Reconstructing the Carol Burnett Show, Part 7

More reviews and commentary on Lost Episodes of the Carol Burnett Show found on my Christmas present--The Carol Burnett Show Lost Episodes Ultimate Collection. As noted in previous blogs, MeTV has moved beyond seasons 1-5 (the seasons no one has seen in over 40 years) and is now broadcasting seasons 6-11 (which we've all seen 100 times in syndication). There is no way of knowing if they will go back to the beginning once all those episodes are used up. How will I ever see the episodes I missed which are not on DVD anywhere? There is another DVD collection called The Best of the Carol Burnett Show featuring several segments from the early years, which I intend to purchase later but there are so many other episodes I can't find. Anyway, here are my thoughts on the segments spread across the three DVD collections in the Lost Episodes Ultimate Collection (The Lost Episodes, Treasures from the Vault and Classic Carol. BTW, Carol's Lost Christmas which contains three yuletide hours was not included in this set, though I have seen it as part of the package on some sites. I will have to buy that one separately through Amazon or eBay.)

Season One:
Jan. 8, 1968
Lana Turner, Frank Gorshin

Frank Gorshin and Carol in the weird scuba finale

This one was probably included in the DVD collection because the guest star was Lana Turner, a glamorpuss from Hollywood’s Golden Age and a veteran of such soapy classics as Peyton Place and The Bad and the Beautiful. The only problem was she really couldn’t act, sing, or dance. She looked gorgeous in a blonde movie-star kind of way. There are weak hijinks with Carol and Lana acting jealous over Lyle and Turner featured in a romantic waltz where she sing-speaks syrupy lyrics to "Greensleeves" and competently waltzes with lead dancer Don Creighton. Frank Gorshin displays his mimicking skills in a number with the girl dancers, each dressed as a different movie legend with Gorshin imitating their male co-stars. He really isn't a great singer either, but his impressions are spot-on including a very rare imitation of Joseph Cotten. Gorshin was a big deal to me as a kid because he played the Riddler on Batman. Now as an adult, I realize he was doing Kirk Douglas the whole time. Gorshin appeared with other impressionists such as Rich Little, Marilyn Michaels, and George Kirby on a short-lived variety series called The Kopykats. The material was pretty lame, but the imitations were brilliant. Perhaps I'll do a blog on that show under the heading of Lost TV.

The direction is pretty poor during a sketch called The Sound of Murder with Frank and Lana as a pair of crooks scheming to murder Carol. The stars appear underrehearsed and the camera angles focus on the wrong spots, missing the punchlines. The whole show wraps up with a bizarre aquatic extravaganza to "By the Beautiful Sea" with Frank, Carol, and the chorus in scuba gear and flippers.  

Jan. 22, 1968
Shirley Jones and George Chakiris
The guest stars do not participate too much in the sketches here. George Chakiris won an Oscar for playing a Puerto Rican gang leader in West Side Story, but he's actually Greek and performs a dance number from Zorba. You can see him in the chorus supporting Marilyn Monroe in "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and Rosemary Clooney in "Love You Didn't Do Right By Me" from White Christmas. He also flirts with Carol during the Q&A. Shirley Jones, another Oscar winner and future star of The Partridge Family, does a lovely solo Broadway medley and ignites Carol's jealousy as Roger's sexy secretary in a Carol and Sis sketch.

Season Two:
Dec. 16, 1968
Marilyn Horne, Eileen Farrell, Isabel Sanford and maybe Bernie Koppel

Eileen Farrell and Marilyn Horne as two of the three little pigs

The two opera stars, Horne and Farrell, appeared for the first time on Carol's show in this segment and then returned a few seasons later when the show was taped in NYC (See Reconstructing the Carol Burnett Show, Part 1 for a review of that episode). Here they appear in a parody opera of The Three Little Pigs with Carol as the third piggie who builds his house of bricks and Harvey as the Big Bad Wolf. It's pretty funny and pokes gentle fun at operatic conventions.

The comedy begins with Harvey and Carol as the newly elected president and first lady. The show was aired in December 1968, just after Nixon was elected. The new prez and his family try to act like just plain folks, but come across as stiff and weird. The black housekeeper, played by Isabel Sanford of the Jeffersons (who appeared on many episodes), offers sassy commentary. A guy who looks just like Bernie Koppel and Isabel Sanford join with the opera stars and the cast to sing Christmas carols for the finale.

April 7, 1969
Imogene Coca, Robert Goulet
Goulet was an incredibly sexy, deep-voiced Broadway star whose rich, dark baritone went right to the libido of female fans (and some males too, I'm sure). He's bearded in this guest appearance, amping

I couldn't find a photo of a bearded Robert Goulet with Carol,
so here he is with another sexy singer of the 1960s Tom Jones,
who also had a variety series

up the macho level and explains to Carol the chin spinach is for a World War II movie role. (The picture was called Undergound and released in 1970, then died a quick death.) He and Lyle battle over who does NOT get to go with Carol to a concert. Imogene Coca, best known for her pairing with Sid Caesar, is poignant in a sketch with Carol as a pair of what we used to call spinsters on a tour of Europe. Strolling into an Italian cafe where the chorus kids are dressed like colorful gypsies, the pair are clearly on the lookout for male companionship. Carol hooks up with Harvey as a sleazy Italian count (but probably just a con man). Then Imogene is left alone and she is invited to dance by Lyle who turns out to be a hustler demanding payment for his attention. Left alone, she ruefully sings Noel Coward's "If Love Were All." The hour concludes with a fairy-tale extravaganza with Carol as the all-purpose princess Cinderumplewhite, Goulet as the handsome prince, Coca as the wicked witch, Harvey and Lyle as a two-headed monster and Vicki as the little girl reading the story. This was the highlight of the episode with Bob Mackie's outrageous costumes stunning as always. At one point, the entire chorus charges on as a dragon with about 30 legs, a masterful Mackie creation.

Season Three
Jan. 26, 1970
Soupy Sales, Mel Torme, Ronald Reagan
The vile Ronald Reagan appears during the Q&A and politically-neutral Carol actually treats him like

Carol as Bugs Bunny

a human being. An audience member asks if he'd ever move to Washington and he replies he'd never leave California. If only he's kept his word, things would be so much better for America. The majority of this episode is a salute to Warner Brothers Studios. Many of the segments were given over to movie-studio salutes so movie parodies and musical numbers could be worked in. Carol dresses as WB cartoon star Bugs Bunny and Soupy Sales plays Elmer Fudd in a brief vignette (Cher would do the same bit on her show years later with Sonny as Elmer.) Soupy Sales was a mediocre comedian who hosted a kiddie show. I knew him best as a regular panelist on the syndicated What's My Line which aired every night at about 7PM. The WB salute continues with a musical medley of songs from the studio's film and a take-off of Joan Crawford's Oscar-winning role in Mildred Pierce called Mildred Fierce. This sketch does not follow the original film (Carol would revisit the source material a few seasons later with a spoof more closely adhering the original plot of a mother covering up her daughter's shooting of the lover they shared.) In this earlier incarnation of Mildred Fierce, Carol as Joan is a ruthless executive clawing her way to the top. Gender roles are reversed for 1960s anti-feminist yucks with a domineering Carol abusing her male secretary (played by Soupy as a swishy stereotype) and her milquetoast husband (Mel Torme in a WWI soldier outfit). Harvey plays a "real man" who is out to show Carol as Joan what it means to be a "real woman." Cringeworthy gags about manly women abound.

There's also a Carol and Sis sketch with Harold Gould, best known as Rhoda's father and Rose Nylund's boyfriend Miles, as Roger's boss.

Season Four
Nov. 2, 1970
Cass Elliott, Ricardo Montalban, Emmett Kelly

Carol, Vicki, and guest Cass Elliot engage in one of the weirdest production numbers in the show’s history. The trio, clad in matching knit ponchos and curly wigs enter a chaotic urban scene with the chorus rushing around like typical non-caring city dwellers. The women sing “Show Me Where the Good Times Are,” seeking a hot time in the big metropolis. Evidently, they just got off the bus from some small town. When the chorus boys and girls ignore them—including Lyle as a hunky construction worker—and they notice the frenzied pace and air pollution, they segue into Joni Mitchell’s “Big Yellow Taxi.” You know, the one where the singer bemoans the fact they’ve paved paradise and put up a parking lot. Scenes of factories belching smoke and filth-clogged rivers are intercut with the singing and dancing. This must have been a message moment, going along with the anti-pollution movement of the late 1960s. Carol would often end each program with a plea for the TV audience to combat this industrial menace. “Remember the child you save may be your own,” she would say before tugging on her ear. It makes me nostalgic to watch these cries for public advocacy today as Trump rips away regulations so our air and water will be as dirty as it was when the show was broadcast in 1970.

Carol as Esther Williams in Slippery When Wet

Apart from appearing during the Q&A, Ricardo Montalban makes his only contribution in Slippery When Wet, a take-off of Esther Williams movies with Carol backstroking her way through a pretty lame parody. Jokes rely on water in the ear, the stomach upsets caused by Mexican food, and Carol getting her wet bathing suit on Ricardo’s nice suit. The hour ends with the charwoman cavorting in a circus setting with legendary clown Emmet Kelly.