Welcome to the weird, wild and at times absolutely inexplicable 1970s variety show era. It’s a place where the cocaine budget was likely higher than the GDP of a small nation, and someone in a boardroom said, “You know what goes great with soft rock? Aliens.” Today we’re talking about the 1978 television special The Carpenters…Space Encounters.

If you’ve ever sat back and wondered, “What if Close Encounters of the Third Kind was directed by someone — Bob Henry, who took his skills at directing and producing variety shows and ended up making variety specials for most of his career, including Leif, Feliciano! Very Special, Flip Wilson… Of course, and several specials for the Carpenters — who had only ever heard of sci-fi through a haze of mood lighting and easy-listening radio?”

Well, you’ve found your holy grail.

Richard and Karen Carpenter, that loveable brother and sister duo — are just minding their own business in the studio, cutting tracks and hanging out with legendary comedian Charlie Callas, who plays their agent. Soon — Wam! Bam! Thank you, spaceman! —they’re being scouted by extraterrestrials. Not scary, we’re here to harvest your organs, aliens, but John Davidson and Suzanne Somers, dressed like they’re about to host a space-disco on Saturn.

Yes, of all the people in the world who would portray the most perfect creatures in the universe, they picked the star of TV’s That’s Incredible! and a year into Three’s Company, Somers, who somehow looks better than she ever has before. Seriously, whoever did the makeup on this — great work, Sandy Holland (The Carpenters’ regular hairstylist), Rudy Horvatich and Katherine Kotarakos — earned their money. 

It turns out that John and his fellow space-travelers have a major problem: their planet cannot make music. Obviously, the only logical solution to a universal cultural crisis is to kidnap The Carpenters. John teleports into the studio, whip-cracks a hi-tech pocket video screen to show them clips of “Fun Fun Fun,” and proceeds to perform a rendition of “Just the Way You Are” that makes you realize just how far we’ve strayed from the light.

I once saw Davidson star in Oklahoma, and the play was so bad that the entire audience booed the show when Jud, the villain, died. That’s how bad it was.

At this stage, the film then descends into a fitful blend of madness and mid-70s production value. We get a stroll through an old garage for a performance of “Goofus;” Richard sitting at a piano in front of a full orchestra, hammering out a medley of the Close Encounters and Star Wars themes while surrounded by laser lights and chroma key effects. Who gave Richard a phaser pedal?

Then, we achieve the grand finale, where the cast takes the party to the ship’s own nightclub. Karen and Suzanne Somers team up for “Man Smart, Woman Smarter,” followed by a disco-medley that includes “The Hustle” and “Boogie Nights.” If you’ve ever wanted to see the epitome of soft-rock royalty getting down to disco, stop reading and start watching.

The whole thing wraps up with the inevitable performance of “Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft”—the song that was practically written for this exact brand of madness—and an instrumental playout of “We’ve Only Just Begun.”

It’s saccharine, it’s bizarre, it’s a time capsule of a network television machine that had a nearly captive audience. Somehow, this had four writers: Bill Larkin, Joseph Neustein (a member of the Match Game staff for 700 episodes), Tom Sawyer and Stephen Spears. 

“Calling occupants of interplanetary, quite extraordinary craft / And please come in peace, we beseech you / (Only our love we will teach them) / Our Earth may never survive / (So do come, we beg you).”

May 17, 1978 was a weird time. 

Also: I love The Carpenters unironically. I want that to be perfetcly clear.

You can watch this on YouTube.