February 8, 1985

THE Upper East Side is hardly known as a theater district. Yet it contains a surprising number of theaters, surprising even to the theaters themselves. Many of them have been East Siders for nearly a decade or more. But few are close neighbors. Many are tucked away on residential streets. And all have heard audience members say: ''You know, I live just a few blocks away and I didn't know until now that you were here.'' So now, nine of the houses have banded together, as the Eastside Theaters, to improve their visibility. As a curtain raiser in the campaign, they are conducting a festival (through Feb. 17) that offers a bargain in these days of astronomical ticket prices. For a $25 pass, one can visit all the theaters, choosing from more than 45 performances of 15 events including drama, a musical, comedy improvisation and operettas. That, they say, is a savings of $100. The pass is available at all the theaters. Tickets for individual shows range from $8 to $18.

Four state security policemen were convicted and sentenced to prison today for their role in the abduction and murder of a pro- Solidarity priest. The 25-day trial was believed to be the first in which a Communist Government had publicly prosecuted members of its internal security forces for the slaying of a dissident. The five-judge tribunal sentenced two senior defendants, both police supervisors, to terms of 25 years, the longest prison sentence under Polish law; the two lower-ranking men received 15 and 14 years. In accordance with Polish law, the judges determined guilt and levied punishment.

A headline in some editions of Sports Pages yesterday incorrectly reported the result of the basketball game between Arkansas and Southern Methodist. Arkansas won, 69-66.

Business leaders said the President's budget should have done more to narrow the deficit. Page D1. WASHINGTON, Feb. 7 - Senate Republican leaders said today that they would propose a one-year elimination of the cost-of-living increase for Social Security pensioners as part of a package aimed at reducing Government spending by at least $50 billion in 1986. The Senate majority leader, Bob Dole of Kansas, stressed that the Republicans would support the elimination, beginning next January, only as part of a larger package that included cuts in other domestic programs and in the military budget. Meanwhile, Republican and Democratic members of the Senate Budget Committee bluntly told Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger that he should expect President Reagan's military budget request to be reduced.

''THE AGE OF CARAVAGGIO'' at the Metropolitan Museum of Art is on every count a most remarkable achievement. It has great paintings. It has paintings which, though not so great, have something irreplaceable to tell us. It has a schema, an argument and an armature. It brings instruction, it brings delight, and it also brings a terror that is all too topical. What more can we ask? It is the particularity of Caravaggio that within a period of 15 years or less - from 1595 to his death in 1610 - he turned painting around. There was painting before him, and painting after him, and no one can confuse the two. He brought to painting a new dynamic, a new and terrible ferocity of representation, and a readiness to face areas of the psyche that had previously been off limits. He did this primarily in Rome, then the unquestioned center of the international art world, but he also did it in Sicily, and in Malta, at a time when he was on the run from justice.