"We don't have time to go around taking moral stands," the voice of Douglas Brackman, the balding managing partner of the mythical Los Angeles law firm of Mackenzie Brackman, booms from the large-screen TV.

Instanteously, hecklers in a crowd of about 250 would-be attorneys respond with a bellowing "Yeeeah!" that rings through a packed room in Harvard Law School's Harkness Commons.

It is Thursday night, and the scene is a familiar one, both on screen and off. On "L.A. Law," photogenic young barristers execute melodramatic cross-examinations. And at Harvard, students live out "fantasy law" with them--en masse.

Without fail, one night a week, 200 to 300 "L.A. Law" groupies leave their law school casebooks behind and gravitate to Harkness Commons to cheer and sneer their idols.

Some come for the law, others for the cheap beer.

Most come for the fantasy of it all.

"It's escapism," says Kevin C. Davis, a third-year law student and a regular at the student center viewings. "It's not about the law, it's about yuppiedom--and that's what people like about it."

But events at the Law School this fall suggest that many students there would like the legal profession to mean more than just yuppiedom. Students were enraged when Dean Robert C. Clark closed the school's public interest law counseling office over the summer. Hundreds attended a rally protesting his action, and about two-thirds of the student body signed a petition calling for the school to do more to encourage its students to seek careers providing legal aid to the needy.

But the fervor may be deceiving, and official figures are telling. According to statistics from the school's Office of Career Services, about 70 percent of its students enter private firms upon graduation.

With education costs skyrocketing, nascent lawyers lured by starting salaries of $70,000 to $80,000 are often inclined to leave their nonyuppie ideals at the Law School.

Thursday nights in Harkness Commons in many ways reflect this tug-of-war between public spiritedness and corporate glamour.

Asked to identify their favorite "L.A. Law" characters, most students in the audience immediately point to those who least often compromise their ideals.

Victor Sifuentes, the firm's ardent champion of the "underdog" client, is the attorney one student finds most endearing.

"Stuart Markowitz is my favorite," says another, confessing his bias for the good-hearted tax attorney. "But," he quickly adds, "all of my friends say I'm going to be more like Arnie Becker." On last week's episode, Becker--the firm's resident womanizer--sold out a seven-year-old girl to bring in a hefty fee.

From the way they talk, it would seem the law students really do identify with these TV attorneys--a couple of years ago, the Law School Forum even invited cast members to speak at the school. (Unfortunately for the students, they were forced to forego their plans when the actors and actresses wanted first-class tickets to Boston.)