Reconstructing the Carol Burnett Show: Part 40: The Specials

Before, during and after her variety series, Carol headlined a series of specials available as bonus features on DVD collections or on YouTube.

Carol + 2

March 22, 1966: Lucille Ball, Zero Mostel

(Released on DVD on Carol +2: The Original Queens of Comedy, and as a Special Bonus Feature on The Carol Burnett Show: The Lost Episodes Box Set)

Lucy and Carol in the
Chutzpah musical number
in Carol + 2

This is sort of a pilot that CBS ran to see if Carol could carry a hour-long variety show but they insisted she have two top-tier guest stars to guarantee big ratings. Lucy was under contract to CBS to do at least a few specials in addition to her regular series The Lucy Show. Mostel had starred on Broadway and won Tonys for A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and Fiddler on the Roof, and the film of Forum was out this year. 

The hour begins with weird, mechanical music (it sounds like a 1960s idea of a computer spinning its tapes) and an announcer introducing the three principals as the camera zooms in on giant caricatures of each. Carol enters and lavishly praises her two guests. Like a bull or rhinoceros in a china shop, Zero breaks up the pleasantries by saying these self-congratulatory intros are ridiculous (Zero played a man who turns into a rhino in Ionesco's play). What if plumbers behaved the same way ("Oh, Irving what a lovely wrench. Is that a new plunger?") He suggests they shut up and get to work.

The first sketch features Carol and Zero as a bickering couple celebrating their tenth anniversary who rediscover their passion for each other when it seems they've never been legally married. The two master comics milk the physical and facial gestures for all they're worth. Zero's face changes from a blank stare to a devilish leer as he realizes his wife is now a single girl and the audience applauds. Carol is equally exaggerated in her horny reactions to Zero's offstage singing of love songs as she dons a revealing negligee. After the sketch, Carol sings in her character, "You're My Reason" written by MItzi Welch to a sleeping Zero. 

In "Goodbye Baby," Lucille and Carol are sisters quarreling over Carol's baby. Lucy urgently needs to catch a bus, but Carol strongly insists she not leave until the infant says goodbye. Zero then recreates his performance as Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof with "If I Were a Rich Man." After a commercial break (you can see the commercials on YouTube), there's a brief sketch with Zero as a psychiatrist listening to Carol describe her brother who thinks he's a frog. Carol scratches her nose and Zero writes it down as a nervous tic. The central joke is Carol then spending the rest of the scene desperately trying not to scratch her nose, turning pratfalls and falling off the couch. Carol next sings a slow ballad version of "Wait Til the Sun Shines, Nelly." The set-up is she's a wardrobe mistress named Nelly in one of Hugh Hefner's Bunny Clubs, warbling of her thwarted attempts at romance with Zero as the club's bartender. Bunny clubs were exploitative nightclubs with women in skimpy outfits and rabbits ears serving drinks to sloshed tired businessmen.

The hour concludes with Carol and Lucy as cleaning ladies pretending to be show-biz big shots as they dust, mop and collect half-finished cigarettes at the William Morris Agency. When Carol doubts her illusions, Lucy peps her up with the specialty number "Chutzpah" by Ken Welch which sounds a lot like "Hey, Look Me Over" from Lucy's Broadway show Wildcat. The choreography is energetic and the two look like they're having fun. Before the end, Carol pitches sponsor American Motors' safety record. We get a second of Carol saying good night to the studio audience and asking them to watch the show when it's on the air to up the ratings.

The DVD Original Queens of Comedy also includes the 1972 version of Carol in Once Upon a Mattress, the 1959 musical fairy tale which made her a star on and Off-Broadway. I'll cover that show along with the other two televised versions in a later blog post.

Reconstructing the Carol Burnett Show: Part 21

Lots of news on the Carol Burnett Show front: The Paley Center (formerly the Museum of Broadcasting) appears to have finally opened its doors after almost two years of COVID shutdown. They have several complete episodes from the "lost" years (Seasons 1-5) which are not on DVD or have been hacked up on the syndicated reruns seen on MeTV, Amazon, Shout Factory! and other outlets. I will have to pay them a visit soon and find the missing pieces. Speaking of those syndicated half-hours, several have mashed together segments from different episodes. They recently showed one with separate sketches featuring Sammy Davis Jr. and Cher who never appeared together on the show and another with Alan King and an extended sketch which was originally on the family show for Season 10 with no guests. Also Channel 21, a local PBS station, is running hour-long episodes, although none are the missing complete shows from season 1-5. But they do have some really interesting segments from seasons 6-11. I checked the programming schedule of other PBS stations and it seems they do have the complete Ethel Merman episode from season 2. Here's a rundown of recently seen episodes from my DVD collection I hadn't gotten around to, reruns on Channel 21, and mash-ups on MeTV.

Season Three:
Nov. 23, 1969: Lucille Ball, George Carlin

Carol and Lucy as the Rock Sisters

(The Lost Episodes/Classic Carol) Old and new comedy styles are highlighted as the Queen of TV past (Lucy in her third appearance on Carol's show) co-stars with then-hip comic George Carlin. The main sketch has both guests in a time-warp show-biz mash-up. Carol and Lucy play the Rock Sisters, a sibling vaudeville act too corny even for 1919. Harvey plays a parody of Ted Lewis, a now forgotten crooner whose signature was a lisping "Is everybody happy?" Theater manager Lyle fires the girls and Harvey and they remain unemployed for 50 years, denoted by pages falling off a calendar. 

Half a century later, Carlin plays a disc jockey staging a concert at the same theater where Carol, Lucy and Harvey were terminated. He's one act short in his bill of 100 attractions. His dim-witted assistant Tondelayo (Vicki) hires the now ancient siblings to complete the show. There are plenty of geriatric gags as the grey-haired entertainers hobble their way to their latest gig. The "girls" are almost booed off the stage for their old-fashioned rendition of "Happiness Cocktail," a piece of special material parodying the songs of the 1910s and '20s. But the chorus boys, dressed as hippie rockers lend a hand and the old broads are a hit. 

In Tribute to Carl Reiner: TV's Funniest Moments

With the recent passing of Carl Reiner at the age of 98, I began thinking of my favorite moments of TV comedy and he was responsible for many of them. As the creator and main writer for the classic Dick

Van Dyke Show, Reiner delivered many of the biggest laughs of my childhood. As Alan Brady, the tyrannical top banana Van Dyke's character wrote for, he had several of the show's funniest bits. The first season you could only see the back of Alan's head, but in later seasons, you saw all of Reiner. He would often mock his own baldness. One of the most hilarious moments of the show was when Alan was holding up an empty glass for his boot-licking brother-in-law Mel Cooley (Richard Deacon). "What's the matter, Alan? Are you thirsty?," Mel asked.

"No, Mel, I want a glass of dust," Brady angrily shot back.

The delivery and the sarcasm made another otherwise so-so gag into a merciless putdown.

Reiner was also a versatile sketch comedian, appearing on such shows as The Carol Burnett Show and Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In. He did voice-overs for the Linus the Lion-Hearted cartoon series in the 1960s, as did Jonathan Winters and Sheldon Leonard.