Carol Burnett Reflects on How Comedy Has Changed Since the 1970s

Things are certainly very different with comedy compared to how things were when The Carol Burnett Show was on the air. Speaking about some of the changes is Carol Burnett herself for a new interview on this week’s edition of Who’s Talking to Chris Wallace?. The show debuts new episodes on Friday mornings on HBO Max while airing Fridays at 10 p.m. ET/PT on CNN. From the interview, Burnett first spoke about how the television medium has altogether changed drastically from before, given the increase in content and rapid rise of streaming services.

“Well, there’s just so much [that’s happened since the 1970s],” Burnett told Chris Wallace. “There is just so much, you can’t decide what to watch. When we were on, people stayed home on that Saturday night because they– you couldn’t tape then, you couldn’t tape it, on TV or any of it. So, they had– they had to be at home. That’s all changed now, you know? You can– and streaming and this and that and so forth.”

Comedy is always evolving, so it’s obviously changed as well compared to the heyday of The Carol Burnett Show. Wallace asked Burnett what she thought of comedy today compared to what was on her show and other programs during the 1970s, and she has noticed that it’s much more “edgy.” Burntett notes that this isn’t necessarily a bad thing except for when there’s no creative thought behind it, with some comedians going for crude humor for the sake of shock value and nothing more.

“Well, it’s a lot more edgy,” Burnett explains. “And I’m not a prude. I can– I can take edgy if it’s warranted. But I just– if somebody just uses four letter words and talks about their bodily functions, just out of the blue, I’m not interested. You know?”

She added, “Also, there’s not that many belly laughs anymore. What I did, wanted, with our show, was, I didn’t want it to be that topical. I wanted it to be — let’s go for the laughs, let’s go for human foibles, right, and stuff like that, you know, rather than tackling today’s headlines. And so as a result, we’re still viable.”

Related: Carol Burnett Talks Turning 90, Names Her Proudest Career Accomplishment

Carol Burnett: Comedy Icon

Given Burnett’s accomplishments and contributions to the world of comedy, her opinion carries great weight. Her impressive career was just acknowledged on Wednesday for a television special celebrating Burnett’s 90th birthday. Many of her best career moments were put on display with various celebrity guests sharing fond stories and praise for Burnett. She has also recently said how the success of The Carol Burnett Show remains what she’s most proud of.

“[My proudest accomplishment] would have to be the variety show running 11 years, when at first CBS had no interest in doing it,” she explained, per the Daily Beast. “They had to because I had it in a contract to do 30 shows, so they had to put me on the air. I had no idea that we would run this long.”

The program was one of television’s most revered shows of the era, and better yet for Burnett, it wasn’t canceled. It was still going strong after eleven seasons, and the offer came in for a 12th year to keep things going with Burnett. That was when she decided to walk away, feeling it was better to go out on top than to get canceled later on.

“I decided we should leave before we’re asked to leave,” she said.

Now, several decades later, the program remains one of TV’s greatest comedy shows in history, and Burnett will forever be a beloved comedy icon.