It was as if the clock was turned back to 2005 during FOX's primetime lineup this evening, as Carrie Underwood commanded the stage for a full two hours with her variety special "Carrie Underwood: An All-Star Holiday Special."
Carrie took to the stage nearly a dozen times to perform songs from her latest album Play On including "Cowboy Casanova," "Temporary Home," "Songs Like This" and "Mama's Song" among others. Watch her perform "O Holy Night" below:
Carrie had many friends on to perform with her during the special, including Brad Paisley, Kristen Chenoweth, Christina Applegate and fellow Idol winner David Cook. Cook performed Carrie's favorite song on his album, "Lie." Watch the performance below:
Probably the biggest surprise during the special was the amount of camera time Carrie's funny bone got. She played matchmaker with her sister Stephanie, at which she kept finding the least plausible pairings like Johnny Depp and Jack Nicholson posers. Carrie also demanded her mother get off the stage when she attempted to do a Vegas-like number.
But the funniest segment of all was when Carrie kicked off the night showing flashbacks of how she was able to rise to stardom on Idol, which included bribing the judges with cash, dognapping Ryan Seacrest's pug named Simon, using a voodoo doll to get Constantine Maroulis kicked off the show and psyching out Bo Bice before the finale by saying things about his appearance.
One thing is apparent from this special - if Carrie ever decides to give up singing (which she should never do), she could carve out a career for herself in comedy.
