Celebrate the 50th anniversaries of 60 Minutes and The Carol Burnett Show tonight on CBS. At 7PM ET, enjoy “Fifty Years of 60 Minutes,” an hour-long look back at the long-running news program. Visit the official 60 Minutes website for more information about the special.
Here’s a promotional spot:
(“Fifty Years of 60 Minutes” commemorates the start of the 50th season of 60 Minutes rather than its 50th anniversary. The series debuted on September 24th, 1968.)
Then at 8PM ET, watch “The Carol Burnett 50th Anniversary Special,” a two-hour celebration featuring Carol Burnett and original cast members Vicki Lawrence and Lyle Waggoner, plus costume designer Bob Mackie. Special guests include Maya Rudolph, Jim Carrey, Jay Leno, Stephen Colbert, and Kristin Chenoweth. Read the official press release for “The Carol Burnett 50th Anniversary Special” here. CBS created a website for the special with videos featuring a number of preview clips.
(The Carol Burnett Show premiered on September 11th, 1967. The award-winning variety series ran for 11 seasons and 279 episodes before ending in March 1978.)
Here’s a promo:
It appears CBS will present clips from 60 Minutes and The Carol Burnett Show in its original 4:3 full screen aspect ratio. A welcome change from the usual practice of cropping archival footage to 16:9 widescreen.
60 Minutes and The Carol Burnett Show are by no means obscure. But anniversary specials like these are rare. The television industry, including the broadcast networks, prefer to focus on today and tomorrow rather than look back at yesterday. Kudos to CBS for remembering its past and celebrating its history.
Do you remember the early days of 60 Minutes? Were you watching The Carol Burnett Show when it debuted 50 years ago? Are you excited for tonight’s anniversary specials?
I suppose I’ll watch, but do we really need to see the GWTW excerpts again?
I was wondering whether to bother with the Carol Burnett special. It’s likely to be all the same “best of” clips they showed in the previous specials.
Did anyone watch one or both of these specials last night? How were they? More importantly, was archival footage presented in its original 4:3 aspect ratio or cropped to 16:9 widescreen?
I recorded the Carol Burnett show special, and will probably watch it tonight. I hope it features lesser-known clips and not the ones we have been seeing over-and-over for decades.
Yep they showed again the trifecta of over rerun CBS Show clips– Gone With The Wind, Tim Conway dentist sketch and Tim Conway and the Siamese Elephants.
I watched it last night, and it was better than I was anticipating. True, the old warhorses were trotted out yet again, but I suppose that was to be expected. However, there were clips that I had never seen before, especially from the very early seasons, which rarely see the light of day, so that was a treat. It was also overly-fawning, and I suppose that is also expected in a tribute show such as this. But the most enjoyable, heartfelt, and charming tribute was from Jim Carrey. It really was sincere and touching. And from Jim Carrey! That was really a surprise, and a high point. I wondered how they decided which performers to feature in the minute-or-so long montage of guest stars. There were so many over the years. Maybe they were Carol’s personal favorites, or maybe they were people (or people’s estates) who gave their permission to be shown. One thing that was very odd is that they kept hammering the point that it was on Saturday nights. True, it was part of a classic Saturday night line-up, but it was only on Saturday night for about the second half of its run. It seemed like revisionist history, and the fact that it aired on other nights has been swept under the rug. Surprisingly, the show had its highest rating during its third season on Monday night.