NEW YORK (AP) — Producer Roy Huggins and James Garner, who teamed up in 1957 to give the nation the tongue-in-cheek "Maverick" series, are at loose again with a new show they also hope becomes
a hit series.


Technically a pilot for a proposed series, the opus, "The Rockford Files," aired on NBC-TV
Wednesday night. Close scrutiny revealed it to be a private eye show that sort of winked now and then. A "Maverick" it ain't, but it may work, even though it was the sort of whodunnit that raised initial hopes with a brisk strangling, then seemed to take forever before the traditional Great Chase got under way.


Garner played a gumshoe who, as it turns out, has done five years behind bars for an armed robbery he didn't commit. He now tries to solve cases police list as "unsolved-inactive." His home-office is in a seedy-looking trailer down at the beach. He drives a hot car of recent
vintage and, like all good private eyes, dresses casually but well, despite his perennial lack of
funds.


Into his life steps a comely young lady (Lindsay Wagner) who wants him to find out who killed her widowed father, a wino we saw done in at the start of the show. The murder is in the "unsolved" category. She isn't dismayed by Garner's $200-a-day-fee. "Money doesn't happen to be my problem," she crisply informs him. "I can hire a platoon of people like you." And she writes him a check. It is at this point I begin to like the show. He runs a credit check, the cad, and learns her hopes exceed her bank balance. She has, he moans, "worse credit than me."


But no matter. It turns into love at second sight and detection on the installment plan, the latter leading to a wealthy young widow whose 68-year-old millionaire husband has died on the wedding night. Stay with us, now. Turns out he expired before plighting his troth. The old wino, his mind fuddled, was picked up, whisked off to Las Vegas and passed off as the groom who "died" later that night. She collected the millions, the wino subsequently was strangled and things seemed headed toward a happy ending until Garner stepped in.


Despite this plot, the show was liberally sprinkled with funny, offbeat little things that often gave it the sly "Maverick" touch. One example: Garner has tied up a villain in the men's room of a bar and is causing him pain when another man walks in. "Oh, I'm sorry," the chap says. "I didn't realize the room was being used." At the end, having used his "gat" to shoot down a plane whose occupants are strafing him in the Nevada desert, Garner isn't cheered by the police. He's instead held in custody and is outraged by it. "I don't know how to tell you this, buster," sighs
a weary gendarme after noting that ex-cons can't have guns, "but you can't go around shooting down light airplanes with,a handgun."


Though the pace was generally plodding, Garner gave the impression of having fun, ditto the supporting thespians. If the show becomes a series and the impression persists, Messrs. Garner and Huggins could find themselves with another winner on their hands.

JAY SHARBUTT