ARLENE FRANCIS

Arlene Francis is a happy woman. She has a husband she adores (actor Martin Gabel) and a son about whom she feels the same. She has had a nice but unremarkable career as an actress, and a pleasant social life with amusing, industrious, even famous people who are her peers--like Comden and Green, the Garson Kanins, the late Bennet Cerf, the Harold Romes (she co-authored this), the Moss Harts, and virtually everyone else of note in New York and Los Angeles. Surely there ought to have been material enough in her dinner party conversations to have made for a witty, urbane repertoire of anecdotes. Unfortunately, Ms. Francis has not got the point: she focuses the greater part of this on memories of her career as a TV talk show personality--as hostess of the Home show, and as a panelist, for 25 years, on ""What's My Line."" Both shows were noted for their mild manner and gentle raillery. One is more or less grateful that there is somebody out there who is serene. But that makes for a footnote, not a book.