On Broadway

TELEVISION

Wednesday, December 1 BOB HOPE PRESENTS THE CHRYSLER THEATER (NBC, 9-10 p.m.).* Gary Merrill, Joan Hackett and Stuart Whitman star in a drama, "The Highest Fall of All." Color. I SPY (NBC, 10-11 p.m.). In "Weight of the World," Agents Scott and Robinson try to block the plans of Red Chinese scientists who want to pollute Japanese water supplies with bubonic plague. Color.

Thursday, December 2

CBS THURSDAY NIGHT MOVIE (CBS, 9-11 p.m.). Richard Burton and Barbara Rush in The Bramble Bush, the story of a doctor who returns to his home town to care for an incurably ill friend. Color.

Friday, December 3

THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E. (NBC, 10-11 p.m.). "The Virtue Affair." Illya and Napoleon deal with a fanatic in France who is trying to perfect an insecticide bomb that would ruin wine. Color.

TRIALS OF O'BRIEN (CBS, 10-11 p.m.). "Dead End on Flugel Street." Attorney O'Brien defends Burlesque Comedian Boozey Bailey (Milton Berle), accused of murdering his wife.

Saturday, December 4 GET SMART! (NBC, 8:30-9 p.m.). "My Nephew the Spy." Secret Agent Smart attempts to conceal his occupation from visiting relatives who arrive just as KAOS agents are trying to kill him. Color.

SATURDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES (NBC, 9-11:15 p.m.). The Big Carnival. Kirk Douglas is a small-town reporter bent on making the big time.

Sunday, December 5

MEET THE PRESS (NBC, 1-1:30 p.m.). Senator Robert F. Kennedy is guest. Color.

G.E. FANTASY HOUR (NBC, 5:30-6:30 p.m.). Burl Ives is the off-camera voice of a snowman who sings and narrates Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, an animated Christmas story.

THE SUNDAY NIGHT MOVIE (ABC, 9-11:30 p.m.). William Holden and Clifton Webb in Satan Never Sleeps, the story of a priest caught behind the Bamboo Curtain. Color.

Tuesday, December 7

TUESDAY NIGHT AT THE MOVIES (NBC, 9-11 p.m.). Kirk Douglas again, this time with Nick Adams in The Hook, about a North Korean pilot imprisoned aboard an American freighter.

THEATER

MARCEL MARCEAU is a stylish musician of motion, an exciting architect of space, an eloquent poet of silence. He is the pantomimic accountant of the laughably saddening costs of being human, with the knowledge that no matter how funny the pratfall, the heart is where the hurt is.

THE ROYAL HUNT OF THE SUN. Peter Shaffer's historical drama tosses a pebble of thought into a sea of spectacle. Although the resulting ripples are small, they are enough to give Christopher Plummer an opportunity to show consummate skill in playing a tortured Pizarro searching for Peruvian treasure and a rebirth of faith.

GENERATION. Old Trooper Henry Fonda finds himself bucking the winds of youth and anticonformity when he visits his newly wed daughter and son-in-law. Their Greenwich Village loft is already a fortress of individualism, and, if they get their way, will soon be a delivery room for their at-any-moment baby. They get their way. The audience gets the laughs.

HALF A SIXPENCE, a freshly minted musical, is Cockney Performer Tommy Steele's contribution to the British balance of payments and the Broadway entertainment quotient.