Here’s a YouTube Video of Gracie Allen and George Burns. It’s only 5-1/2 minutes, full of silly humor, and the first bit of it has Gracie darning socks while chatting with George.

It’s slapstick really; clearly this skit-style entertainment format evolved from Vaudeville. I’m guessing the era is early 1950s, given the clothing.

I remember when I was growing up in the 60’s and 70’s there were shows that really were one skit after another, like this. Remember Jackie Gleason? Earlier, Arthur Godfrey, and later Carol Burnett.

Even Laugh-In and Hee Haw were mostly short skits. In the mid-70’s, remember the campy and ridiculous late night Love, American Style? I guess Saturday Night Live is no doubt still like that. Surely Steve Martin’s 70’s “Wild and Crazy Guy” would have been right at home in the Love, American Style skits. Of course, many of those I mention in this paragraph were more modern and late night for a reason. George and Gracie were plain vanilla in comparison, but all fun.

So for those who like innocent but giggle-inspiring retro entertainment, those who reminisce, those who are curious and those who darn socks (or handknit socks which one day may need darning)… have a silly few minutes if you choose! I enjoyed it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 13th, 2008 at 1:56 amand is filed under Dance and Music, Miscellaneous Artforms. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.