The difference being that Carroll O'Connor was trying to portray a specific social type, a fairly common one, as a character in a drama. So in order to accurately portray that type he had to use the words he did; it's either that or delete the character altogether. In the case of "All in the Family" better than half the plot of the show was the conflict between the cranky Dad and his daughter and son-in-law on the other side of the generation gap; to make Archie Bunker talk sweet would have the same effect on "All in the Family" as rewriting "Star Trek" where it took place in a world without space travel. Whereas a comedian rapping out a string of disconnected jokes is free to say or not say any one particular shtick; Silverman could easily have dropped that one joke from her routine and no one would have noticed, nothing would have been lost.
Yours WDK - WKiernan at concentric.net