Have you noticed that lately the topic of adoption seems to be everywhere in the media? One week recently, it was as if all the TV show producers had decided it was Adoption Week.

First, there was talk show host and new adoptive parent Maury Povich (NBC), who had adoptees discussing the appropriateness of contact from a biological family. Then, Oprah (ABC) had a show to reunite siblings who had never met. Featured were the two brothers of Coloradan Susan Friel-Williams, who has helped scores of on-line searchers reunite. Susan spent years searching for her missing brother and, while they were all appearing on TV, the story of Susan and her brother was also being featured in Woman's World Magazine (1/23/96). Next, Tennessee's open records bill was featured on Today (NBC).

Movies, Sitcoms and More. It's not just the TV talk shows talking about adoption. In February, Lifetime had reruns of the docudrama about the battle for Baby Jessica. In March, ABC premiered Dalva, a sentimental epic starring Farrah Fawcett as a birthmother who searches for her relinquished son. Any birthmother who watched the final scene probably brushed away a tear or two when Dalva was reunited with her 21-year-old son. His first words to her were, "I hear you've been looking for me."Dalva's soft reply: "All my life."It was pure fiction, but contained essential truths about a birth-mothers' experience and grief. For the past two seasons on ABC's seriocomedy Grace Under Fire, Grace - the divorced mother of three - first was found by her birthson, Matthew, and the two have since navigated through reunion. The "honeymoon period"ended when Grace bailed Matthew out of jail for streaking naked through a women's rights rally; this triggered a confrontational first meeting with the adoptive mom and culminated with Grace's warning to Matthew that she would not tolerate his manipulating either mother against the other.

This season, ABC premiered Second Noah, a family hour show about an attractive couple who adopted eight youngsters of varying ages and cultures - most in pairs (of course): A teenaged father and his toddler son; twin brothers adopted at age three; and a homeless. Hispanic teen and her younger brother. The final twosome - pre-teen African-American and Caucasian best buddies - are quite simply soul sisters.

As in real-life adoption, this likeable show is half realism and half fantasy. Jessie is a working mom and the show explores gritty adoption issues like the attraction between the teen father and the Hispanic girl as well as one of the twins' desire to search for his biological mother. Yet, the family lives on a "compound" with an impressive mansion.

Mar-Apr 96 | Part 2