Reconstructing the Carol Burnett Show: Part 19: More Movie Spoofs

As 2021 comes to an end and I am recovering from being in an auto accident (I was struck by a car while crossing a street while I had the light), here is a new installment in our series on the Carol Burnett Show. This time we focus on the series' brilliant movie parodies.

Season Seven
Dec. 15, 1973: Ruth Buzzi, Richard Crenna

Harvey and Carol in 
Raised to be Rotten

(Full episode found on YouTube) The high point of this segment is a salute to Bad Girls of the Movies. Ruth plays Mrs. Robinson from The Graduate and then Richard comes in as Benjamin, the much younger object of her seduction--dressed in a boy scout outfit. Then Carol does her over-the-top Bette Davis impersonation while Vicki plays Anne Baxter as Eve Harrington from All About Eve. After Vicki smears Carol with make-up and smacks her with a powder puff to make her look bad, Vicki then takes Carol-Bette's dress and imagines replacing the great star. Carol throws Vicki out of the dressing room. Then Harvey as Gary Merrill comes to comfort Carol, but tries on the dress himself. (More condescending gay/trans/cross-dressing humor).

Memories of Laugh-In

Lily Tomlin, Barbara Sharma, Goldie Hawn,
Ruth Buzzi, and Nanci Phillips on
Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In

In the early 1970s, George Schlatter, the producer of Roman and Martin's Laugh-In, appeared on the David Frost Show. When asked by Frost what it was like to put together that mad house on a weekly basis, Schlatter casually mentioned they did about 250 jokes a show. This fascinated my 10-year-old self and so on the very next Monday night (Laugh-In was on every Monday from 8 to 9), I counted every single gag and yes, it added up to 250. By this time the show had been on for a few years and I was old enough to stay up late and watch the entire thing. When it premiered in 1968, my bedtime was 8:30, so we would watch I Dream of Jeannie at 7:30 (this was before the FCC designated the 7:30-8PM slot solely for local stations) and then the first half-hour, usually just as they finished the News. The Decades Network is now rerunning episodes and it brought back a host of memories. It was my favorite show because you never knew what was going to happen next--a bucket of water, a specialty song, a cocktail party. I would often fantasize about being a regular performer, even going so far as to participate in my sixth grade talent show with my imitation of Lily Tomlin's Ernestine. My teacher even said she thought I did a good job and was far superior to the other "acts" which mostly consists of girls lip-synching to Motown records. At least I was using my own voice.