The world was Stockard Channing's oyster when she thrilled us with Rizzo in "Grease", but since then her orbit has been somewhat lower. She's carved out a nice niche in the upper echelons of made-for-TV melodramas, and nearly every year she gets nominated for some award or other. It was the Golden Globes this year, for this performance. She seems particularly adept at playing women in tug-of-love battles over children (see also `An Unexpected Family'), and here she and Peter Riegert are the anguished but wealthy childless couple who throw money at poverty-stricken trailer-trash mother-of-four Laura Dern, hardly happy about the impending appearance of kidling number five; Dern and abusive hubby Richard Lineback are only too happy to sell the superfluous sprog. So far, so usual, but the twist (unlike most TV movies, there is a twist) comes when complications at the birth raises the possibility of brain damage. Will the yuppie couple pay for damaged goods? Will love of child conquer love of money for the trailer trash?
Review of The Baby Dance
