Carol Burnett

Born in San Antonio (Texas), on April 26, 1933, Carol Creighton Burnett moved to Los Angeles when she was 8 years old, where she was left in the care of her humble grandmother, who lived in a boarding house, due to the alcoholism problems of her parents. parents. She learned to act there, when as a child she invented an imaginary sister named Karen, similar to child star Shirley Temple . She “She Fooled the other guests at the boarding house, because she would greet them, I would sneak unnoticed down the fire escape, she would quickly change me and appear playing Karen.”

At the age of 18, she worked as an usher at a Warner Brothers movie theater until the manager fired her for trying to stop a couple from sitting through the end of Strangers on a Train instead of waiting for the next showing, ruining their entire life. function. She couldn’t go to university due to lack of resources, until she found an envelope from her with an anonymous donation, which allowed her to study English and drama at UCLA.

After performing at a teacher’s party, a man approached her while she was putting cookies in her bag to take to her grandmother. Instead of berating her, she asked him about her future plans, and offered her a thousand-dollar interest-free loan for her to go with her boyfriend, Don Saroyan, to New York to pursue her dreams. She soon became famous on the Big Apple nightclub circuit for her solo performances. She made her Broadway theater debut in 1959 with the musical Once Upon a Mattress , which was enormously successful, and earned her a Tony Award, her highest recognition in her country on the stage. That same year she debuted as a regular contributor to The Garry Moore Show ., where he embodied various characters, but above all the cleaning woman, his most popular creation, which he has continued to repeat for years.

With her friend Julie Andrews , she stars in the show Julie and Carol at Carnegie Hall in New York , which they would repeat many years later, in the 70s, and which was televised with great acceptance. She also participates in “Cavender is Coming”, one of the most remembered chapters of the Twilight Zone series , where she plays the clumsy young Agnes Grep, who receives the unexpected help of Harmon Cavender, a guardian angel eager to gain his wings. She is also especially remembered for her character in an episode of Agent 86 , where she was Ozark Annie, a circus performer inspired by Juana Calamity. And she caused a sensation when she was on The Lucy Show., whose hostess, another of the icons of American television (for the legendary series I love you, Lucy ), Lucille Ball , became one of her best friends. “He always sent me flowers for my birthday,” Burnett recalls. “One year I woke up to find out on the news that she had died. A while later the bouquet arrived, with a card that said: Happy birthday, Niña. I love you Lucy.”

She asked to host a variety show on CBS in 1967, and despite the fact that network executives were reluctant to allow a woman to host such a space, they ended up giving in. She had no choice, because during her time on The Garry Moore Show she had been tied to a contract, according to which she had 31 one-hour shows left to shoot, but she could choose the format she wanted. Once those shows were over, the program, The Carol Burnett Show , had devastated, so it would be on the air until 1979, without losing traction. Enlivened with a live orchestra, his musical numbers, interviews with stars like Rita Hayworth , his sketches and his parodies of feature films such asGone with the Wind . “We left our skin,” she recalls. “It was like starting a different revue in the theater every week.”

At the height of popularity, he starred with Walter Matthau in   Laughter and Tears , where they play two bachelors afraid of marriage who nevertheless end up getting married. She would repeat with the actor in the masterful Front Page , where she gave life to the unfortunate “two dollar” prostitute Mollie Malloy. He also participated in The Four Seasons , directed by and starring Alan Alda , where both gave life to a marriage that was breaking up when he began a relationship with a much younger woman. He got to work with the teacher John Huston , on Annie, where he gave life to the villain, Aggie Hannigan, alcoholic caretaker of the orphanage who hates girls. “During filming I had to undergo cosmetic surgery due to an overbite problem,” she recalls. “Huston would have me replay a sequence where he put me in a closet, so I told him it was likely that in the final cut he would go in with one chin and come out with another. He told me to roll with a determined face and not to worry.”

Although she had married the aforementioned Sayoran, she divorced in 1962. Later she was married to Joe Hamilton, a cathodic producer, with whom she had three daughters, Jody, Erin and Carrie, who gave her a lot of trouble, due to her drug problems. (and who died very young, at 38, in 2002, as a result of cancer). Following Hamilton’s death, she has been paired with musician Brian Miller, 23 years her junior.

Carol Burnett was the first celebrity guest on the opening episode of the Sesame Street puppet show . She has never left the show, she has participated in numerous series, as she has been, for example, the stepmother of Bree ( Marcia Cross ), in Desperate Housewives , and the mother of the cheerleading coach ( Jane Lynch ), in Glee . When she was awarded her Walk of Fame Star, she asked to be placed in front of the Warner Brothers movie theater, where she had been fired from in her youth.