- What a pleasure to be here with you.
- You know, I had to come by your dressing room
before we started
'cause I knew it was gonna be emotional for me
because this woman is one of the reasons I'm here.
(audience applauding) What she did on television
made me wanna be on TV,
and what you meant to my parents.
I had to go, you know,
get the crying out backstage 'cause-
- Oh, Steve.
- I didn't wanna come out here and do it.
And meeting her was just, like, so major for me.
This woman is a legend in this business.
(audience cheering)
I wanted to say that.
That was really good.
- Oh.
You know, he said that exactly the way I wrote it.
(Steve laughing) (audience laughing)
- Right now, we're on Stage One right now.
This is where Jack Benny did his iconic show,
and you played Jane to his Tarzan.
- That's right. (audience cheering)
- [Steve] Yeah.
- Oh, look. (chuckles)
Oh, my goodness.
- Have you been here since?
- No, I don't think so.
- [Steve] Really? - I don't think I have.
That was a long, that was 1962.
(audience oohs)
In the sketch, Jack wanted to throw boulders
like playing ball with each other.
And so I threw it back to him,
and Jack fell back into some prop bushes
that we're very sticky, you know?
And he cut himself on this bush,
and in front of the audience, and he's bleeding,
and just keeps going.
He didn't stop tape or anything. He kept going.
(audience applauds) It was like a Broadway show.
- [Steve] Wow. Yeah.
- Like you had to just keep going, you know?
You know, today they would've stopped and-
- Oh, yeah. Oh, they shut that down.
- (chuckles) Shut it down right away.
Not Jack. He was a trooper.
- Yeah. This studio was also on James Stewart Avenue.
- [Carol] Oh.
- Which is one of your favorite actors.
I saw you posted on your Instagram.
Did you have this shirt made?
- [Carol] "Always remember, be nice to people."
- [Steve] Yeah.
- No, that was from his daughters,
and they gave it to me because he was my favorite.
It happened when they were gonna go to college.
He had twin daughters,
and they said, "Dad, do you have any advice for us,
you know, going to college and everything?"
And that was the advice he gave them.
- Yeah.
(audience applauds)
Now, here's what I think is so incredible.
You received an anonymous donation of 50 bucks
which made it so that you could afford to go to UCLA.
- Yeah, we were pretty poor. (chuckles)
And in fact, our rent was $30 a month.
I lived with my grandmother in a one-room
with the Murphy pull-down Bed,
and I slept on the couch.
And I wanted very badly to go to UCLA,
but we couldn't afford it.
Get this. Back then, the tuition was only $43.
(audience exclaims)
That's how old I am.
(audience laughing) But anyway,
our door led right to the lobby of this building we lived in
and there were pigeonhole mailboxes.
So every morning I would look out,
and see if there might be an envelope in our slot.
So this one morning there was,
and I went out, and I got it,
and it was an envelope with my name type written on it,
and the address and all.
And I opened it up,
and there was a $50 bill.
And to this day, I don't know where that came from.
- [Steve] Really? (audience applauding)
- I do not know.
- "The Carol Burnett Show", it ran for 11 seasons.
This show won 25 Emmys. 25.
(audience cheering)
You had everybody that was anybody on that show.
- Yeah.
- Which, of all the people you had on the show,
which one left you the most star struck?
I mean, you had everybody on there.
- Well, they were all pretty spectacular.
But I think maybe the one that impressed me the most
at the first time was Ray Charles.
(audience applauds)
You know, usually he would go on a show,
and just play his number and so forth.
But we put him in a sketch.
And my middle daughter, Jody, she was five years old,
and we were watching the "Ed Sullivan Show" one night,
and Ray Charles came on and she said, "I love him."
And so about two or three days later (chuckles),
we had a plumber working in the kitchen.
She said, "I'm married, you know?"
Ray Charles is my husband."
(audience laughing)
She said, "He's blind, and I have to lead him everywhere."
(audience laughing) (Steve chuckles)
So, when Ray came on my show I told him this story,
and he said he just loved it.
So then I told Jody, I said, "Your husband's on this week."
(audience laughing)
And she went, "Oh!"
And so she came back after the show,
and Ray Charles was there.
And I said, "Ray, this is Jody."
He said, "Where's my little Jody?"
And she ran over to him. He picked her up.
They hugged, she started to cry, and kissing him.
The whole... It was so beautiful.
I mean, to this day. Yeah. - [Steve] Wow.
(audience applauding)
- When I first started this show in Chicago,
I stole something from your show.
When you used to walk out,
and talk to the audience before the show.
- Yeah.
- And that's where "Ask Steve" was born.
(audience applauding) And to this day,
it's now "Hey, Steve".
And I take questions from the audience because of your show.
- Wow. When we were gonna start the show,
the executive producer came up to me,
and he said, "You know, Carol, you've gotta do the warmup
and come out and, you know do Q and A
because the audience should get to know you
before you put on all those crazy outfits,
and do all those crazy characters.
- [Steve] Yeah.
- And I was scared to death the very first taping,
but after three or four weeks,
I started to get a kick out of doing it.
There were no planned questions.
It was all random.
And it became one of my favorite things to do on the show.
- Yeah. Wow. Yeah, that's good.
'Cause it's my favorite segment.
- [Carol] Yeah.
- I love 'cause when people ask you questions,
and then I end up going probably more off the question
than on the question. (audience laughs)
I end up not giving out advice at all, so.
- Did you ever get one you couldn't answer?
- Oh, yeah, yeah. I've been stumped a couple of times.
- Yeah.
- 'Cause people go into some real personal issues sometimes.
- Ooh.
- You know, my husband cheated on me, what should I do?
Here he is right here.
(audience laughing)
You know?
- That's more like Maury Povich.
- Yeah.
(audience laughing and applauding)
(laughing) Yeah.
See, that's some stuff I wanna say, but I can't now.
(Carol laughs)
But she a legend, so she said it. What you gonna do?
(Carol laughs) (audience laughing)
(laughing) I like that, man. That was good.
Well, let me say this.
Your sitcom, "Mama's Family",
- Uh-huh.
- let me tell you somethin', man,
(audience applauding)
I think in all of television,
that has to be in the top-three funniest shows
- [Carol] It was. - I've ever seen.
- [Carol] It was. (audience applauding)
- How did that show come about?
- Well, it was written by Dick Clair and Jenna McMahon.
They were partners in writing, and they were from Chicago,
and they both hated their mothers.
(audience laughs)
(laughs) And so my background,
being from Texas and Arkansas,
I immediately, when I read it,
I went I started talking like this, you know?
Mama? You know, how come you talk to me like that?
I thought Vicky picked it up, and Harvey.
So all of a sudden they became Southwestern, or whatever.
And we did it that way.
The writers were very upset.
They said, "What are you doing with this,
with our sketch here?
You're going to alienate the entire South."
(chuckling) You know?
And I said, "That's just the way I kinda saw it happen."
And we did it.
We never thought we were gonna do it more than one time,
but it got great response.
So we wound up doing those about 35 times on our show.
And we did not alienate the entire South.
No. (chuckles) - No. The South loved it.
(audience applauding)
Now, we've got the "Carol Burnett 50th Anniversary Special"
which is this Sunday,
and it is star-studded, everybody.
(audience cheering)
You got the whole gang back together.
- Well-
- Was it overwhelming for you?
- It was overwhelming.
And what was really nice about it, it's a reunion show,
but we had a lotta people on, stars that I'm starstruck by
like Jim Carey, and Bill Hader, and Jay Leno,
and Maya Rudolph, and Jane Lynch, and Bernadette Peters,
and Harry Connick, Jr., and I mean, on and on.
(audience cheering)
- Hey, listen, before you go,
I wanna hit you with some of these
rapid-fire Uncensored Questions.
(music fanfare) (audience cheering)
Okay, here we go.
If you were forced to compete on a reality show,
which one would you pick?
- The Kardashians.
(Steve laughs) (audience laughing)
- All right. What about the best party you ever went to?
- Lucille Ball
(audience cheering)
gave me a baby shower.
It was in the evening.
It was black-tie, and men were invited.
And her husband was Gary Morton, and he was a comedian,
so it was his deal to open up all the baby gifts.
So he was doing bits about diapers, and you know?
And it was so funny.
There were cocktails and dinner.
And as we were leaving, the men who were leaving said,
"We didn't realize that baby showers
could be this much fun."
(Steve laughs) (audience laughs and applauds)
- Yeah.
All right, last one.
What actor or actress would you like to do a project with?
- Meryl Streep.
(audience applauds)
Not only is she a brilliant actress,
but she is very funny, and she sings up a storm.
- [Steve] Yeah.
- Yeah, and I just think it would be great fun
to do sketches with her, any kind of a scene with her
because I always feel you wanna work with somebody
better than you are because it only makes you better.
(audience applauds) - I know that's right.
Ladies and gentlemen, the legend, Carol Burnett!
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