LOS ANGELES — On one iconic night of The Carol Burnett Show, viewers came expecting the usual mix of charm, wit, and polished variety-sketch fun. What they got instead felt almost dangerous—in the best possible way. Tim Conway entered the bullring ring not as a matador, but as a hapless, pint-deep version of one, and by the time the sketch ended, the audience was doubled over, tears streaming—not just from laughter, but from the outrageous tension of how far the bit dared to go.
From the moment Conway tripped into the ring—cape in hand, the bull’s muzzle already inches away—the sketch detonated. His face dead-straight, his eyes half-lidded, he delivered the kind of ad-lib chaos he’d perfected at the show. The bull (portrayed by a sturdy stage beast) charged, horns low. Conway stepped aside… then stumbled, flicked his cape at a stagehand, tried to pivot, missed—comedy and real physical jeopardy colliding in live television.
Behind the scenes, the sketch was known for one thing: Conway’s willingness to risk the reaction. According to archived accounts, production staff would hold their breath during his “second takes,” because he often veered off script in ways that made co-stars improvise desperately. What happened in the bull-ring sketch is a textbook example of his modus operandi: the straight man appearance collapsed into absurdity as soon as the animal entered the equation.
At one jaw-dropping moment, Conway’s cape got snagged by the bull’s horn, he spun, lost his footing, and crashed into a stand of props. The audience roared. The co-actors scrambled. Carol Burnett herself later admitted she was prepared to break character and yell “cut!”—but the live-studio magic took over. For many fans, this sketch is still considered one of the top moments of live-sketch comedy, blending danger, surprise, and Tim’s unique brand of “I know you expect me to fail—and I will—and you’ll love it” timing.
What makes it endure isn’t just the spectacle, but the tension that underlies the laughter. The bull isn’t a cartoon-beast. The cape-moves aren’t effortless. The danger is real—or at least feels real—and the comedy doesn’t soften it. It heightens it. It says: we’re here to play, but we’re also quivering so you can laugh with us, not just at us.
Even today, when clips of this sketch surface online, viewers comment on how they held their breath waiting for Conway to clear himself. How they felt the audience in the room lean forward. How the laughter came in waves, not constant applause. That moment of “oh no, he didn’t” turned into “of course he did—and it was perfect.”
Beyond the laughs, the sketch speaks to Conway’s genius: he made the audience complicit. He didn’t just want us to watch him fail—he wanted us to feel the failure, to ride the momentum of improv, to sense the live stakes. In the rare world of television sketches, where every second is rehearsed, this one dared to flirt at the edge of chaos—and won.
For The Carol Burnett Show—a program already honored as one of the greatest variety shows ever made the “Drunken Bullfighter” remains a landmark. It’s a reminder that sometimes the funniest moments aren’t the cleanest. They’re the ones where everything almost goes off the rails—and you’re glad it did.
If you’ve never seen it, find the clip, watch the first thirty seconds, then settle in. Because for five minutes you’ll witness not just a sketch, but something live, risky, and alive. Conway doesn’t just execute jokes here—he invites you into the ring.
