Lucille Ball As Mame

500 threads about this same topic

Lucille Ball is MAIM.

R1 Oh well. There’s dozens of threads on one topic all over this joint. 🤷🏼‍♂️

My what an unusual and rare topic. Thanks OP! PS If you try searching and find nothing, Google the topic and Datalounge and you might be surprised.

This topic is really bedrock Data Lounge material.

The major problem is not Lucille Ball. She didn't write it.

The first major problem is Jerry Herman's decision to make it a musical. The play and the movie were still fairly recent, so there was no pressing need to bring the property back. It was still around. The whole project was unnecessary.

The second major problem is that when Warner went all in on a big movie version, the moment, if there ever was one for this musical, had passed. The social and cultural landscape had changed entirely between 1966 and 1974. What had been unnecessary had become something much worse, in terms of box office. It was irrelevant. It was out-dated. It was OLD. On the day the movie started shooting, it was already fatally OLD.

The third major problem is that Warner wanted an important screenwriter to go with its important production. Paul Zindel was enjoying some success at that exact moment and got the job. He had no experience with comedies or musicals, but the got the job. And the script he wrote is garbage. If Lucille Ball had gotten Angela Lansbury's libretto or Rosalind Russell's script, she would have had a chance. But she didn't. She got Paul Zindel. And that dialogue lies dead in the water. NO ONE could have been successful with it. Lucy was an experienced producer. She should have spotted that problem and taken steps to make sure it was fixed. Perhaps she was focused on the singing and dancing. But she failed to protect herself and she's still taking a drubbing for it.

That's it. That's all you need to know about this, OP.

R1 R4

That may well be, but by all means please keep commenting and being assholes. It’ll just keep it bumping back to the front again 😋🤣

"Did we need another thread?"

"I never could sing but I tried to in Mame"

We need a little Christmas

like we need a ruptured fistula.

R5 the real problem is that Gary didn't talk her out of it!

[quote] Perhaps she was focused on the singing and dancing. But she failed to protect herself and she's still taking a drubbing for it.

Is “focused” really the right word?

She was not an experienced producer. She'd only done her own show which endlessly recycled the same stuff over and over again with people she'd known for decades. She hired Herbert Solow to develop other shows at Desilu because she had neither the time nor the expertise to do it. She was a figurehead studio chief at best.

r5 has put an end to all discussions on the subject, which I have seen discussed here close to never. r12 Just stop it, she was the producer of the greatest sitcom of all time, with her husband, during the Golden Age of Television, and they invented several things during that and other times. They went on to produce the most iconic show of all time, Star Trek, and they produced other shows that hold up well , e.g. The Untouchables, Mission: Impossible et al.

Many iconic shows were filmed there as well, without being directly produced by Desilu, e.g. The Bing Crosby Show, The Jack Benny Program, The Andy Griffith Show, My Three Sons, I Spy, Hogan's Heroes, Family Affair, The Real McCoys et al. I'd say Desi was the greatest TV producer of all time, and Aaron Spelling the best and most successful. Aaron Spelling had one of his few roles as an actor in I Love Lucy in one of its best episodes, and they owned a hotel together; I think they lived close by for some time, and were main parts of the TV Rat Pack, in those times. Of course Lucille will get less recognition for her work as producer, actor et. al. than Desi because she is a woman. Don't know about Mame, but of course it was a running joke in I Love Lucy that she can't sing.

We really don't discuss this enough.

R14: Hope you're being ironic. Desi was the producer in the family and Desilu's popularity as a rental lot started with him. Basically, it continued because of the productivity of Danny Thomas, Sheldon Leonard, Don Fedderson and other tenants, who began renting space in the Desi era. Lucy never functioned as a real executive----she spent her time bullying guest stars. Desilu stopped producing pilots after Desi left until Solow was hired. I suspect Solow went with hour long dramas because he knew Lucy was clueless about them---she had no understanding of Star Trek.

In 20-30 years would DL Fave Catherine Zeta-Jones work? Now that Jerry is dead, they can write a new book and fix the racist elements (providing he laid down in his will that changes can be made to his shows). Any chance?

I'd give Gene Saks a slice of the culpability pie too, R5.

Lucy looked 30 years too old for the part, was a baritone, and couldn't carry a tune in a bucket.

Otherwise, it was all good.

I enjoy Mame except the Lucy songs.

When she's not trying to sing, she is funny in the lead role.

I hate to say it but I would watch CZJ as Mame. Madonna too. Would Madge be willing to play Vera?

Madonna wouldn't be worthy of licking Vera's telescope as she looked at the moon.

Puke.

I disagree that she's awful. I think she's charming. The direction is bad and the singing is bad. Had those two things been better it would have been a terrific movie.

Why did they wipe a glazed donut on the camera lens? It’s like watching a movie with Cataracts.

Audrey Christie, who plays Mrs. Upson, played Vera in the final company on Broadway. Nice she got to sing on Broadway, but in her three movie musicals based on Broadway shows ("Carousel", "Molly Brown", "Mame"), she did not. I believe she played Bea's mother on "Maude", while Eve Arden, one of the touring "Auntie Mame's", played Bea's aunt.

I hated Mame and Lucy in it when the movie came out, but I saw it again recently and it's tolerable.

I saw it as a pre-teen, loved it, saw it as an adult, noticed its flaws, but it hasn't aged well. At least Warner Brothers got rid of the stairwell utilized in dozens of films for this version although much of Lucy's Beakman Place apartment looks like a museum.

[quote]And the script he wrote is garbage. If Lucille Ball had gotten Angela Lansbury's libretto or Rosalind Russell's script, she would have had a chance.

No she wouldn’t. Lucy was completely miscast from the start. She was wrong for it in every possible way.

Have you heard the original cast album for Wildcat OP?

The fact that Lucy couldn’t sing overshadows every other problem with this film. Blame the producer, director, or screenwriter all you want, but her awful attempt to carry a tune is the most memorable thing about the movie. Plus, she was too old.

[quote]If Lucille Ball had gotten Angela Lansbury's libretto

A libretto is the script for an opera. The script for a theatrical musical is called the "book."