Burns teamed with Avery Schreiber, whom he met when they were both members of The Second City, to form a comedy and improv troupe based in Chicago. Burns and Schreiber were best known for a series of routines in which Burns played a talkative taxicab passenger, with Schreiber as the driver. During the summer of 1973, they appeared on the ABC variety series The Burns and Schreiber Comedy Hour.[5] During the first half of the 1965–1966 season of The Andy Griffith Show, in an attempt to replace the Barney Fife character after Don Knotts left the show, Burns was cast as Warren Ferguson, a dedicated but inept deputy sheriff. Warren possessed some of the same qualities as Barney which irritated Andy but without the chemistry. His character was not popular and was dropped after 11 appearances.[6