I Love Lucy faves

Mary Jane Croft was brilliant at being a snob.

I must be the only gay who was not a fan...

Oh, goody. I look forward to the fresh insights into this episode that perhaps were not covered in the 987,456,293,109,273,451 thread on this exact same topic!

Beating a dead dog deader.

That clip is priceless comedy gold

Betty Ramsay is definitely very DL like

This is a very funny scene, made better by the actresses' excellent comic chops.

I love Lucy's startled "WHAT!?" when Betty finally decides to include her in their conversation even if it is only to ask for more coffee.

r1=Cynthia Harcourt

I’m just like Betty Ramsay

It’s a moo moo.

Gravich!

I love it when Ethel Mae Potter returns to her hometown of Albuquerque and does a show. She sings my all-time favorite song “Shortnin’ Bread”.

ETHEL MAE POTTER… WE NEVER FORGOT HER!

I think it's from the "Breaking the Lease" episode-

"Honestly, Ethel's given more performances of that speech than South Pacific."

Hilarious.

Aunt Martha’s Old Fashioned Salad Dressing

Do you Ouija?

‘I think it’s time for a change of pace, don’t you?’

“I got out of bed yesterday feeling real blah. Felt like a real slob.”

Aunt Sally’s Pecan Pralines. 500 yards…

Aunt Sally’s Pecan Pralines. 400 yards…

Aunt Sally’s Pecan Pralines. 300 yards…

Aunt Sally’s Pecan Pralines. 200 yards…

Aunt Sally”s Pecan Pralines. Just around the bend!

You have just past Aunt Sally’s Pecan Pralines!

I sing Shortnin’ Bread by Ethel daily.

Because of Pluto TV, we can see I Love Lucy 24 hours a day. The episodes are uncut and the picture quality is the best I've seen of the show.

Too many to list! The whole trip and stay in California for starters. The only episodes I didn’t really care for were the ones with too much of Ricky singing. Desi was talented but just not my thing.

The Scottish musical fantasy and the ones with Cousin Ernie are my least faves but Teensy and Weensy were good.

Stomping the grapes.

Oh, and the assembly line of chocolates.

HOSTESS PANTS!

Look what happened to YOUR washing machine.

"The TIME has COME!"

My younger sister and I say this line all the time and crack up.

Ethel opening the Ricardos' door and bellowing for Fred just as he's walking in.

"I'm not a Maharinsess, I'm a henna rinsess!"

Yes, let's let her get a load of us!"

"Stop cackling, Marion! I've been waiting 10 years for you to lay that egg!"

R29 FRED!

I loved MJ Croft. Surprisingly, check out sometime the episode “Lucy Is NG As An GN” from her last “Here’s Lucy” series’s Season 6. Ironically that last season, between no longer being to hop around as much as she used to pre-broken leg a few years earlier, and being preoccupied with working on “Mame!”, the last season featured her actually being funnier as just more like real-life saltier “Lucille Ball,” and this ensemble episode from her once-again (part-time now) original writers is pretty funny, including MJ’s turn with 2 broken hands.

For some reason I've always liked the scenes in the Ricardos' kitchen. I love the pattern on their dishes.

'Lucy writes a novel'

She is so brilliant in the last scene.

"It's going to head up the chapter entitled 'don't let this happen to you!"

HahahaHAHA WAAAAAAAH

“When Miss Bankhead is bored, Miss Bankhead will let you know”.

Speaking of I Love Lucy... it's 1952 when Lucy is supposed to be pregnant with her first baby on the show ... she was 41 then. Really? In real life, it was her second child, and third or 4th pregnancy - seemed very unrealistic.

r4 beat me to the punch.

r25 her character was in her early 30s.

The dress shop. The naming alone killed me with how Lucy's ego resulted in "something that rolls off your tongue" like. . .not Ethel-Lu's but. . .Lucy-Eth's.

Flying back to NY from Europe with the cheese disguised as a baby was a favorite with MJ Croft.

Revisiting favorite DL threads is fun and OK by me especially at this scary time. Down the road many of our freedoms like social media may be ended by the fascist juggernaut sweeping the U.S.

Pretty sure this was actually from the weekly show’s final and 6th season, during 1956-57. I loved the “country” episodes. ❤️

Ethel made every episode better.

Lucy with the cheese "baby" on the plane flight from Italy is one of my all-time faves and Mary Jane Croft was fabulous in that one too, albeit not as a character named Betty Ramsay.

I also always get a kick out of Lucy and Fred and the seasick pills on the Staten Island Ferry as a test run for the ocean voyage to Europe. And up we go....and down we go.....!

And, of course, Aunt Martha's Old-Fashioned Salad Dressing.

R11, I’m laughing my ass off.

Every time this show is on TV it's a rerun. When are they going to make something new?

Mary Jane Croft was very bitchy as Daisy Enright, Connie's nemesis in Our Miss Brooks. She also had a son who was killed in the Viet Nam War.

Mary Jane brought some much-needed relatability to many truly awful episodes of The Lucy Show.

Hahahaohhh, Mr. Loper, ohhhh!

That's a fun scene and it's pretty tight and all 3 performances are spot on.

To which scene do you refer, r50?

The cheese wrapped as a baby is probably my favorite scene, every line is hysterical.

This thumbnail popped up after the last YouTube video I watched, and it made me laugh. Not sure what the context is; it's kind of funnier not to know.

The cheese episode is imo the funniest of them all. The way Lucy shoves the cheese into Ethel's face...and then Lucy confessing, with a wink in her eye and a nudge, "It was a piece of cheese"...as cliche as it is she really was a comedic genius.

r51, well, the scene from OP!

His name's Cheddar...I mean Chester!

R54 The cheese episode was brilliant.

I love how the writers were not above making Lucy annoying, as in the Hollywood star's homes bus episode, when she has a dispute with another passenger--excuse me, this seat is taken. Sure is, honey. Then she points out to the other passengers (who couldn't care less) that her husband is filming Don Juan at the moment. They probably think she's crazy--why would a movie star's wife be on a tour bus of Hollywood homes?

When they dresses like space aliens “meep zorp”

I really hated the fake high voice Mary Jane Croft put on, on The Lucy Show. I was seeing this in prime time. I was a kid. I missed Ethel. MJC was a good actress, but I never thought she was too good a comic foil for Lucy. She was better as the snobby Betty Ramsay.

Lucy flirting with the mannequin to make Ricky jealous and the mannquin coming apart apart at the waist while she's dancing with it. Even Seinfeld ripped that jone off 40 years later.

I like most of the Hollywood episodes--except for the sudden shift to ill-advised drama with Lucy being jealous thinking Ricky is cheating, and her deciding not to stay in Hollywood even though she's offered a screen test (AS IF!). I wish they'd stayed in Hollywood. Ricky could have played at a nightclub in LA.

It's actually quite curious that they didn't stay in LA as the guest star possibilities were obviously endless, not to mention all the crazy new plotlines in Hollywood..

Speaking of which, those 2 episodes with John Wayne and his Grauman footprints were a masterpiece! My god, the writing!!

The Pleasant Pesant.

Oddly I was going to agree I generally like the Hollywood episodes *except* for the John Wayne/Chinese Theater ones

The John Wayne episodes opened the next season, I think. I liked them. The numerous footprint/cement boxes and Ricky's reaction when he sees another one messed up--he freaks out. It's hilarious.

I think these were written by the new team of Schiller and Weiskopf.

[quote]I love how the writers were not above making Lucy annoying

Lucy was annoying in many episodes, and the ones where she's extremely annoying are my least favorite. Such as when Lucy thinks she and Ricky aren't legally married and puts him through an ordeal to propose and remarry her. Or when she thinks Ricky loves the coming baby more than he loves her, so Ricky has to prove his love.

I also don't like The Inferiority Complex episode because Lucy's complex is so out of character from what we've come to know of Lucy. When has she ever been lousy at telling jokes or anecdotes? When has she ever been bad at bridge?

R68 I wasn't referring to her being annoying in those ways. I mean when they had her be socially inept. Being petty or boorish to random people in public. At times. It wasn't that often.

I love the Hollywood episodes, despite Lucy's antics being downright criminal: stealing John Wayne's footprints; trespassing on Richard Widmark's property; stalking Cornel Wilde, impersonating Ricky's talent agent, etc. And she could've blown Ricky's screen test by being an uncooperative scene partner. The Hollywood community gossiped about Lucy, but her antics could've gotten Ricky banished from the business.

And then they just went back to New York and after a few episodes it was like none of it ever happened.

Ricky had no further acting career in movies or TV, and the shelved movie was never released.

R71, the Don Juan movie was shelved but at the top of the Graumann's Chinese episode, Lucy, Ethel and Fred throw Ricky an end-of-movie wrap party. And when they get back to New York, their friends and neighbors suddenly treat him like a big movie star.

Then in Europe, Charles Boyer, Vittorio Felipe, Angela Randall, and even the Queen knew who Ricky was. And in Florida, we learn he made a picture with Claude Akins. Ricky definitely got more acting gigs.

R72 Since he never went back to Hollywood, where did he get these other acting gigs?

Ever since we said "I do", there have been so many things that we don't...

R72, just because we never see him go back to Hollywood doesn't mean it didn't happen. Maybe he was another Jose Iturbi, turning up in MGM musicals here and there for single musical numbers, which he could've shot in NY soundstages.

R75 And maybe Lucy got a job at a bank when she and Ricky moved to Connecticut, with a screaming, fat, bald boss with a moustache. We didn't see it but anything's possible!

Disagree with those saying they should have stayed in L.A...how many times can you do the same story: Lucy does something crazy to meet a celebrity...it was already getting old by the end (though my fave of the Hollywood episodes was William Holden...he really was dreamy then and unlike most others it seemed less like a fake-ish acting guest appearance and more like he fit in the show like any other regular cast member..plus his chemistry with Lucy was great) . I love Lucy was always NYC to me...though oddly enough I didnt hate the Connecticut season...at least the 1st one where it was still called "I love Lucy" by the time it was called " The Lucy and Desi hour" you could see the strain on their relationship and how tired everyone was.

R74 I always though they were sort of implying that to be about sex. Or maybe not, but its a good line for those that say getting married puts a damper on one's sex life.

Harpo Marx, Van Johnson, Rock Hudson & Hedda Hopper, Don fucking Loper! How can you not say they weren't all great episodes (as well as the Bill Holden and 2 John Waynes)??

For me, the worst episodes were all the ones with Little Ricky and the issues he created.

Hans Conreid: There are two words you must never say: one of them is swell and the other is lousy.

Lucy (or was it Fred?): Ok, well.....what are the two words?

[quote] Disagree with those saying they should have stayed in L.A...how many times can you do the same story: Lucy does something crazy to meet a celebrity...it was already getting old by the end

Obviously they wouldn't be doing that in every show. But apparently the New York location was played out after they came back from LA, since they went to Europe. Then they ended up moving to Connecticut. I never really cared for the Connecticut shows as much. You can do a lot more in Hollywood than in small-town Connecticut.

A favorite episode will always be the one in Florida with Elsa Lanchester as suspected ax murderess Evelyn Holmby. Actually, it was the only good episode in Florida.

Lanchester and Tallulah Bankhead are the only female guest stars I can think of who gave Lucy & Desi a run for their money. Then again, there weren't many female guest stars, even in the Lucy/Desi Comedy Hour.

I thought Florida was another instance of "let's go somewhere since we've used up all our New York ideas." The Elsa Lanchester episode was a good one.

[quote]Then again, there weren't many female guest stars, even in the Lucy/Desi Comedy Hour.

Edie Adams, Ann Sothern, Betty Grable, Marjorie Lord, Ida Lupino, June Haver ... and of course, Cesar Romero.

Background on the comedy hours:

The first five were shown as specials during the 1957–58 television season. The remaining eight were originally shown as part of Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse.

Its original network title was The Ford Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Show for the first season, and Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse Presents The Lucille Ball–Desi Arnaz Show for the following seasons.

The successor to the classic comedy, I Love Lucy, the programs featured the same cast members: Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, William Frawley, and Little Ricky (billed as Richard Keith in his post-Lucy–Desi acting assignments). The production schedule avoided the grind of a regular weekly series.

Desilu produced the show, which was mostly filmed at their Los Angeles studios with occasional on-location shoots at Lake Arrowhead, Las Vegas, and Sun Valley, Idaho. CBS reran these thirteen specials under the "Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour" title as prime-time summer replacements, from 1962 to 1965, with a final run in 1967.

1966–67 was the first TV season in which all first-run prime time network shows were in color. These "Lucy–Desi" repeats were the only black and white series aired that year, after which it, and I Love Lucy, went into syndication.

I don't remember these shows being on TV in prime time, and I'm old enough to remember. I do remember I Love Lucy was re-run by CBS on weekday mornings in the early to mid-'60s.

I remember watching the hour long shows on Sunday evenings in the summer in the early 1960s.

For besties Lucy & Ethel and Ricky & Fred turned on each other real quick. Whether fighting over a broken TV set, a washing machine, missing chickens, matching gowns, or breaking the lease, the Ricardos and Mertzes got pretty nasty with each other but also made up just as quickly.

My favorite though was when Lucy and Ethel spatted over hostess pants and got pretty catty: "I merely intimated that she was a little hippy, but on second glance she does have the biggest potamus I've ever seen!"

The grape-stomping episode always makes me laugh.

I always wonder why they had no female celebrities pop in with cameos during the Hollywood episodes (I don't count Hedda Hopper). They rolled out J. Wayne, Holden, Widmark, Hudson, Wilde, etc. but not one even mid-level female during those eps. Of course, some smarty-pants will come in here and say it's because Lucy was afraid that Desi would end up banging her.

Why would them being in HW make a difference because they had plenty of female starlets in the Florida eps, they had Barbara Eden in the Connecticut eps and all of the dancers in the NYC era. Desi had all kinds of opportunities, but in HW it was crickets. Weird.

Were there really that many episodes that took place in NYC that couldn't just as easily have been set in LA or Connecticut? The NYC apartment set was iconic, of course, but how many episodes specifically were about living in NYC? Of course, living in an apartment in a brownstone may have been key....

[quote] I do remember I Love Lucy was re-run by CBS on weekday mornings in the early to mid-'60s.

This is what I remember. Later came repeats of Beverly Hillbillies and My Three Sons. Never saw the Connecticut episodes until a later run in the mid 70s. At one time in the 1970s one could watch three different versions of Lucy a day in repeats.

Speaking of that brownstone, loved the episode where Lucy thinks the Mertz's new renters are foreign spies.

Four times a day counting Here's Lucy in first run. Never saw that in repeats.

The expression Lucy makes the first time she tastes Vitameatavegemin still cracks me up

NYC episodes may have gotten old but the L.A ones would have too (they kind of did for me).

As someone somewhat younger (late Gen X/Xennial) my love for ILL started in the mornings before school when TBS would run reruns.

That was in the very early 90s

The chocolates on the conveyor belt.

R90 If you're talking about starlets, not stars, there was the Hollywood episode where Ricky was doing promotion with 5 or 6 young, sexy starlets, and Lucy gets jealous. I think one was Joi Lansing.

They probably didn't have many female guest stars because it was more fun to see Lucy interacting with male stars she had crushes on. But I'm just guessing.

Starlets could be a good thread. I think Angel Tomkins.

[quote]Speaking of that brownstone, loved the episode where Lucy thinks the Mertz's new renters are foreign spies.

Featuring gay Hayden Rorke (Dr. Bellows)!

Hands down my favorite is the Lucy Goes To The Hospital.

Is the spy episode where she pretends to be an armchair? I vaguely remember it. Did she wear a slipcover?

R92 Seems like it was paired with re-runs of December Bride when I was a kid.

Those times of network morning/afternoon TV were like no other. The shows were almost all geared towards housewives--the ads, too. For washing machines, refrigerators, deoderant, soap...the afternoon game shows (where there seemed to be more ads for medicines, like Anacin, and Contac) and the shows like Art Linkletter.

In addition to the perfect comedic timing of all three women, it's the dynamic that is so primal.

We think we desire to introduce mutual friends and see them get along, but we really don't.. We just want two unrelated people to unite on appreciating us.

"I never want to be introduced to anybody."

[quote]I always wonder why they had no female celebrities pop in with cameos during the Hollywood episodes

They did have Eve Arden make a brief cameo at the Brown Derby. Eve's tv show, "Our Miss Brooks" filmed at Desilu, so she probably headed over to the ILL set while on break.

It would've been nice had Ava Gardner popped up in one of the Hollywood episodes just to see Fred's reaction.

1-The Tallulah Bankhead hour-long was supposed to star Bette Davis and Gary Merrill. Bette hurt her back while inspecting a potential rental house.

2-ILL betrayed one of its basic concepts, that being Lucy's never-ending quest for a career in show-business:

In an early episode, after her performance with Ricky, she's offered a show-biz job. She declines it to bring Ricky his slippers.

After her "dance" with a Ricky dummy, she's offered a movie contract. She decides she'd rather be a wife and mother.

In one of the hour-longs, Lucy gets tired of being just a housewife, gets a job working for guest star Paul Douglas on a morning show. She experiences job burnout, never sees Ricky and quits.

French episode about fake francs. Lucy attempting to eat snails and then the whole thing about translating from French to German to Spanish to English. "I am innocent!"

Also in France, instructing Charles Boyer on how to be more like himself.

R21- Uncut!

Oooh -That sounds hot 🥵

For me, other than Tallulah and Elsa L. the only other female guest star who was really given anything to do opposite Lucy was Ann Sothern, playing her own sitcom character Susie McNamara (from Private Secretary) in that great (and I believe first) hour long Lucy-Desi show about how Lucy and Ricky met in Havana. lso guest starring DL fave Cesar Romero and Rudy Vallee. They even cleverly managed to get Fred and Ethel into the scenario.

All the other ladies - Betty Grable, Edie Adams, Ida Lupino, Marjorie Lord and the awful June Haver seemed to be there as nothing much more than window dressing. Though Edie did get that pretty song to sing....

There is a very early episode of I Love Lucy from about 1951. In the episode Lucy is worried Ricky is having an affair because he sees a postcard that Ricky writes to a woman saying how wonderful it was that she came to his show. Lucy decides to have her and Ethel visit this woman’s apartment.. When the woman opens the door, Lucy can see how older and unattractive she is. Lucy does not understand why Ricky would have an affair with a woman who looked like that. When the woman opens the door, Lucy says she is conducting a survey. The woman responds – you’re not from Kinsey are you? The sex survey. That was VERY risqué for 1951 and a funny scene.

That first episode was originally 75 minutes, by the way.

My cherished morning rerun lineup consisted of ILL, My Little Margie, Private Secretary, Our Miss Brooks, and December Bride. I loved faking a cold to stay home from school to watch them all. For some reason, I Married Joan and Love That Bob! were shown in the late afternoons. And Burns & Allen would be shown on the weekend.

I'm not sure that any of them hold up as well as ILL, except perhaps Burns & Allen and Love That Bob! which were both written and produced by Paul Henning who later went on to produce The Beverly Hillbillies and Petticoat Junction.

I'm ancient but not old enough to have seen any of those shows in their original prime time schedules.

THEODORE?

Color shot of the Connecticut set. One of the writers said the set was too big, as it took forever to cross from the front door to the stairs, for example. They would have to write dialogue to cover the action.

I wonder why they simply didn't make the set a bit smaller?

R117 I don't know, but if I think (I could be wrong) they might have moved the front door closer to center stage.

"...the characters moved to Connecticut to allow the writers to expand script ideas because, as Desi once said, 'we'd used up every conceivable storyline that could be set in the tiny New York apartment.' "

Did any of the hour long episodes NOT feature a guest star?

R112, that episode was in Season 3 and aired in 1954.

Minnie was played by Kathryn Card, who would return the following season, playing Lucy's mother Mrs, McGillicuddy.

I didn't like the addition of the "guest couples" on the comedy hour episodes, who seemed to take the place of Vivian and Bill in a few of the story lines. I read Viv wasn't happy about it, but Bill didn't care as long as he was employed, and he was happy he had less to do. I haven't seen these episodes for a while, but iirc Desi didn't have as much to do, in his old, ILL persona, on these shows. He was somewhat subdued.

R114 You may have just triggered another I Married Joan thread!

Like cicadas, we get those here every so often.

Interestingly, I was recently on a Delta flight. One of the TV offerings was the entire 2nd season of I Love Lucy. While it contained classics like the chocolate factory and the Lucy-is-pregnant episodes, it also contained episodes I’d never seen before. I guess the repeats we used to watch on TV when we were young were only a selection from the series.

R122 all of this was why The Lucy and Desi hour sucked. Most shows were written around guest stars and the whole Mertz/Ricardos dynamic was way deluded. You could tell by this time things werent great bts and the chemistry between Lucy and Desi was off. Lucy seemed vaguely strained and lost her pep. Its sad really, I skip most episodes.

Lucy also wore the "elastic headband facelift" look (with a wig) in some of the episodes of the hour shows (and not in others). It seemed unnecessary. It gave her face the familiar Lucy Show look (she didn't always wear it on that show, either, if she had go get wet, or something).

*got wet

I just remember Ida Lupino (who I love) being painfully unfunny.

It always surprises me how much Lucy seemed to age between ILL and Lucy Show.

[quote[I haven't seen these episodes for a while, but iirc Desi didn't have as much to do, in his old, ILL persona, on these shows.

Desi was having health issues at the time and his doctor advised him to cut back on his work load. Switching to one hour specials and having guest stars do the heavy lifting took the pressure off Desi from playing Ricky week after week.

Having celebrity guest stars also provided Desi, as producer and owner of Desilu Productions, as well as owner of the show's negatives and syndication rights, the opportunity to charge higher fees.

^^ oops.

Listen to (or look into) "My Favorite Husband," Lucille Ball's radio series that preceded "ILL" and had the same EP and writers. MANY of the plots in "MFH" were recycled, sometimes using word-for-word identical dialogue, into "ILL" scripts.

Notable that the MFH version of the Mertzes consisted of Rudolph and Iris Atterbury, played by Gale Gordon and Bea Benaderet, who were supposedly the original choices for the Mertzes. Rudolph was George's (the husband of the title; played by Richard Denning) boss.

According to the Desi Arnaz book, the hour long shows may have cut his hours on stage (there were only a handful done every season, vs. the 30+ weekly episodes of ILL) but he was busy trying to make Desilu into a leading production house, so he was still busy.

Lucy Learns To Drive

Equal Rights

The Italian Haircut

The Star Upstairs

As an aficionado, these are my favorites of the non-crazy-famous episodes. Ethel trying to tell Ricky about the new cake she read about as Lucy falls from the balcony above. Lucy telling the story of the cars (this, just after the greatest sight gag in the series) and the ramp by Grand Central (so I turned to give him a dirty look! ….And no one was driving!), the flaming gay stylist warning Ricky and the way he flirts with Lucy in the Italian wig, and the absolutely pathological, anti-social phone call to let the boys know they were made to do the dishes.

What about the fab foursome stuck in the Alps after an avalanche with only Lucy's half-eaten Swiss cheese sandwich for sustenance? That mention of 7 Brides for 7 Brothers was one of the few times that an immediate cultural brand name found its way into the dialogue, IIRC.

Bruce Ramsey seemed like a cookie-sniffer.

Madelyn Pugh

The episodes on the road getting to California were great too, especially Ethel visits her hometown and the one were Ethel and Lucille had to hitch a ride with the woman they ended up suspecting of being a serial killer.

When Ethel defends Lucy on some point, and keeps telling the story over and over. Finally Lucy gets fed up and says "that story's had more performances than South Pacific!"

Ethel, offended, leaves the bridge party. She says "And I'm taking my chairs, my cards..." and she snatches a sandwich from a lady about to take a bite "...and MY sandwiches."

That to me is the funniest moment of I Love Lucy.

Hold it. I love ILL and I love Ida Luoino. When was Ida Lupino on ILL?

R140 On the Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour, with husband Howard Duff.

Howard Duff was insanely hot!

Lucy telling the other ladies the absolute truth at the bridge game never gets old or any less funny.

Rep 112:

Think the woman who answers the door is Kathryn Card. who later played Lucy's mother.

The Hollywood episodes and the Europe episodes are fantastic

R124 here.

In the second season, in one of the first few episodes, Lucy and Desi actually slept in one king size bed.

Where did they change it?

I always noticed they had two beds pushed together (but maybe not in the second season).

I loved all of Mary Jane Croft's appearances. Snooty Cynthia Harcourt, nosy Evelyn Bigsby, snobby Betty Ramsey.

Loved Ethel's complete about-face when she learned she and Betty were from the same hometown: "I should've known you were from Albuquerque, you're so warm and friendly."

Did Lucy and Mary Jane Croft have a prior history together pre-ILL? It seems several of the actresses who appeared on the series over the years were earlier colleagues.

R143 yes. That episode is a sublime comedy of manners. As good as the writing got.

R148 Lucy's reaction to that is the best.

A very funny early episode- Lucy as a sculptress. M

Ethel shows an art collector a clay bust of Lucy’s head which is really Lucy and he buys it and want to take it home immediately. He starts picking it up and Lucy reveals her secret 🤫.

R143- Imagine, a group of gay males and the questions they would ask the gay male that has to tell the truth.

What is the actual length of your fully erect penis?

You say you are a top but have you ever been fucked?

I loved Lucy and Ethel talking about how routine their lives have become with Lucy describing how Ricky will stumble into the kitchen asking "Has the coffee percolated yet?" before pouring himself a cup and going back to bed, blowing Lucy an air kiss. ("I coulda slept all day!")

Ethel tops that with Fred sitting down to do the crossword puzzle and not being able to find his glasses and he yells to Ethel for help. Fred goes looking for Ethel and Lucy says that he won't find his glasses where they are, but Ethel lets Lucy know that they will be on top of Fred's head. Fred walks in and sure enough, that is exactly where they are. The ladies busting out in hysterics makes the scene.

At the first read through, Lucy noticed that the abbreviation ILL was used on the top of each script.

She said "OH NO! I don't want to look at ILL everyday I'm working. Just call it LUCY." And that became the abbreviation for the rest of the series.

Mary Jane croft was a such a great comedic actress I'm authorized she didn't have her own shows. She was on Ozzie and Harriett regularly

*surprised

Mary Jane was great in the Johnny Carson episode.

I remember Mary Jane as the Viv stand in on several Here's Lucy episodes. They weren't that great but it was comfort food.

Mary Jane was the voice of Cleo the basset hound on "People's Choice." She was in every episode. She also played Miss Brooks' rival (Daisy Enright) on that "Our Miss Brooks."

She was the second husband of prolific radio writer and performer, Elliott Lewis. (His first was Cathy Lewis, also a veteran radio performer, who played Deirdre on "Hazel.")

I meant her second husband was Elliott Lewis! And Lewis's first wife was Cathy Lewis (and that was her birth name, not her married name.)

Mary Jane tried to sing Moon River when Lucy sang to Mr Mooney.

This was the version of The Lucy Show where the opening credits start with Lucy in a mail bag and continue to her portrayal of "Iron Man Carmichael" among other abominations.

Don't get me started on tbat ridiculous cameo style representation of Ball's head dueing the closing credits.

That cameo was created at MGM in the 1940s during their attempt to glamorize her.

Lucy Writes a Novel has some really great moments.

Oh r34 -- sorry I missed your post!

When I see clips of Lucy in her MGM musicals from the 1940s she always looks amazing, so gorgeous, so photogenic in Technicolor. And for someone we know couldn't sing or dance, she dubs and moves admirably. Clearly, MGM was giving her lots of opportunities but I guess she just didn't click. After more than 10 years in Hollywood, it must have been devastating to be let go in her mid-30s.

Lucy was in Stage Door with Katharine Hepburn at RKO in the 1930s, then had a bigger role and better billing in Without Love (1947) at MGM with Tracy and Hepburn.

I love that interview with Lucy about RKO at r167. I can't remember her ever coming off as soft and gracious in her later years as she does there.

R168- Bette Davis, Joan Crawford AND Martha Stewart have NEVER come across as soft and gracious and yet we still love(hate) them.

Martha Stewart--what an actress! What a star!

R166, Lucy spent eight years at RKO and became known as "Queen of the Bs." Frustrated at being cast in 2nd tier productions, Lucy went over to MGM, hoping they'd make her a big star.

MGM tried. They put her in dramatic pictures, musicals, romantic comedies, but she just didn't click with movie audiences. Perhaps being labeled "Queen of the Bs" made it tough for movie audiences to see her as anything other than that. Lucy soon found herself relegated to supporting roles, before walking out of her contract.

But just as well. Had she become a big movie star like Crawford, she likely would've never gone on to television so early in the game and we never would've gotten "I Love Lucy."

Five Came Back

Was Lucille Ball a household name in 1951 r17? Was she more well-known for her films or for the radio show?

R168 I think she loved talking about the studio years with someone who'd done their homework.

That RKO documentary is pretty fabulous.

Thanks for the heads up, I'll check it out

We'll have it ready for you at nyoooon.

Don Loper's feet never touched the floor in that episode.

Are you trying to imply that he was light in his loafers?

And his socks.

Buying the painting in Paris and then the different language translations.

Ricky: Ethel!! Are you carrying eggs too?

Ethel: I [italic]was...[/italic]

(about the hostess pants Lucy secretly gifted Ethel)

Lucy: I saw them in Harper's Bazar! Ethel: Well they certainly are bizzare!

I would hope that Madelyn and the Bobs could spell better than that!

Mr. Potter: Ethel Mae is very big in Albuquerque.

Fred: She's big everywhere!

Ethel Mae Potter: we never forgot 'er.

Lucy: I want everyone on the bus to know that my husband is having lunch with Richard Widmark right now!

Bus Driver: I can hardly wait to get home tonight and tell Lana all about it.

Some of the jokes were rehashed.

Season 1, Episode 25:

Lucy & Ethel to the boys: "We're revolting!"

Ricky: "No more than usual."

Season 2, Episode 30:

Lucy: "Ethel, you know what? I'm revolting."

Ethel: "Oh, I wouldn't say that."