Jack Burns, RIP

[Schmo]

Jack Burns, known for his brief tenure as Deputy Warren, has passed away.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Burns

[Schmo]

Here’s an article from 2018 praising Burns’s comedic chops.
https://www.metv.com/lists/in-defens...-griffith-show

[Schmo]

How did Burns end up being cast on TAGS? His urban style of humor didn’t fit the show’s theme.

[Zoneboy]

Verified here.

https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards...d.php?t=388612

[Schmo]

Originally Posted by Zoneboy

Verified here.

https://www.sitcomsonline.com/boards...d.php?t=388612

I read that before I posted, but I didn’t want to link to it because of the profanity.

[Zoneboy]

Originally Posted by Schmo

I read that before I posted, but I didn’t want to link to it because of the profanity.

Profanity is automatically filtered if posted here and Wikipedia is not always a reliable source which is why I refuse to use them as one.

[Schmo]

As a kid in the 1970s and early 1980s, I only knew Burns as “Warren” and Schreiber from Doritos commercials.

[AB]

May he rest in peace.

[Duster76]

Originally Posted by Schmo

How did Burns end up being cast on TAGS? His urban style of humor didn’t fit the show’s theme.

I read somewhere that Andy was impressed with Burns after seeing him perform in a club. I can only guess what the original vision was, the boy from the faster paced northern life comes down south with his big city police experience leaving Andy to work him into the more toned down ways of sleepy Mayberry.

Andy admitted on Larry King that the failure of the Warren character was his fault not Jack Burns. I couldn't agree more with that statement. The episode that introduced Warren may have been the worse introduction of a new character in TV history. The episode, "The Bazaar", was essentially a remake of the episode, "Andy Saves Barney's Morale". In the Barney episode, Fife makes a fool of himself by arresting the whole town while Andy was away, what does Andy do, help Barney save face. In the Warren episode, he arrests the "Ladies Auxiliary" for gambling and Andy storms around the entire episode almost ready to string Warren up. Taking over for Knotts was going to be an uphill climb, how was the character going to have any chance if Andy hated him. Most of the Warren scripts were really for the Barney character, it was very unfair.

One last thing, I thought the episode "Girl-Shy" was his best episode, I felt sympathy for his character and I thought the character might have been salvageable if Griffith and his production team had wanted to make it work.

[Mayberry'sBadBoy]

Originally Posted by Duster76

I read somewhere that Andy was impressed with Burns after seeing him perform in a club. I can only guess what the original vision was, the boy from the faster paced northern life comes down south with his big city police experience leaving Andy to work him into the more toned down ways of sleepy Mayberry.

Andy admitted on Larry King that the failure of the Warren character was his fault not Jack Burns. I couldn't agree more with that statement. The episode that introduced Warren may have been the worse introduction of a new character in TV history. The episode, "The Bazaar", was essentially a remake of the episode, "Andy Saves Barney's Morale". In the Barney episode, Fife makes a fool of himself by arresting the whole town while Andy was away, what does Andy do, help Barney save face. In the Warren episode, he arrests the "Ladies Auxiliary" for gambling and Andy storms around the entire episode almost ready to string Warren up. Taking over for Knotts was going to be an uphill climb, how was the character going to have any chance if Andy hated him. Most of the Warren scripts were really for the Barney character, it was very unfair.

One last thing, I thought the episode "Girl-Shy" was his best episode, I felt sympathy for his character and I thought the character might have been salvageable if Griffith and his production team had wanted to make it work.

Adding onto the above Burns was actually the fourth choice to play Barney's replacement. The first choice was Jerry Van Dyke, who portrayed Jerry the Deputy in Banjo Playing Deputy, which is an episode that uses the same formula (Andy gets a new bumbling deputy he doesn't like forced on him and responds in frustration) but is done with a bit more understanding and Jerry Van Dyke's Deputy Jerry character is a bit more likable than Warren. After Jerry left for My Mother the Car, Alvy Moore and Larry Hovis were offered the role but turned it down for Green Acres and Hogan's Heroes respectively.

One has to wonder why Andy and the Shows producer thought that the formula of "Andy getting a bumbling deputy he doesn't like forced on him and acting frustrated" was a good idea to use twice. As you mentioned introducing a replacement for Barney was going to be an uphill battle and using a formula where Andy spends most of the episode angry at the new character is not a good way to do it. Even when troublemaker Ernest T. Bass was introduced Andy didn't get nowhere near as Angry as he did with Warren. The only character I can think of that had as bad of an introduction as Warren did was Helen Crump but even that's excusable because Andy Discovers America was supposed to be the only episode Crump appeared in and when they had her on for A Wife For Andy she was much more subdued and likable.

As for how they could've introduced Barney's replacement, I think what they should've done is made John Master's (Choir Director played by the great Olan Soule) the deputy given he could best be described as a "successful" Barney Fife. TAGS regulars would already know the character, the introduction episode wouldn't have featured Andy being angry and (IMO) Soule would've had a much easier time doing "Barney" material than the other replacements

[vitoscotti]

RIP Jack Burns. All his tags episodes are some of my favorite classic sitcom episodes of all time. When he meets Aunt Bea and Opie in front of the grocery store (The Bazaar) for the first time it's pure genius. Andy Griffith made a huge mistake letting him go.

[PracTz]

OK, the late Mr. Burns did the best anyone could have done with the character of Warren (and he had a very lengthy and varied entertainment career) but I have to wonder if any TAG fans have ever heard of anyone who actually thought Warren was an improvement over Barney?! I think the number of folks who believe that likely is even fewer than those 'Laverne and Shirley' fans who think their LA relocation was an improvement over their Milwaukee hometown antics.

RIP, Mr. Burns.

[Schmo]

Did “Warren” get a proper sendoff or did he just disappear ala Chuck Cunningham?

[Schmo]

Jack Burns started out working with George Carlin. But while Carlin went on to superstardom and was widely praised as a visionary, Burns seems to have been largely forgotten.

[PracTz]

Originally Posted by Schmo

Jack Burns started out working with George Carlin. But while Carlin went on to superstardom and was widely praised as a visionary, Burns seems to have been largely forgotten.

I think it was mentioned that Warren had been fired shortly after his last appearance.

Yes, some may praise the late Mr. Carlin as a 'visionary' but I consider him to have been a significant contributor to the marked decline of civility in the last four decades that has resulted in the current largescale crass, crude junior high mentality that has made life more unpleasant for virtually everyone (including those who were told that unfettered profanity was supposed to be 'liberating' but that has proven IMO to be one of the biggest lies of the then-Counterculture).

Better Mr. Burns got to make what he did on his own than to have to stay connected to that kind of legacy, IMO.