As Donna Reed has proved, it seldom pays

Last September, when The Donna Reed Show first went on the air, the experts were certain that the ABC series would never last the year out, let alone the season.

The show--about a small-town pediatrician's wife and her family--seemed to be, on the face of it, totally without distinction. In the first place, it had a format and theme so similar to half a dozen other family situation comedies that even its star went around describing it as "a sort of Mother Knows Best." It came on the air without fanfare, sneaking in the back door, as it were, as if afraid someone might ask it to explain its presence there.

To make matters worse, it was backed up against some tough competition. There was The Millionaire, for instance, an established success all about that popular commodity, money. Three weeks later it ran head-on into Mr. Television himself, Milton Berle.

The results were disastrous. In the week after Berle made his debut, The Donna Reed Show set some kind of new low for shows which were later to become successful: it's Trendex sank to a dismal 6.9. Its 15.1 Nielsen, while not quite so alarming, was still nothing to get excited about.

It was at this point that Miss Reed herself made what at the time was the year's most optimistic statement. "We have a good show. Our family feels like a real family. People will tire of Uncle Miltie. Then we'll come into our own."

In effect that was exactly what happened. The Nielsen began to climb steadily--to 16.9 by November, to 18.5 by December, to 19.2 by January, to 21.2 by April.

Miss Reed and her partner in Todon Productions, Tony Owen (her husband), never actually surpassed Berle in the ratings, but they may have been instrumental in cutting down his influence to a point where Kraft considered it the better part of valor to drop the show.

At any rate, The Donna Reed Show, once an undernourished foundling, suddenly found itself with muscles. Its contract with Campbell's has been renewed for next season; its' time changed to 8, more suitable for family viewing. With those advantages working for them, the Owens figure there's no ceiling on what they can do.

Recalling her optimistic forecast today, Donna is a little embarrassed. "Well," she says, "I didn't quite say that--I mean, Milton is a good friend of ours. We didn't exactly run him off the air. It was more--well, I just had a feeling all along. Tony and I knew we were taking a risk. Just look at all the shows canceled every year! I can only say I felt it was right."

What makes the situation even more extraordinary is that no basic changes were made in the show during those discouraging early days. No new writers were hired, no drastic changes made in the story line, no actors hired or fired, and no gimmicks introduced to beef up the show's appeal.

"We just stood firm," explains Donna. "The only thing I can say is that we were a little late about persuading the sponsor to let us lose our tempers on the show."

There was a pause, as if this last remark were self-explanatory. Miss Reed elaborated.

"I mean, the sponsor didn't want Donna Stone, my character, to ever be mean. Tony and I have a family of our own, and there is no such thing as a family where arguments don't occur. Keep it goody-goody and you lose the effectiveness."

"Yeah," Owen chimed in. "They couldn't understand why we objected to Donna being a pollyanna."

Donna, who has four children ranging in age from two to 13, has definite theories about what makes a happy family life. One of them is that parents should not be permissive.

"We believe in discipline for our children," she says. "You have to tell your children off occasionally. And you can't always do it in a nice voice. They need the security of knowing you mean what you say."

She has extended this philosophy to the television screen, and thinks it may have a good deal to do with achieving "the feeling of a real family," which she considers the show's greatest asset. Generally speaking, she thinks TV is either far too full of parents who are hopelessly permissive, or populated strictly with little angels. Asked if Lassie, Campbell Soup's companion show, might be one of them, she smiled, but refused to comment.

How do her own kids like the show? "Well," says Donna, "they like the idea of staying up late to see it.

"You'll find," she says, "that on our show if our son comes home with C marks instead of the B's he should have, he'll be punished. Because that's how it is--or should be--in real life."

The fact that Donna has now become, ipso facto, an authority on the perils of parenthood is by itself ironic, since she made her greatest fame playing a shady lady. Born on an Iowa farm, she made her way up in show business via the beauty-contest route, survived apprenticeship as a movie ingenue and finally got her first really interesting part--Lorene, the bad girl in "From Here to Eternity"--in 1953, and won an Academy Award.

"There was a day," she explains, "when I used to think of everything as B.E. or A.E.--Before 'Eternity' or After 'Eternity.' But the funny part was that the Oscar did not bring any more roles like Lorene. And I certainly didn't press the point. I guess down deep I don't believe it's worth it to have to wage that all-out campaign to make the audience accept you in that kind of role. What audiences really want to see is the same thing over and over."

And that is exactly what Donna is giving them.

However, she thinks the real reason she temporarily jettisoned her career as a dramatic, "From Here to Eternity" type of actress is that she enjoys working with her husband.

"We're together professionally," she says. "We're in business for ourselves. We're part-owner of the show. We control it creatively. It's seen by a great many. One sponsor has renewed. Another company signed to co-sponsor. What more can you ask?"