Okla-homey
10/15/2006, 08:51 AM
October 15, 1951 I Love Lucy debuts
http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/218/sssssssssssssssssssssssslucilleball9nk3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Fifty-five years ago on this day, TV's first long-running sitcom hit, I Love Lucy, debuts. The show starred comedian Lucille Balland her real-life husband (and America's favorite Cubano,) Desi Arnaz.
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/7449/lucy013ea.jpg
Ball was born in 1911 near Jamestown, New York, to a telephone lineman and a concert pianist. Her father's job required frequent transfers, and within three years after her birth, Lucille had moved many times, from Jamestown to Anaconda, Montana, and then to Wyandotte, Michigan. While her mom was pregnant with her second child, Frederick, her dad Henry Ball contracted typhoid fever and died in February 1915.
After her father died, Ball and her brother Fred were raised by her working mother and grandparents. Her grandfather, Fred C. Hunt, was an eccentric socialist who enjoyed the theater. He frequently took the family to vaudeville shows and encouraged young Lucy to take part in both her own and school plays.
In 1925 after a romance with a local bad boy (Johnny DeVito), Ball decided to enroll in the John Murray Anderson School for the Dramatic Arts with her mother's approval. There, the shy girl was outshone by another pupil, Bette Davis.
Ball went home a few weeks later when drama coaches told her that she "had no future at all as a performer". Two years later, she witnessed the accidental shooting of her brother's friend, Warner Erikson, who found himself in the path of a .22 caliber rifle shot, severing his spinal cord. Her strange grandfather was sued and prosecuted, and lost the family home.
In 1933, she was hired as the Chesterfield cigarette girl and was featured in all the company's advertisements. Attracting attention with her Chesterfield ads, she finally began playing bit parts in Hollywood movies in 1933.
By the late 1930s, the starlet had graduated to comic supporting roles. In 1940, she met Cuban bandleader Desi Arnaz while shooting Too Many Girls. The couple married the following year.
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/8430/lovelucy5vk.jpg
Ball continued to land movie roles that didn't fully showcase her talents. Frustrated, she turned to radio and starred as a ditzy wife in My Favorite Husband from 1948 to 1951.
CBS decided to launch the popular series on the relatively new medium of TV. Lucy insisted Desi be cast as her husband in the TV version, though the network executives said no one would believe the couple were married.
Desi and Lucy performed before live audiences and filmed a pilot. Audiences howled with approval thus convincing network executives that audiences responded well to their act, and CBS cast Desi for the show.
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/3950/lucy3sv.gif
I Love Lucy became one of the most popular TV situation comedies in history, ranking in the top three shows for six years and turning the couple's production company, Desilu, into a television dynasty and multimillion-dollar business.
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/5577/sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssgrapesre8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Lucy and Desi during their salad days
Ball became president of the company in 1960, after she and Desi divorced. She also starred in several other "Lucy" shows, including The Lucy Show, which debuted in 1962 and ran for six seasons, and Here's Lucy, in which she starred with her two children until the show was cancelled in 1974.
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/2268/ssssssssssssssssssssssssdesiluob0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Cast of "Here's Lucy" in 1968. Gale Gordon played Lucy's boss.
A later show, Life with Lucy, featuring Lucy as a grandmother, was cancelled after only eight episodes. Ball worked little in the last years of her life. She died of congestive heart failure following open-heart surgery in 1989.
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/8026/sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssslucilleballam3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
By 1989, Lucy was very sick, but she arose from her sickbed for this last public appearance at a "red carpet" event before we lost her. It's said of Lucy she always gave a ton to her fans.
It's probably safe to say, no American woman has been more universally loved and admired at home and around the world than this ditzy auburn-haired gal from Jamestown NY.
Originally buried in Hollywood, Lucy's kids moved her remains to her hometown of Jamestown NY where she now rests.
RIP. America loved Lucy.
http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/218/sssssssssssssssssssssssslucilleball9nk3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Fifty-five years ago on this day, TV's first long-running sitcom hit, I Love Lucy, debuts. The show starred comedian Lucille Balland her real-life husband (and America's favorite Cubano,) Desi Arnaz.
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/7449/lucy013ea.jpg
Ball was born in 1911 near Jamestown, New York, to a telephone lineman and a concert pianist. Her father's job required frequent transfers, and within three years after her birth, Lucille had moved many times, from Jamestown to Anaconda, Montana, and then to Wyandotte, Michigan. While her mom was pregnant with her second child, Frederick, her dad Henry Ball contracted typhoid fever and died in February 1915.
After her father died, Ball and her brother Fred were raised by her working mother and grandparents. Her grandfather, Fred C. Hunt, was an eccentric socialist who enjoyed the theater. He frequently took the family to vaudeville shows and encouraged young Lucy to take part in both her own and school plays.
In 1925 after a romance with a local bad boy (Johnny DeVito), Ball decided to enroll in the John Murray Anderson School for the Dramatic Arts with her mother's approval. There, the shy girl was outshone by another pupil, Bette Davis.
Ball went home a few weeks later when drama coaches told her that she "had no future at all as a performer". Two years later, she witnessed the accidental shooting of her brother's friend, Warner Erikson, who found himself in the path of a .22 caliber rifle shot, severing his spinal cord. Her strange grandfather was sued and prosecuted, and lost the family home.
In 1933, she was hired as the Chesterfield cigarette girl and was featured in all the company's advertisements. Attracting attention with her Chesterfield ads, she finally began playing bit parts in Hollywood movies in 1933.
By the late 1930s, the starlet had graduated to comic supporting roles. In 1940, she met Cuban bandleader Desi Arnaz while shooting Too Many Girls. The couple married the following year.
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/8430/lovelucy5vk.jpg
Ball continued to land movie roles that didn't fully showcase her talents. Frustrated, she turned to radio and starred as a ditzy wife in My Favorite Husband from 1948 to 1951.
CBS decided to launch the popular series on the relatively new medium of TV. Lucy insisted Desi be cast as her husband in the TV version, though the network executives said no one would believe the couple were married.
Desi and Lucy performed before live audiences and filmed a pilot. Audiences howled with approval thus convincing network executives that audiences responded well to their act, and CBS cast Desi for the show.
http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/3950/lucy3sv.gif
I Love Lucy became one of the most popular TV situation comedies in history, ranking in the top three shows for six years and turning the couple's production company, Desilu, into a television dynasty and multimillion-dollar business.
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/5577/sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssgrapesre8.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Lucy and Desi during their salad days
Ball became president of the company in 1960, after she and Desi divorced. She also starred in several other "Lucy" shows, including The Lucy Show, which debuted in 1962 and ran for six seasons, and Here's Lucy, in which she starred with her two children until the show was cancelled in 1974.
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/2268/ssssssssssssssssssssssssdesiluob0.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
Cast of "Here's Lucy" in 1968. Gale Gordon played Lucy's boss.
A later show, Life with Lucy, featuring Lucy as a grandmother, was cancelled after only eight episodes. Ball worked little in the last years of her life. She died of congestive heart failure following open-heart surgery in 1989.
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/8026/sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssslucilleballam3.jpg (http://imageshack.us)
By 1989, Lucy was very sick, but she arose from her sickbed for this last public appearance at a "red carpet" event before we lost her. It's said of Lucy she always gave a ton to her fans.
It's probably safe to say, no American woman has been more universally loved and admired at home and around the world than this ditzy auburn-haired gal from Jamestown NY.
Originally buried in Hollywood, Lucy's kids moved her remains to her hometown of Jamestown NY where she now rests.
RIP. America loved Lucy.