More Beast, Less Beauty for CBS’ ‘Beauty & Beast’

The fur is really going to fly when CBS’ “Beauty and the Beast” returns this season.

That’s because there’s going to be less in the way of beauty and more in the way of beast from now on, and that’s bound to make hard-core fans want to get their claws into the guys who changed it.

The storybook romance of Vincent (Ron Perlman) and Catherine (Linda Hamilton) comes to a tragic end Tuesday in a special two-hour season opener, when Catherine is abducted by the leader of a criminal empire and then murdered.

A hit with critics, the fantasy drama with its distinctly medieval look and feel won several Emmys but has never attracted many male viewers. So when the romantic light goes out of Vincent’s life, the darker, more enraged side of the man-beast will kick in--driving him to the streets of Manhattan in search of the killers, and perhaps, more male viewers.

When the show moves into its regular Wednesday night time slot on Wednesday, Vincent and his fellow Tunnel Dwellers will gather for Catherine’s funeral and introduce a new “Beauty and the Beast.”

Vincent will be less the lover and more the action figure--and the entire show will reflect this change.

Joining him will be a host of new, above-ground characters--the most noteworthy of which is the special crimes investigator and potential love interest, Diana Bennett.

Co-executive producer Paul Junger Witt, however, said that Bennett, played by Jo Anderson, will not be Catherine incarnate.

“This character is a cop,” Witt said. “The character really couldn’t be more different in respect to the Linda Hamilton character. We would never try to duplicate that character.”

She is a woman with “a few more rough edges,” he said, “a character who is a bit more cynical, who initially is less romantic, who if she is to become involved with Vincent--and we’re still feeling our way through a lot of this stuff--is going to have much greater resistance, as will Vincent.”

The risk in changing the show is nevertheless considerable, and Witt knows it.

“We feel we have modified the show in the sense that it’s a more exciting show now. The pace of the show is greater, faster; there’s more movement, there’s more activity, there’s more action,” he said.