This Time Together

A Note from the Author:

First of all, my thanks to all for being included in the Club. It’s quite an honor!

Now I’ll try to explain how this book came to be, and how it wound up turning out the way it did.

For several years I’ve travelled throughout the country, appearing in various theaters doing a one-woman show: “AN EVENING WITH CAROL BURNETT WHERE THE AUDIENCE ASKS THE QUESTIONS.” This came about because I used to open our TV show by “bumping up the lights” and having the studio audience ask me whatever came to mind! It was our warm up and it was great fun to do, because I never knew what someone would ask or say it was never plannedÉ totally off the cuff. And, believe me, we got some “doozies.” So I took that premise and hit the road. Over the course of the past few years, some of the questions would be the same. Folks would ask me to do the “Tarzan yell,” and I would tell them how it came about. Many questions would be about our show and our gang of merry players: Harvey Korman, Tim Conway, Vicki Lawrence and Lyle Waggoner. I had stories I could tell about each one that were funny and personal. Often, someone in the audience would want to come up on stage and sing a song! No problemÉ I would ask them to “C’mon up!” One time there was a lady in the first row whose cell phone rang, and I took the call! The person on the other end had no idea who she was talking to I just said I was taking messages and we’d get back to her. But I was never asked something I couldn’t answer in one way or another. The questions were usually pretty amusing, and I often found a way to lead into an anecdote, or two, of my favorite stories.

About a year or so ago, the thought occurred to me write these anecdotes down. Could it be a book, perhaps? No matter, I just felt the need to put pen to paper. I had lots of stories to tell embarrassing moments encounters and friendships with wonderful icons like Jimmy Stewart, Cary Grant, Walter Matthau, and my close relationships with Julie Andrews, Lucille Ball and Beverly Sills, and Broadway producer/director, Hal Prince. There were also stories about the not-so-famous people who had had an impact on me. My grandmother, who raised me, loomed large and was hysterically funny so naturally I included her. All of the above I had finessed in the road show. So I thought the finished result would be simply a book of funny anecdotes

But as I kept writing there were stories I wanted to tell that I never used in the road show stories and incidents in my life that weren’t necessarily funny, but that resonated with me stories I’ve never told before. Personal events that I wanted to share began to emerge. So the result has been a kind of hybrid. It’s not a full autobiography by any means. I guess I’d call it “Anecdotes and a bit of a memoir.” Hence the subtitle: “Laughter and Reflection.”

I really hope you like it.