TELEVISION - Feb. 10, 1996

Art Imitating Life: Mary Tyler Moore plays herself in an upcoming episode of ABC’s “Ellen,” with the story line mirroring her real-life efforts to save an octogenarian lobster. The Feb. 21 episode finds Ellen (Ellen DeGeneres) “kidnapping” a crustacean from an almost certain rendezvous with a pot of boiling water; she then gets hailed as an animal-rights crusader by Moore. Moore actually went to bat last spring to save a lobster from a raffle orchestrated by a Malibu restaurant. Thanks to Moore, that lobster now is happily residing in its own tank at Gladstones 4 Fish, where a plaque heralds her efforts.