It’s one of television’s funniest moments ever. And it wasn’t even scripted.
Tim Conway’s elephant story on “The Carol Burnett Show” is still making its rounds on the internet, with views now nearing 34 million.
Conway passed on May 14, 2019. He’s left a lot of laughs for us to remember him by but this one outtake hit all the right spots.
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Posted by Tim Conway onThursday, May 9, 2013
What makes it even more hilarious is that Carol Burnett had rules. That included not breaking character as they filmed in front of a live audience. But Conway wasn’t having it.
Burnett explained,
“As I’ve said, I never wanted to stop and do a retake, because I like our show to be ‘live,’ so when the ‘Family’ sketches came along, I was adamant that we never break up in those scenes, because Eunice, Ed, and Mama were, in an odd way, sacred to me. They were real people in real situations, some of which were as sad and pitiful as they were funny, and I didn’t want any of us to break the fourth wall and be out of character.”
“Then one week, in the eleventh season, Tim was appearing as Mickey Hart, Ed’s hapless helper in the hardware store, and the family was playing Password, with Mickey as Eunice’s partner and Dick Van Dyke, playing a boarder named Dan, as Mama’s partner.”
She continued.
“Eunice wants Mickey to guess the password ‘ridiculous,’ and gives him the clue ‘laughable.’ Mickey responds with ‘elephant!,’” Burnett recalled. “Eunice is obviously pissed as hell at this dumb answer, and is lacing into Mickey about his stupidity, when Mickey starts to explain why he thought the word was ‘elephant.’”
The audience’s initial reaction to Conway’s ridiculous story just made the actor continue.
He goes on about an elephant with a dwarf trainer and a ballerina skirt.
At this point, Burnett and the others looked a bit confused while still trying to stay in character.
But Conway was feeding off the laughter.
He pushes on saying that there’s a rumor that the dwarf and elephant were lovers. Carol looks down and just breaks into laughter.
They were supposed to continue the sketch but Tim’s not stopping!
Vicki Lawrence and Dick Van Dyke both have their heads down now just losing it to Tim’s elephant story.
Tim pauses for a bit so Carol turns to Vicki about to continue the scene but before she can say anything, Conway continues where he left off, narrating how the elephant was shot and buried together with the dwarf.
Carol, Vicki, and Dick have completely lost it at this point.
Another short pause later and you can see Carol looking at Tim now with eyes flashing warning signs but this is Conway’s moment.
He goes on again with a big tombstone and Carol just reaches out to hit Tim on the shoulder before falling back herself.
Good luck watching this one without laughing!
The second part begins now and as Tim and Carol take their seats for the scene, Tim once again launches into a story this time about Siamese elephants.
Burnett just buries her head in exasperation at this point.
Carol tries to switch her attention to Vicki in an attempt to continue the sketch but all four actors are just laughing now at Tim’s impromptu story.
Vicki got the last laugh. Carol finally regains her composure and does the scene with Vicki but Lawrence comes back with,
“You sure that little asshole’s through?”
Conway and Van Dyke drop to the floor unable to control their laughter while poor Carol just shrinks back on the couch herself giggling uncontrollably at the hilarious response.
This is comedy television at its finest! Enjoy the ridiculous scene below!
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