Profile : Carol’s in Good Company

Carol Burnett was admiring her new peach-colored dressing room at CBS Television City in Hollywood.

“You’re the first person to break it in,” she said to her visitor, plopping down on the sofa. “Isn’t it lovely? I don’t have my paintings up yet. It’s a combination dressing room and office because there isn’t enough space at CBS.”

It was three days before the first taping of her new CBS variety series “The Carol Burnett Show,” premiering Friday. Workers were busy readying the expansive Stage 33--the same stage that was home to Burnett’s classic 1967-78 CBS variety show--for that Saturday evening’s taping.

Burnett was taking a brief break from intensive rehearsals with the premiere episode’s special guest, Martin Short, and her repertory of seven regulars, including Meagan Fay and Richard Kind from her recent NBC series “Carol & Company,” Rick Aviles (“Ghost”) and Jessica Lundy (“Over My Dead Body”).

Despite her hectic schedule, Burnett was relaxed and gracious during the half-hour conversation. “Have you seen the stage?” she asked. “I would always say I want to come back to 33 because it is the best audience studio around. All the rest of them (studios) in this building are the bleacher setups where you are like the Christians vs. the lions, and it’s not good.”

Studio 33 resembles a real theater, complete with plush seats.

“We’re doing it like a live show,” she said. “We will only stop to change clothes and scenery. We will not be going until 2 or 3 in the morning to make it perfect. I am a warhorse. When the bell goes off, I want to run the race and go home.”

Burnett is back at CBS this season after doing 34 episodes of her anthology comedy series “Carol & Company” for NBC.

“It’s a much better feeling over here,” she admitted. “I am glad to be over the hill (“Carol & Co.” taped in Burbank). There are good memories here. I know the casts have changed, but to come back to this building and to feel needed, wanted and loved. The good vibes around here didn’t exist at NBC.”

Burnett paused and sat back on the sofa. “I hope I am not alienating anyone at NBC, but I must say there is a different feeling here,” she said. “If the show doesn’t work, I am glad I am here. I feel that if it does work, it has a better chance in this atmosphere.”

She wasn’t happy doing “Carol & Company’ because the anthology format was a grind. Burnett said it was impossible for the writers to come up with a good 22-minute sketch every week. “I don’t think Neil Simon or Larry Gelbart could write one every week,” she said.

“We didn’t get a script until Wednesday or Thursday and we would do it on Friday,” Burnett said. “Then what happened, by the nature of the beast, is that writers started writing theme shows, where there would be a 10-minute sketch and a nine-minute sketch. I just said, ‘This is too hard, too difficult and there is no joy in this.’ ”

So Burnett went to Michael Eisner, the chairman of Disney, which produces her series, and asked him about turning “Carol & Company” into an hourlong variety series. “Variety is a dirty word,” Burnett said, smiling. But Eisner gave his blessing to the idea. Burnett went to then-NBC Entertainment Group chairman Brandon Tartikoff, who also, she said, expressed interest.

“Things got kind of jumbled” in the spring after Tartikoff announced he was leaving NBC for Paramount Pictures. “When we told NBC we would like to go to an hour, they were busy trying to figure their Saturday night lineup,” Burnett said. “They were putting two episodes of ‘Carol & Company’ back to back and they were doing well. But they said, ‘We don’t have any use for an hour.’ I didn’t understand. I thought their ties had gotten too tight.”

“When Disney was legally able to come to us and say, ‘Would you be interested in a one-hour show?,’ we were really excited,” said Peter Tortorici, executive vice president of CBS. “One of the biggest thrills last May was setting the schedule and concluding negotiations to bring her here. I was around when she decided to go to NBC and it was a dark day. We consider her part of the family. Having her back in the building has been a tremendous lift.”

Tortorici said that Burnett “represents a really strong link to what CBS was in the hearts and minds of American viewers. But she leads into the future. She is coming in with a new kind of show and a new producer and it is a nice piece that fits.”

“We all change,” Burnett said. “I am not making any kind of concentrated effort to be different; we are different. I haven’t been caught in some time warp.”

Television also has changed since the 1970s. “I am sad for one reason about what has happened in TV,” Burnett said. “It is no longer show business, it is show business . They are losing sight of the process.”

The old series, Burnett said, didn’t hit its stride until the fifth season. “Now, if you don’t make it in five minutes. . . . We haven’t even done a pilot yet for this show. The first show is going to be the pilot. There’s going to be a lot to iron out. We don’t have the luxury of time to develop. I hope we can make it and people will take to it.”

Burnett shrugged her shoulders. “What’s going to happen will happen,” she said matter-of-factly. “I have no control over that. All I want to do is enjoy the process. I would rather go down in flames than try to placate somebody and be a moderate success. If it fails, I will go do something else.”

“The Carol Burnett Show” premieres Friday at 9 p.m. on CBS.