The Carol Burnett Show

I remember watching it as a kid with my parents in the '70s.

Even then, there would be parts that bored the shit out of me.

Tim Conway was awful. And he seemed to go on and on. When he played the older boss of Mrs. Higgins, it seemed interminable.

And every time Carol sang, I longed for someone who had a less abrasive voice. Or a bathroom break.

I’m sorry OP, was there a point or purpose to your posting of this non-story? Was there? I mean, can you at least just give us an honest answer for once in your life? Can you? Is it really that hard? Can you just try for once in your life? So what's it going to be OP? What's your point for posting this? There really is nothing cute about this.

I find myself skipping many sketches, especially in the early shows. Very few sketches outside of the "Family" and movie parodies hold up.

Comedy is very topical. What is funny in its time usually doesn't age well.

As a teenager, I thought SNL was the most earthshaking tv show ever. Almost every show had sketches that would have me in tears of laughter.

Watching those same episodes now for the first time in decades, I smile, but I'm not breaking up. I'm not the same person, and most importantly, these aren't the same times.

It was always a mix--somethings worked, some didn't. I never got the point of Tim Conway.

It seems that Tim comes on just to try and make Harvey laugh.

The charwoman sketches were the worst. Unfunny and aiming at sentimentality. Burnett was looking for a trademark and this was sort of it until she did Eunice and that was the magic.

R7

Yes, the Family sketches were truly inspired. They were a totally different kind of humor than anything else on the show. They were more akin to a feisty episode of All In The Family.

I also enjoyed some of the As The Stomach Turns bits. There’s one with Pat Carroll that is hysterical.

[quote]I also enjoyed some of the As The Stomach Turns bits.

That sticks out in my mind, too.

God, I hated the sound of Carol's voice when she sang. When she would do duets with people who could sing, they may as well have just used a car horn for her parts.

I especially hated that weird vibrato she had where every song she did sounded like she was going into the Tarzan yell

I wish I could find the footage of where she sang the Trolley Song (?) to a playback, and the crew purposefully slowed down the recording in spots.

I think they showed it on the final episode.

Oh wait.... HERE IT IS!

Her iconic sketches are remembered as being more funny than they actually were.

It just makes us all cry that this poor entitled non-contributing fat stupid swine of an OP is not incessantly amused by Carol Burnett and her show.

It just makes us all hope the OP drops a lung soon so we don't have to worry about her bloated not-laughing-constantly pig face.

Tim Conway should have remained on a re-occurring basis. Every week was too much. HK was so much more talented.

Harvey Korman wrecked every scene he was in with Tim Conway. Even as a little kid I would think: Hey, they're supposed to be making US laugh. You’re a douchebag, Harvey Korman.

Do you think Went With The Wind held up?

Agreed. I used to love it(and when Lyle took his shirt off), but some years ago, they were shilling the box set on tv showing snippets and I thought "this was funny" I did like the Mrs. Wiggins skits.

OP does Amazon have the original episodes as they aired?

I grew up with Carol Burnett & Friends, which was a 30 minute syndicated version of the network version of The Carol Burnett Show. They edited out all of the musical numbers. I suspect those shorter episodes go down easier than watching the 60 minute network version.

I wish The Tracey Ullman Show was available for streaming. That was my favorite sketch comedy series.

[quote]They edited out all of the musical numbers. I suspect those shorter episodes go down easier than watching the 60 minute network version.

I bet it was an issue of not having the rights to the songs in a new format.

When I first watched the show, I thought the the cracking each other up seemed very unprofessional. I thought good actors wouldn't break character.

I later learned that much of it was planned in rehearsal because the audience liked it.

That is why Lorne Michaels banned it on SNL. (No one told Jimmy Fallon.)

I also remember reading in a book about SNL that the ultimate putdown for comedy deemed corny; "That's too Carol Burnett."

"Watching those same episodes now for the first time in decades, I smile, but I'm not breaking up. I'm not the same person, and most importantly, these aren't the same times."

seriously heavy, dude...seriously heavy...

When I watched the Eunice sketches when I was a kid, I would crack up. As an adult, they still make me laugh, but some of the cruelty makes me cringe.

I never thought they were funny, just people being mean to each other.

"The Kidnapping" is a classic that still holds up.

R26 That is funny. And people obviously had longer attention spans back then because it takes a while for the joke to be made.

Another timely topic

Harvey Korman as Mother Marcus at 1:25 is still hilarious.

I love Carol and when that show was on, it was great.

But yes, like SNL, not everything is perfect.

When they started to rerun newer episodes on one of the mesothelioma channels, I saw a skit with Sammy Davis Jr that was terrible and really, really homophobic. We know Carol wasn't a homophobe - she did the great Anita Bryant skit - but it was probably seen as acceptable humor then and didn't age well.

[quote] Her iconic sketches are remembered as being more funny than they actually were.

They're great, but the weight of nostalgia is at times a burden.

[quote] When I watched the Eunice sketches when I was a kid, I would crack up. As an adult, they still make me laugh, but some of the cruelty makes me cringe.

They were just so REAL. That could have been my family.

I find Carol overrated but love Harvey. For me is he is much funnier than her.

I can't believe Lorne Michaels was such a snob about this show. Carol and Company were way above him.

They certainly liked to fuck the audience.

I love the full shows with music intact. Love Carol's voice.

r12, too bad the joke is lost in the terrible sync job done by whoever uploaded it to youtube. Not your fault, but what a disappointment.

Wanna hear something really awful?

Here's Carol singing The Ladies Who Lunch.

R38 In fairness to Carol, everyone sounds better than Elaine Stritch.

But Carol Burnett is like Sandra Bernhard: A comic who can't sing well who prefers the video of being a singer to being a comic.

I also love Carol Burnett singing voice.

"Mildred Fierce" holds up beautifully. I like it better than "Went with the Wind."

[quote]I also remember reading in a book about SNL that the ultimate putdown for comedy deemed corny; "That's too Carol Burnett."

SNL was trying to establish itself as the cutting edge show of the time. In order to do that, they thumbed their nose at "the establishment."

But Akyroyd said a couple of years back that he and a lot of the SNL staff actually had a lot of admiration for Carol Burnett and her show, but it just wasn't the hip thing to say around 30 Rock at that time. Most of them were huge fans of the older comedians. Belushi adored Milton Berle and pushed for him to host.

Radner idolized Lucy and Michaels was a huge fan of that disgusting "Honeymooners".

Carol Burnett has a fine Broadway Musical Comedy voice. Some of you don't know what the fuck you are talking about. Oh, that's right. You're in high school. Never mind.

I always felt like the Eunice skits owed a lot to Eudora Welty's brilliant story, "Why I Live at the P.O."

I would love to hear a duet between Burnett and Patti LuPone--there'd be more honking than in a flock of geese.

Burnett's voice is dreadful. That weird push she had when she tried to belt made it sound like she was always doing the Tarzan yell. Her version of I Cain't Say No from the Sylvia Fine specials was so bad that Celeste Holm complained. That bitch would complain about anything, but still.

Burnett's voice was OK for comic songs, but when she sang ballads, and BLASTED her way through each lyric, it was awful.

She needed a good friend to say, "No, Carol. Just no."