Carol Burnett on her 50th anniversary special: Our show could never have been done today

TV Insider

“It was way too pricey by today’s standards,” Burnett says in advance of tonight’s The Carol Burnett 50th Anniversary Special. “Those fantastic Bob Mackie costumes alone would break the budget. And they’d never let me hire Vicki Lawrence, who was just out of high school and raw as can be. They’d say, ‘Are you crazy?’ But back then—in the covered wagon days—the network left us alone to be artists.”