) on CBS'decision to return the show, but from the fans' point of view itgaveus a tremendous feeling of accomplishment," said Kleckner, a systemsengineer from suburban Chicago."We no longer felt like a single letter to the network was goingto go off into never-never land. It was a group effort we couldn'taccomplish without the Internet.""The Magnificent Seven" stakes out territory familiar to Westernbuffs. Themes of loyalty, vengeance and honor anchor the plots, andthe dialogue has the requisite terseness and only a few contemporarygaffes."How do you honor a man of peace? With bloodshed, or forgiveness?You need to find forgiveness, ma'am," Josiah, played by Ron Perlman,tells a mother bent on killing her son's murderer in the episodeairing 9 p.m. EST tonight."You're wrong preacher," the woman (guest star Tyne Daly) replies."I made a promise to David. I will find forgiveness when I've keptmy word. My kind of justice is the apocalypse."It also offers the kind of fairly bloody shoot-'em-ups that arerelatively rare on violence-conscious television these days."Magnificent Seven" gets the dusty, wind-blown look right - it'sfilmed north of Los Angeles at Gene Autry's old studio, MelodyRanch,and at other movie ranches clustered nearby.Besides Perlman the series features Michael Biehn, Eric Close,Andrew Kavovit, Dale Midkiff, Anthony Starke, Rick Worthy and LaurieHolden.Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen starred in the 1960 film version,based on Akira Kurosawa's "The Seven Samurai," about seven men hiredby a small village for protection against bandits. In the TVadaptation, the gunfighters battle various evil people.When it first debuted in January 1998, the series made a strongshowing and ranked No. 14. After pre-emptions because of eventsincluding the Olympics, however, it had plummeted in the ratings andits future seemed doubtful.Then an eye-catching ad appeared last May in the trade paper DailyVariety: "Wanted: The Magnificent Seven. Return Winning Show toViewers."The $1,000 cost was covered by at least 100 fans from across thenation who had linked up via the Internet, Kleckner said. They andmany others already had flooded CBS with e-mail requests for theshow's survival."Once we decided to do the ad, everybody jumped up and said, 'Ican give you $5, I can give $10,' " Kleckner said. One womancoordinated the money collection, another used her credit card tosecure the ad space and Kleckner and a fourth person wrote the ad.Why the passion for the series?"It's not a bunch of giddy teen-agers drooling over men," Klecknersaid then. "The show is extremely well-written and the charactersindividually and collectively have a tremendous amount ofchemistry."Although "Magnificent Seven" didn't make CBS' fall schedule, itreturned earlier this month to replace the sinking detective series"Buddy Faro" on Fridays. Thirteen new episodes are scheduled to run,the network said; its fate after that is uncertain."Magnificent Seven" hasn't been able to beat the competition,including ABC's "Sabrina the Teen-Age Witch." But the Westernrepresents a big improvement over "Buddy Faro" numbers and isdrawingmore of the advertiser-favored male audience.Perlman was part of another series in 1987-90, "Beauty and theBeast," that also inspired audience devotion. He knows how deeployalty can run: Every day, he said, he's approached by those whoadmired the fantasy drama that co-starred Linda Hamilton.He is grateful but unsurprised by the response to "MagnificentSeven.""If you do a Western that's got any kind of depth or integrity,that approaches the genre in a respectful and unpredictable fashion,there are people out there who are voraciously interested inspendingtheir time watching a show like that," he said.Kleckner received a nice thank you from CBS for helping to leadthe save-the-"Seven" effort: She appeared as an extra in the Jan. 8episode.The experience also renewed her faith in broadcast television andconfirmed the power of the Net for her."As a viewer, I felt I never could make my voice heard. I foundthis particular show brought me back to network television because Ihad drifted away to cable and the (satellite) dish. And the Internetlet me make my thoughts known to the people who had the power."