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The Invisible Man's Mother

The Carol Burnett Show
SKETCH-O-VISION
A VERY GOOD USE OF YOUR TIME.

The setup

A proud mother's coffee visit with her new neighbor goes awkward when she has to explain that her grown son is the Invisible Man.

Community rating

– / 10

The premise

Here’s the bit.

Mrs. Zimmer welcomes a new neighbor for coffee, and the visitor can't stop bragging about her son, a very successful doctor. When the talk turns to Mrs. Zimmer's own son, she reluctantly admits he still lives at home and was born invisible, and the neighbor soon finds herself greeting an empty room as doors open and objects move on their own. Once the guest flees, Mrs. Zimmer turns on Arnold with a full round of maternal guilt about her humiliation, nagging an empty chair about his posture and his feet on the coffee table, before complaining to her husband that two perfectly visible parents somehow ended up with a son nobody can see.

The funny people

Meet the cast. 4

Say it with us

Highly quotable.

All I ask is that my son be healthy, happy, and cast a shadow.

I remember when you were a baby, I kept diapering the wrong end.

Two normal people like us. I can see you. You can see me. How did we ever get a son that's invisible?

A little extra

Notes from the archive.

TheTVDB and IMDb place this sketch in season 6, episode 13 (December 16, 1972), the episode with guests Anthony Newley and Bernadette Peters; the official YouTube clip's description labels it season 6, episode 4.

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One more couldn’t hurt.

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