“Forgotten Hollywood”- Carol Burnett Gets Harvey Award…
Manny P. here…
Comedian Carol Burnett was honored by a Pennsylvania museum dedicated to actor Jimmy Stewart, who she became smitten with as a toddler during a trip to the movies with her grandmother in San Antonio, Texas. She received the museum’s Harvey Award at an annual fundraiser for the James M. Stewart Museum Foundation, based in the star’s Pennsylvania hometown of Indiana, about 45 miles northeast of Pittsburgh.
Burnett grew up intending to be a writer, but switched to drama at UCLA and moved to New York, landing a role in 1955 as the ventriloquist dummy’s girlfriend on The Paul Winchell and Jerry Mahoney Show (Mahoney was voiced by Winchell). Her career took off with critical acclaim for her work in Once Upon a Mattress on Broadway, and as a regular on The Garry Moore Show, a variety program, and both in 1959.
CAROL BURNETT JAMES STEWART
She got to meet Stewart — sort of — during a visit to his set of The FBI Story in 1958. A director at Warner Brothers had asked to meet with her about a project, and she was to meet him for lunch. She learned he was directing Stewart’s movie, and lost her composure when she was introduced to him. A few years later actor George Kennedy, a mutual friend, introduced Burnett to Stewart more formally and she would keep a place for him in her heart as she’d become as famous for her television show as he had been for his many films. Burnett has called Stewart her idol. She shared this with her audience on the final episode of The Carol Burnett Show on March 29th, 1978, ending an 11-year run on CBS. Stewart then made a surprise appearance.
Past winners have included actors Janet Leigh, Shirley Jones, Ernest Borgnine, and Rich Little, the impressionist known for his stammering imitation of Stewart. The award is named for the 1950 film in which Stewart’s character befriends an invisible rabbit.
Pull your ear, Carol, and say goodnight…
Until next time> “never forget”
This entry was posted on Friday, October 3rd, 2014 at 10:15 pm and is filed under Blog by Manny Pacheco. You can follow any comments to this post through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.
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