TV REVIEW : ‘READ’ FAILS TO GET A PASSING GRADE

It’s a little hard to understand what any American kid with a few thousand hours of TV under his eyelids will find of interest in “Read Between the Lines” (airing at 3 p.m. today on Channels 7, 10 and 42, and at 4 p.m. on Channel 3).

The problem of adult illiteracy is the theme of this hourlong presentation of the “ABC Afterschool Specials.” Intended for 11- to 18-year-olds, it’s billed as an adventure-drama but plays more like a cartoon with humans.

Gramps (Philip Bosco) is a widowed toy maker whose inability to read nearly results in the theft of rights to his greatest invention until grandson Casey (Jordan Marder) and the Harlem Globetrotters team up to save the day.

The greedy and unscrupulously rich manufacturer is foiled, Gramps regains control of his potentially lucrative “Space Circus” toy and, most didactically important, he overcomes the embarrassment and shame of his illiteracy and decides to learn how to read. It’s all very socially conscious.

No one’s asking for “Masterpiece Theatre,” but “Read” is also pretty dull, cliche-ridden and seems demographically schizophrenic in its aim: The crucial plot point (the abstract concept of contract rights) is going to be meaningless to younger viewers, while the simplistic storyline (script by Marjorie Rosen) seems sure to bore older kids and might cause brain damage to unsuspecting adult viewers.

Even a few minutes of on-court magic from the Harlem Globetrotters (with first woman-Trotter Lynette Woodard and James (Twiggy) Sanders in featured roles) isn’t much help.