"This Time Together" book review by Deborah Ground Buckner

from the May 2010 issue of KC Stage

This Time Together: Laughter and Reflection by Carol Burnett.
Published 2010 by Harmony Books. 267 pages. $25.00 (978-0-307-46118-6)

Reading Carol Burnett’s new memoir, This Time Together: Laughter and Reflection, is like sitting down for an enjoyable chat with an old and dear friend. The Carol Burnett Show ran for eleven seasons from 1967 to 1978, and I can remember begging my mother to let me stay up past bedtime to watch this glorious hour of music and comedy. Fortunately, she always let me, and we watched together.

This book arose from Burnett’s recent tours performing Laughter and Reflection: A Conversation with Carol, Where the Audience Asks the Questions. Those familiar with Burnett’s show will remember how each evening began with her coming out on stage and saying, “Let’s bump up the lights” and taking questions from the audience members. The tour is a complete show of that practice, providing an excellent vehicle for Burnett to share stories from her life and career. Over time, certain stories have been told again and again, and these became the fodder for the book, with other recollections added to fill in the gaps.

There is fascinating background from the beginning of Burnett’s career, moving to New York and hoping to break into Broadway musicals. At one point, she and several other girls pooled their money on a killer audition dress that they would take turns wearing. Her big break came with an off-Broadway production of Once Upon a Mattress, then a regular gig on The Gary Moore Show.

Burnett includes many fun stories from behind-the-scenes of her own show, with tales of regulars Harvey Korman, Vicki Lawrence, Lyle Waggoner, and Tim Conway. A young Bob Mackie designed all the costumes for the show, including the memorable get-up worn by Starlett O’Hara in the spoof Went with the Wind (“I saw it in the window and just couldn’t resist it.”)

Stories of family and friends are told in a heart-warming manner, like a friend sharing anecdotes over a cup of coffee at the kitchen table. When Burnett writes of her meetings with Jimmy Stewart and Cary Grant, she sounds as awed and star struck as most of her readers.

Burnett ends the book with her list of “Gratefuls” (a friend told her “when she’s going to sleep every night, she counts at least three Gratefuls for the day she has just lived through” - an excellent practice we should all follow). One of the Gratefuls is particularly insightful about her success and, at the same time a sad commentary on the state of television today: “Nothing like our show (and, I might add, all the other variety shows during that time) could ever see the light of day today. The networks just aren’t there for that kind of programming anymore. They won’t spend the money — and, given the profusion of cable competitors, they may not even have the money. And, sad to say, audiences won’t even know what they’re missing unless they look for the old variety show reruns late at night on some distant cable channel. So I add to my Gratefuls that my time happened when it did.”