Fred and Ethel

Who?

They are retired performers. Ethel is supposed to be younger than Fred but still closer in age to him than Lucy.

Retired vaudevillians who saved their money for years and were finally able to retire and buy a small apartment building in New York at the bottom of the East River. Location is everything!

I think they moved on the east side. Not downtown

Nobody said they were downtown. The East Side doesn't necessarily mean The Lower East Side. They were midtown in the East 50s. The 600 block. Which if it existed would be in The East River.

This is my guess. Fred and Barney Kurtz came to Albuquerque with their vaudeville show. Ethel, a young girl of around 16/17 or so, wanted out of her small town to be a star. Ethel was in the drama club and the glee club and everyone told her that she should be in pictures. She saw her chance when Fred & Barney blew into town.

I'm thinking Ethel probably trapped Fred in some way. I'm thinking she got Fred to fuck her, she told her dad, and dad made Fred marry her. This of course created the original animosity and tensions in there marriage. These tensions only increased as Vaudeville started dying and Ethel realized that she was not going to be in pictures and that she was stuck with an old man who wasn't even in the business anymore.

They eventually bought the building, Ethel probably had a couple of miscarriages and probably a couple of affairs with random tenants and then just settled into a life of boredom with Fred. Then Lucy and Ricky moved in and things perked up again.

I love Ethel Mae Potter’s signature song. A huge hit in nursing homes, bingo parlors and church socials.

It's obvious Fred is a homosexualist. Ethel married him to be his beard and she could concentrate on her show biz career instead of providing wifely duties. She looked the other way when he was making passes at vaudeville chorus boys. They moved to NYC to become famous, but unfortunately vaudeville was dying and Fred's reputation had preceded him. So in a low end Greenwich Village gay bar, they met an old lady piano/singer named Mrs. Trumbull who took pity on them. She was trying to unload a dilapidated apartment building that her husband saddled her with, so she sold it to the Mertzes real cheap. A few years later, a young mixed marriage couple named the Ricardos answered their ad in the Village Voice for a small apartment. Nobody would rent to them because the Hispanics had already caused enough trouble in NYC and everyone knew a marriage between a Cuban bandleader and a dizzy redhead would only end in tears and recriminations. But as Ricky's star ascended, the Mertzes knew they could hitch their wagon to him and make their 1920s vaudeville act a retro sensation.

[quote]I have way too much time on my hands for a Friday night

I've had sufficient.

Astute observations, r6.

Ryan Murphy is filming the Mertz backstory, which reveals that young Ethel (Sarah Paulson) was a frustrated lesbian hat-check girl and young Fred (Darren Criss) was an effervescent gay chorus boy when they met and arranged their long-standing but unhappy lavender marriage.

I would watch the fuck out of the Fred and Ethel Mertz Backstory show. Even if Ryan Murphy did it.

Well, Fred Flintstone was a cartoon caveman and Ethel Merman was a loud, brassy Broadway actress.

Gimme two more OP.

[quote]Nobody said they were downtown. The East Side doesn't necessarily mean The Lower East Side. They were midtown in the East 50s. The 600 block. Which if it existed would be in The East River.

It was East 68th St.

[quote]It was East 68th St.

Fun fact: Lucille Ball lived for awhile at Imperial House on East 69th Street.

Bea Benederet and Gale Gordon (Lucy and Desi’s first choices) were the same age.

William Frawley was 20 years older than they intended Fred to be but having Lucy’s sidekick be that much older would not have worked.

Benederet might have been good. Ethel changed a great deal from the earlier episodes and that's due to Vance's personality. Gordon would have been dreadful. He has such an superior, condescending air that was perfect for Mr. Mooney but all wrong for Fred Mertz. None of the warmth or charm of Frawley. Ironically, second choice James Gleason might have been interesting.

Mary Wickes was also considered for Ethel and that's another example of God awful casting.

So, if R8 is correct, and Fred was into the homosex where the man goes up into the man, does that mean he and Ricky were doing it? Is that why it let a mixed-race couple into the building? He had a latin fetish? I have visions of Desi in Frawley's lap yelling, "Ay! Papi!"

[quote]It was East 68th St.

I stand corrected about the East 50s. But the 600 block would still be in the river.

Wasn't it Caesar Romero who finally got Desi's cock because Romero had been pestering Desi about it so much Desi finally pulled it out and offered it to him to get him off his back about it?

Frawley lived with his mother until she died and was always thought to be highly closeted, the stress of which contributed to his alcoholism.

Vance's husbands were gay and closeted.

What a fun group! Comedy for the ages!

Where exactly was Desi's club? I think they refer to it as "downtown." Was it in Greenwich Village? And how did he acquire the club? I think in early episodes, someone else owns it.

Just watched a first season episode this morning. Gale Gordon was Mr. Littlefield, who owned the club and was considering making Desi the club's manager as well as its star. It was Gordon's first appearance on the show and involved putting the girls and Littlefield's wife on timed schedules for their household chores.... The girls aren't having it... Complicated plot and kind of lame but of course that cast pulled it off.

I read that Cesear Romero gave Desi Arnaz a blow job- IN REAL LIFE. He also gave a blowjob to the actor who tried to have sex with Lucy and Ethel is his hotel room.

Vivian Vance was genius casting. Nobody could have done Ethel better. She knew how to hold her own against Lucille Ball, to be funny in her own right yet not overpower Lucy.

Ethel Mae Potter, we never forgot her.

The Ricardos' address was 623 E. 68th Street. However, E. 68th Street in Manhattan only goes up to 600 - which means that the Ricardos' building was in the middle of the East River.

Does anyone know if the Ricardo's apartment was in the middle of the river? I've been wondering for awhile.

No, not the middle of the river. Much closer to the Manhattan side than to the Brooklyn side.

Technically, their apartment was on Roosevelt Island.

No, Roosevelt Island doesn't follow the Manhattan Street numbering system. They are in the river.

[quote]No, Roosevelt Island doesn't follow the Manhattan Street numbering system. They are in the river.

They all lied because they were ashamed of living on Roosevelt Island. Poor Ricky always had to take the air tram at 3:00 am when he was coming home from the club.

r22

I would have as well

Mmmhmm

Did anyone else think that Ricky had the strangest work schedule?

There was more going on in that apartment building than you know!

Fred & Ethel were the Boris & Natasha of Murray Hill. They were plotting to overthrow the government. Think about it. What better way to introduce Communism into the United States than through an innocent elderly couple who everyone thought was past their prime.

Cuban Communist Ricky Ricardo was brought in to assist. Everytime he mentions going to "The Club" he wasn't talking about a place where he entertained. It was the Communist Workers Party Club. He got Lucy pregnant just so he would have an anchor baby to stay in the US.

[quote]Did anyone else think that Ricky had the strangest work schedule?

I used to until I started working it myself. I worked for awhile as a stage manager in a regional theater. When a play was in rehearsal, the actors usually began at 11:00 am. That meant that stage management had to be in by 10-10:30 to make sure everything was set up. The actors would rehearse until 7:00 pm. When a show was in production, we had the day off but had to be into the theater around 6:30 pm so that things could be ready for an 8:00 pm curtain. And often we didn't leave the theater until 11:30 pm (God, those old 3 act plays are long).

So I can now understand Ricky's weird work schedule.

Thanks for that R35.

I was watching the epi where Lucy thinks that Desi is some American history genius because he answers all the questions right on a radio quiz program. (He was at the station when they recorded the show earlier that day.)

The thing is when they are listening to the radio after fucking up the TV, Ethel is in charge of passing around the popcorn in a basket with a long handle. Ethel passes it to Lucy who is sitting next to Fred and Vivian accidently(?) raises the popcorn basket up a little too high and almost hits Frawley in the face. If looks could kill, Viv would have been dead right then and there. Maybe one of the few times you can actually see the animosity that existed between them. I never even noticed it before.

[quote] Nobody said they were downtown. Actually R3 said they bought an apartment building “at the bottom of the East River” implying downtown or LES.

And Murray Hill (the Natasha and Boris comment) is the east 30s not the east 60s.

Better Roosevelt Island than Riker’s Island! That’s where Lucy should have landed! I can’t believe the strain she placed on the Mertz’s marriage with her shenanigans, get rich quick schemes, breaking into show business larks and career gal fantasies! Fred and Ethel were stoic in the face of such chaos!

[quote]Fred & Ethel were the Boris & Natasha of Murray Hill. They were plotting to overthrow the government. Think about it. What better way to introduce Communism into the United States than through an innocent elderly couple who everyone thought was past their prime.

Umm ... you don't remember that Dr. Bellows was a Russian spy? (Allegedly.)

At the bottom of the East River doesn't mean at the mouth of the East River, where it flows into the bay, just past the Lower East Side. It means at the bottom, down, on the river floor.

I never liked that show. Every episode, it was the same thing, 'Ricky, why can't I be in the show?' 'Ricky, why can't I be in the show?' Why couldn't she be in the show? Her performances at home were a right, his acts at the club stank. What's so entertaining about a Cuban beating a drum?

^^ "right" should be "riot"

Ricky Ricardo. . . a man who couldn’t recognize his own wife in a fake mustache.

If they lived on E 68th Street why would Lucy and Ethel spend so much time at Macy's and Gimbels? Bloomingdale's was much closer, and in the 1950s it was a very middle of the road department store. It didn't get chic until the '60s.

And just where was Phipp's anyway?

[quote]This of course created the original animosity and tensions in there marriage.

Oh, dear!

Gee, thanks, r25.

What a quaint little tidbit of information you came along with. We hadn’t heard that on any prior posts. Nuh Uh, not one.

I was waiting for you R46. 🤣😂😁

I luv ya, r48!

It’s all in good fun.

Fred Mertz did NOT have a wife before Ethel.

Your "vibe" is mistaken

R50 has stated her boundaries.

In the 1950s the only way a major TV character would have a second wife would be due to the death of the first wife. And even that is not something that would be written into the story or backstory of a television comedy for no reason; for example, it might be used to explain a stepmother.

Even the original concept for Mary Richards being a divorcée was changed to a broken engagement due to CBS exec's fears that it would alienate viewers.

"Oh God, Albert, they're at it again! That poor dear taking that pounding for hours. If I don't get my sleep you'll have to fix your own lunch tomorrow!"

What was it with toasters and this bunch? Lucy's toaster pitched the toast up in the air. And in the hostess pants episode, Ethel complains she didn't get a toaster for her birthday. Were toasters a luxury item in the early 1950s?