She Loves Lucy (and Desi, Too): Lucie Arnaz on Her Parents’ Love Story and Protecting Their Legacy

Love (Sort of) Wins in the End

Notes Lucie, “They just knew that it wasn’t working for them to stay married and that was sad. But once they decided to stop, everything got much easier for everybody. We spent all of our weekends and summers with my dad, and my mother the rest of the time. But they were very pleasant with each other about visitation and who got to go with who and when. There was never a moment of animosity after that at all. I’ve got to tell you, it’s pretty amazing, because my own step kids weren’t that lucky for the first few years. It’s not always good. But when people are always arguing … well, it’s better to not have that. When they say they can’t solve it, then they should stop, because that’s a toxic environment you don’t want to bring your children up in. So I applaud them for doing it so well.”

Lucie references a documentary she produced about her parents called Lucy and Desi: A Home Movie and the final scene which consists of Lucy and Desi in a swimming pool with Lucie’s son, Simon, when he was less than a year old. “The way they are with each other,” Lucie reflects, “the way they treat one another in the pool is so charming and you’d think they were the oldest married couple in Hollywood. They hadn’t been married to each other for 20-some years, but it’s charming. And every time somebody tells me they’ve seen that documentary, they always say, ‘Oh, that scene at the end in the pool,’ and that they love it, because they can see after all those years they’re so happy that they’re still getting along. Like, ‘See, they really did love each other.’ There was such passion in that marriage that it could have gone either way. But it was a good thing that they were together; they created a lot of good stuff together.”

‘I Love Lucy’

One of those things, of course, was I Love Lucy. What’s interesting is that Lucille Ball oftentimes gets the lion’s share of credit for the enduring power of the show, but people have tended to forget how innovative Desi was behind the scenes. “It’s definitely changing now,” says Lucie. “After many, many years, lots of people are acknowledging what was created and that the show was historic and pioneering for television. It’s not all him and he never took credit for all of that himself. He credits the people he was smart enough to hire, who figured out how to do a three-camera show in front of a live audience on film, which had never been done before. And to run a studio [Desilu] at the same time he’s doing that show and performing on it as Ricky Ricardo was a lot. He did a lot, and I think people now do know about it, because it’s been written about. I don’t know if it was written about enough during his lifetime, but it is now and it’s lovely that people acknowledge that.”

Owning the Show

Early on in production of I Love Lucy, Desi and Lucille actually obtained ownership of the film, perhaps seeing a television future that would involve reruns of popular TV shows. “It wasn’t that much foresight,” Lucie differs, “it was just fricking good luck, because CBS and the sponsor wouldn’t put up the extra $5,000 that it would cost to do the show on film. They agreed to everything else, but when they heard what the extra cost of the film was as opposed to the kinescope [the process of filming the monitor on the East Coast and sending it to the West], they balked and said, ‘No, were not going to pay for that.’ So my father went, ‘What if Lucy and I kick in that extra?’ And that was a lot of money for them back then when they had no money. They were not rich at all. They said, ‘We’ll put in that extra $5,000 against our salaries, but then you let us own the film.’”

Lucie continues, “They agreed, thinking it was a good barter. And it was, but he had no idea idea what it would actually mean in the long run to own it, because they didn’t expect it be so famous. He just wanted to get it on the air, and it turned out to be a really wonderful idea until later on when he decided to sell it back to them so that they could make some money and buy a studio. I think the biggest misconception about all of this is that Desi [Jr.] and I still own 50% of I Love Lucy, which we don’t. We don’t own any of it; it’s been CBS since just before they finished the last season of the show. We own the likenesses of them outside of the complete episodes themselves. In any case, they wanted their company, Desilu, to get bigger and somebody had offered him the idea of buying a studio and that they could buy RKO, which was right next door to where they were filming. So CBS offered them about $5 million and in those days that was a ton of money. They did try to figure out if they could do better by holding onto the show, but there was no syndication [reruns] in those days. They had no idea how well they would have ever done with it. They said, ‘No, this is good. We’ll sell this and it will allow us to get bigger and it’ll be great.’ So they did, and they did get bigger to the point where they became the largest television production company in the world. And it was fabulous, but little did they know the show would go on and on.”

A Desilu Production

For Classic TV buffs, we take a slight tangent for this list of TV shows that were produced by or filmed at Desilu: I Love Lucy (CBS, 1951-57), Our Miss Brooks (CBS, 1952-56), Willy (CBS, 1954-55), Shower of Stars (CBS, 1954-58), December Brides (CBS, 1954-59), The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp (ABC, 1955-61), Sheriff of Cochisel U.S. Marshall (Syndication, 1956-60), Official Detective (Syndication, 1957-58), The Walter Winchell File (ABC, 1957-58), The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour (CBS, 1957-60), Whirlybirds (Syndication, 1957-60), This is Alice (NTA Film Network, 1958-59), The Texan (CBS, 1958-60), Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse (CBS, 1958-60), The Ann Sothern Show (CBS, 1958-61), The Untouchables (ABC, 1959-63), Guestward, Ho! (ABC, 1960-61), Harrigan and Son (ABC, 1960-61); Fair Exchange (CBS, 1962-63), The Lucy Show (CBS, 1962-68); Glynis (CBS, 1963), You Don’t Say! (NBC 1963-69), The Greatest Show on Earth (ABC, 1963-64), Star Trek (NBC 1966-69), Mission: Impossible (CBS, 1966-73) and Mannix (CBS, 1967-75, though Desilu only produce the first half of season 1).

When they were running Desilu together, Desi was the businessman, and Lucy was the one who had the ability to pick shows that would appeal to a wide viewing audience (Star Trek, Mission: Impossible and The Untouchables are three great examples of that). When the couple divorced, Lucy took over the studio, and it was not something she was entirely happy about. “She was the first person to head a studio and a feminist in that regard and with her wonderful business sense,” says Lucie. “But if she was talking to you right now instead of me, she would laugh her head off, because she would say, ‘I hated very minute of it.’ Couldn’t wait to sell the studio, because all she wanted to do was play in the sandbox. She ran the studio with grace and charm and had pretty good instincts. So once in a while if somebody said, ‘We gotta cut the budgets and get rid of some of these shows,’ she’d say, ‘Ooh, let’s not cut Star Trek. I like that show.’ And then she said, ‘You know, Gary likes Mission: Impossible, can’t we save that one, too?’ And that was two smart moves on her part, but she would have been very happy just to be Lucy and not have to deal with any of that.”

No Confusion Between Reel and Real

Despite the phenomenon I Love Lucy became even during its original run, young Lucie never had any issues dealing with her parents being on television or confusing the show with reality. “I don’t remember feeling that as a kid,” she points out. “I may have, but who knows? To me, it was just the way it was. And because I grew up with it from the moment of my birth, I don’t remember anything else. Neither does Desi. This was what my dad and my mom did for a living. This is the work that they went away to go and do. And that’s all. Those were the Ricardos; I knew those weren’t the real people. But there were moments, like I remember crying and feeling really sad when my mother froze in the freezer in one episode [Season 1, Episode 29, ‘The Freezer’]. I cried my eyes out on that, but she didn’t really freeze. But we lived a pretty normal life away from all of that. If anything, it’s just that they were working parents, like many kids have working parents today who don’t get home till late.”

And that normalcy actually went for Lucy as well in the sense that she never took the success of the show for granted. Expresses Lucie, “She was always grateful for all the people who loved that show and who continued to love her until she died. She was very kind to her fans and always took time for them. She taught me that if they come up and bother you while you’re eating your dinner, don’t get crazy. If it wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t have anything. And my father was the same way: very generous, very appreciative, very grateful for every single bit of it. They never got tired of it. Even now, I don’t remember ever getting the sense that she was, like, ‘Oh, hey, leave me alone.’ Never. When you’re a kid and you’re out with your folks, you would wish they would be like that. Like, ‘Let us have our pizza!’ But they would never be like that.”

The ‘Lucy’ Express Continues

As we’re closing in on the 70^th anniversary of I Love Lucy in 2021, it’s not like this show has become a footnote in history. It remains a very vibrant pop culture entity, ranging from a wide variety of merchandise emblazoned with images of Lucy and Desi to the show being available on streaming services such as CBS All Access, and the fact that five colorized episodes will be coming to a select number of movie theaters on August 6. Of the latter Lucie says, “I was kind of impressed, and shocked and thrilled all at the same time. I like that they’re honoring the show in this way, which is fun. They’re making an event out of it, and that’s very hip in a weird sense, you know? The colorization didn’t make the show any better or funnier to me, but I think it’s great. It’s funny that this woman, this Lucille Ball person, is famous for being a red head in a black and white show. That’s funny.”

While Lucie admits that she doesn’t have a need for the show to be colorized, it’s OK with her either way if it invites new generations to look at the series and appreciate it. “That’s good,” Lucie states, “because it’s good for your soul, you know? I mean, laughter is really good for us, especially these days. I always tell people the show is about unconditional love. You know, you can get into all of these screwy situations and predicaments, but at the end of the day there’s somebody there who still likes, who still says, ‘I love you.’ That’s a good thing to think about.”

So Where ‘Lucy’ Is Concerned, Who Owns What?

To clear up the confusion of who owns what elements of I Love Lucy all these years later, Lucie details, “The estate doesn’t own I Love Lucy, but the estate owns the images and likenesses of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, and that includes their images as Lucy and Ricky Ricardo. So if anybody wants to put their face on a tee shirt or they want to do various things that are not part of the whole show as a piece, they have to contact us. Like right now, the whole show as a piece is being colorized and put out in theaters. We don’t have any part of that; the estate has no financial part of that. It has nothing to do with us. The reason I’m even talking to you is that we do work with CBS on lots of other events and merchandise and we are a team where we’re a partnership except financially where the show is concerned.

“But we’re doing a huge merchandise business with them every year, which we’re expanding for the first time,” Lucie continues. “There’s all this wonderful stuff happening that the show can only benefit from, so I’m happy that they’re doing it. The more visibility for the show, the more fun it is. What’s funny is that in the beginning it was, like, ‘Oh my God, I have three children. I have a career. I haven’t time for the bobblehead dolls on my desk that I’m supposed to approve right now. I don’t want this.’ But then, after a couple of years, you realize that unless you focus on it and you do it right, it’s even more trouble. Then you’re running around policing people and telling them not to do this and you have no right to do that. Then you’ve got to get somebody in there to help and you have to spend money. You realize you have to say yes once in a while so you can afford the lawyer to say no. It was a whole other world, this whole other hat that you wear. And it’s been a long time. My father died in ‘86, my mother died in ‘89, so we’ve been doing this for a while now and finally treat it like a business, because it’s not going away. So, you treat it like a business. It’s a prime piece of real estate that my brother and I have to protect and make sure it’s still got some class to it.”

A Deeper Meaning

It’s her firm belief that branding I Love Lucy can actually have more to it than creating mugs and T-shirts; that there is an opportunity to heal the world. Not surprisingly, she has some ‘splaining to do. “One meme at a time,” Lucie says matter of factly. “And what I mean by that is that if you’re going to use a face or an image, let’s use it for good. Let’s make a statement that makes a difference. Let’s talk about the nine-hour retreat we did with CBS where we literally put the whiteboard up and asked, ‘What’s the show about? Why do I care?’ And cull it down to its essence. And you say, ‘It’s about friendship, isn’t it? It’s about unconditional love. It’s about the value of laughter and family. So let’s focus anything we do, anything we make, any experience we build on to reinforce what’s good on the planet.’ It’s not just about selling a jug, it’s not just about making a buck, although that’s nice. And, you know, I’m happy we’ve had the ability to do that. It certainly put my kids through college and paid for their fees and paid for their therapy. There is a way you can think about this differently, and that’s the road we’re going down now. I’ll let you know in four years if we’ve succeeded.” (We’ll be waiting for the phone call!)

The Enduring Nature of ‘I Love Lucy’

For many years, I Love Lucy was widely syndicated to television stations and was seemingly on all the time. These days, the show has become much harder to find, and yet somehow it lives on in the form of the previously-discussed merchandise, the colorized episodes theater event and in the public’s mind, but it certainly ain’t because of fans who were there in the beginning. “It is pretty astounding,” Lucie concurs. “It’s like you can’t kill it; it just keeps growing like the bread in the oven of the ‘Pioneer Woman’ episode. When it was off the air for like five years, we saw some sales of merchandise tanked. The only thing we could attribute it to was the fact that it had actually been off the air during that time. As soon as it went back on the air, things changed. But during that same time, DVDs came out and there’s always been another way to watch the show. And lots of people aren’t watching things in syndication anymore; they’re watching them online, they’re streaming, they’re buying DVDs or whatever. We find different ways to watch those episodes these days.

“I think what happens,” Lucie elaborates, “is that parents put their kids in front of the TV, because they know it’s safe. With I Love Lucy, they know that they can watch it and no one is going to be insulted. It’s not mean humor, not even currents events humor. It’s about friends and families and people wanting things they can’t have. It’s always funny, because it’s not specific like that. So you grow up with her, with them, and then you have kids and you say, ‘Oh, I want to introduce you to something that made me feel good when I was little.’ I hears lots of stories like, ‘My mother turned me on to this when I was little, so I always wanted my kids to sit with me and watch it.’ At this point, that show has probably babysat four generations.”