Who Is Carol Burnett? (Who HQ...?) - Softcover

Stabler, David; Who HQ, Who HQ

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0593886569 ISBN 13: 9780593886564

Verlag: Penguin Young Readers Group, 2025

Inhaltsangabe

Discover why comedian and actress Carol Burnett is one of the most iconic entertainers of the twentieth century.

From an early age, Carol Burnett developed a love for entertainment, teaching herself to "Tarzan yell" at age nine. After graduating from high school, Burnett studied theater arts and English at UCLA, which only solidified her passion for acting. She fell in love with making audiences laugh, landing her first breakthrough role in Broadway's Once Upon a Mattress. Since then, Burnett went on to perform on programs like The Garry Moore Show and Julie and Carol at Carnegie Hall. In 1967, The Carol Burnett Show was born, breaking ground and earning her several Emmys and Golden Globes. The show ran for eleven seasons. Young readers can learn more about the life and legacy of beloved comedian Carol Burnett in this exciting new book!

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

David Stabler is the "kid-friendly alter ego" of New York Times bestselling author Robert Schnakenberg. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

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Discover why comedian and actress Carol Burnett is one of the most iconic entertainers of the twentieth century.

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Who Is Carol Burnett?

On September 11, 1967, just before 10:00 p.m., thirty-four-year-old Carol Burnett gathered around the television set with her family in their Los Angeles living room. Together with her husband, Joe, she settled in to watch her brand--new TV series, The Carol Burnett Show.

There were potato chips and popcorn on the coffee table, but Carol was too nervous to eat. Though she had been an actress and comedian for more than ten years, Carol had never had her own TV show before. She was terrified that no one would like it.

On the screen, Carol walked out onto a stage wearing a yellow polka-dot dress. Her bright red hair was cut short. She introduced herself and answered questions from the audience. After the musical theme played, a series of comedy skits and songs began. Though Carol had taped her first show some weeks earlier, this was her first time watching it. She spent the entire hour peeking through her fingers at the TV.

When it was over, the “good night” music played. All the members of the cast gathered onstage to sign their names in Carol’s scrapbook. Guest star Jim Nabors signed first, followed by funnyman Harvey Korman. Actress and comedian Vicki Lawrence added her signature, and then tall, handsome Lyle Waggoner.

The credits rolled. Watching at home, Carol breathed a sigh of relief. She had done it. The live audience had laughed all the way through. Most importantly, her family loved it. Now she just had to hope that TV viewers across the country would like it, too.

Over the next week, Carol began to sense that her new show was a hit. Fan letters started arriving at the studio: one hundred, then two hundred. Vicki, Harvey, and Lyle received fan mail, too. By the middle of November, forty stations in the United States were showing The Carol Burnett Show on Monday nights. As the first woman to host her own TV variety show, Carol had made history.

How did a shy red-haired girl from Texas grow up to be one of America’s most popular television stars? It wasn’t easy. Raised by her grandmother, Carol forged her own path from San Antonio to Hollywood to Broadway and beyond. And she did it all while overcoming obstacles that would have stopped most people in their tracks. Her inspiring success story proves that happy endings really do happen.

Chapter 1
Hollywood Kid
 
Carol Creighton Burnett was born on April 26, 1933, in San Antonio, Texas. Her father, Joseph, managed a movie theater there. Her mother, Ina, was an avid movie fan. She named Carol after one of her favorite film stars, actress Carole Lombard.

Carol grew up in the early days of the economic crisis known as the Great Depression. Though her father had a steady job, he often struggled to provide for the family. He turned to alcohol to deal with the stress of putting food on the table. Carol’s mother also started drinking. In time, they both became addicted to alcohol. When they drank, they argued a lot.

When Carol was seven years old, her parents moved to California in search of a better life. But their arguments continued. Eventually, they separated, leaving Carol in the care of her mother’s mother, Mabel “Mae” Eudora White, whom she called Nanny. Carol and Nanny lived in a small, cramped boarding house in Hollywood, the home of the movie industry. (A boarding house is a home where guests rent rooms and have their meals together.) Nanny worked nights as a cleaning woman at a movie studio to pay the bills. Carol’s mother lived close by and visited them often. Carol’s father lived with his own mother in nearby Santa Monica.

As a child, Carol developed the same love of movies that her mother had. Her favorite movie was Pinocchio. Her favorite stars included Barbara Stanwyck, Joan Crawford, and her namesake, Carole Lombard. To pay for tickets, Carol collected glass milk and soda bottles and turned them in for the deposit money. She went to the movies at least five times a week! Sometimes she even sneaked a roll or two of toilet paper from the theater bathroom to bring home to her family.

When Carol was nine, she started to do a “Tarzan yell” in imitation of the big--screen jungle hero played by Johnny Weissmuller. Johnny starred in twelve Tarzan movies between 1932 and 1948.

When she was in second grade, Carol invented an imaginary twin sister whom she called Karen. Karen had dimpled cheeks like the popular child actress Shirley Temple. When she was feeling especially mischievous, Carol dressed up as “Karen” and tried to fool her neighbors in the boarding house. When Carol was tired, Karen mysteriously vanished. In 1944, when Carol was eleven, her mother gave birth to a baby girl, Chrissie. Now Carol had a real--life half sister who came to live in the boarding house with her and Nanny.
 
The Golden Age of Hollywood

“The golden age of Hollywood” is a term used to describe a period in the history of American movies from the late 1920s to the early 1960s. During these years, five film studios—MGM, Paramount, Fox, Warner Bros., and RKO—made almost all the movies released in the United States.

The two decades of the 1930s and ’40s, in particular, produced some of the most popular movie stars of all time, including Clark Gable and Carole Lombard, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, and Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn. Some of the classic films made during this period include Gone with the Wind, King Kong, The Wizard of Oz, and Citizen Kane.
 
Besides going to movies, Carol had a lot of other creative hobbies. She loved to read. One of her favorite books was The Yearling, the story of a young boy who takes care of an orphaned fawn. In 1946, it was made into a movie, which Carol wanted to be first in line to see. Grimms’ fairy tales also captured Carol’s attention. She drew pencil sketches of fairy-­tale scenes, bringing the stories to life. Sometimes Nanny would take Carol’s drawings to her job at the movie studio. She’d leave the sketches behind in hopes that someone in the art department would “discover” Carol’s art. But the employees there only left a note asking her not to use their art supplies!

Carol’s other talent was music. Nanny was a trained musician who taught her to play the piano—­although they couldn’t afford one of their own. Carol’s mother played the ukulele. Sometimes the three would gather round the kitchen table and sing in harmony together.

For a time, Carol thought she might want to be a cartoonist when she grew up. She even created her own comic strip, called “The Josephson Family,” about a family whose names all began with the letter J. Carol’s favorite newspaper comic strip was Brenda Starr, Reporter, about a red-haired newspaper reporter. Reading about Brenda’s adventures inspired Carol to work on her junior ­high ­school newspaper.

One day, the paper assigned Carol to write about the school play. The tryouts were being held in the school auditorium. On a whim, Carol decided to try out for the play herself. She wanted to play the part of a gum-­chewing, wisecracking maid. But when Carol got up onstage to read her lines for the drama teacher, something strange happened. She looked out over the sea of faces staring up at her and . . .froze! Was this what stage fright felt like?

Carol stumbled through her reading, sure that she was not going to get the part. But the drama teacher must have seen something in her. The next day, Carol was surprised to learn that she was one of two...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: Penguin Young Readers Group
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2025
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0593886569
• ISBN 13: 9780593886564
• Einband: Taschenbuch
• Zeichner: Squier Robert
• Auflage: 1
• Anzahl der Seiten: 113
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: Nicht verfügbar
• Verantwortliche Person: Buchbär; info@buchbaer.de; ; Weberstr. 67; Osnabrück; 49084; Deutschland