After Leave It to Beaver ended, Barbara Billingsley's career hit a rough patch. The downside to being so well-known for her role as June Cleaver was that she was only seen as June Cleaver. Yes, Barbara had fallen victim to that Hollywood trap known as typecasting. Aside from two episodes of The F.B.I. in 1971, the world spent a long 17 years without seeing her on our screens.

Then, she reappeared, in possibly the most hilarious re-introduction. The 1980 disaster movie spoof Airplane! is now considered one of the greatest comedies of all time. Billingsley is only in it for a minute or two; her character doesn't even get a name. Yet her scene is often brought up as one of the funniest parts in an already laugh-out-loud movie.

In her scene, the stewardess can't understand two black men in distress because of their use of "jive speak". Billingsley, looking every part the sweet mother figure audiences knew her as, explains to the stewardess that "I speak jive," then proceeds to translate and get in an argument with the two men in full street slang.

Jerry Zucker, one of the co-writers and directors of Airplane! explained that getting Barbara for the role was a wild dream. "Barbara Billingsley, she's the perfect white lady you would never think of in a million years could translate jive. We never thought about if it would work. We just came upon a name and thought she would be great."

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Billingsley didn't know what to make of the script at first. "I was sent the script," she explained in an interview with the Archive of American Television. "I thought that was the craziest script I’d ever read. My part wasn’t written, really, it was just that I talked jive. So I went to see the producers and I said I would do it."

Billingsley explained that the scene was actually written by the actors. She met the two men she would be sharing the scene with, and they went out to lunch to discuss. "These fellas were wonderful, and they taught me. They were great. It wasn't hard for me to learn, and I don't know why... maybe they were good teachers." Billingsley even studied up for her short scene, reading a book about jive and researching the origins of the slang.

That short cameo completely revitalized her career. "I went to New York to be on the Today show because of that role! All kinds of things happened for me because of that role. People talk to me as much about that as they ever did about Leave It to Beaver. I got fan mail!" Billingsley said. "It was remarkable. It started my whole career again."

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