Don't let the title fool you. Disney's Most Unlikely Heroes WLS-Channel 7, 7:30 to 8 tonight. (STAR) ABC gives its corporate owner, the Walt Disney Co., a half-hour in prime time to promote its new animated musical.

"Disney's Most Unlikely Heroes," airing at 7:30 tonight on Channel 7, really isn't a typical ABC entertainment program. The Walt Disney Television production is a promotional preview for "The Hunchback of Notre Dame," Disney's new animated film.

That means Disney's half-hour program is really one long commercial, interrupted by shorter commercials. That's why we call it show business. And Disney will be giving us the business tonight, thanks to ABC.

The Walt Disney Co. is ABC's corporate owner, and ABC had nothing but reruns ready to air tonight anyway.

Roy E. Disney, vice chairman of the Walt Disney Co. and nephew of Mickey Mouse's creator, uses a warm, folksy approach as he hosts "Most Unlikely Heroes." He tries to establish an artistic chain linking characters from the first 33 movies created by Disney's animation studios to Quasimodo, the hunchbacked hero of the new "Notre Dame" musical. The G-rated family film will premiere Friday at local movie theaters.

Despite the enduring success of "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," "Pinocchio," "Beauty and the Beast," "Aladdin" and "The Lion King" - with their "unlikely heroes" featured briefly in film clips - the Disney program devotes most of its time (surprise, surprise) to plugging the "Hunchback" highlights.

Producer John Fuller, the writer of "Unlikely Heroes," put his imagination through contortions by stretching Disney lore to create far-reaching character connections between the seven dwarfs and Quasimodo, Pinocchio and Quasimodo, the Beast and Quasimodo, Aladdin's genie and Quasimodo, and so on.

Celebrity guests - including San Francisco 49ers quarterback Steve Young, Sharon Stone, Oscar winner Nicolas Cage, Barry Bonds, John Travolta, Lindsay Wagner, Robby Benson, Marilu Henner, Alan Thicke, Gilbert Gottfried and Joan Rivers - pick their favorite Disney heroes, or attempt to define the essence of heroism in a manner that would please the Walt Disney Co.

Four actors providing voices for "Hunchback" characters - Tom Hulce (Mozart in "Amadeus") as Quasimodo, Demi Moore as Esmeralda, Kevin Kline as Phoebus and Jason Alexander as Hugo the gargoyle - appear briefly in tonight's coming-attraction reel.

My unlikely hero is Cleveland crewcut comedian Drew Carey, but ABC bumped his non-Disney sitcom from its 7:30 slot in tonight's lineup. Hmmmm. "The Drew Carey Show" is a Warner Bros. Television production. Disney and Warner compete vigorously in the entertainment arena, with big-budget movies and TV shows often going head-to-head for show-biz bucks. Warner also owns a TV network, the expanding WB.

What's next? The Oliver Stone Network?