Line #20 Creator/LucilleBall


1	[[quoteright:320:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/lucille_ball_yank_1945_pinup.jpeg]]
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3	->''"I am a real [[LargeHam ham]]. I love an audience. I work better with an audience. I am dead, in fact, without one."''
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5	Lucille Désirée Ball (August 6, 1911 – April 26, 1989) was an American comedienne, actress, model, and film and television executive. She appeared on the stage, in films, and on radio, but is primarily known as one of the most popular and influential television stars of all time.
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7	Along with her late brother Fred, Ball spent most of her childhood in or near her native Jamestown, New York. She first became involved in show business by performing as a chorus girl in a [[BrotherhoodOfFunnyHats Shriners]] show at age 12. After attending drama school she found work as a fashion model and actress in New York City. In the early 1930s she moved to Hollywood and began to appear in small film roles. Eventually she moved up to starring in [[BMovie B-movies]] for Creator/RKOPictures; so many of them, in fact, that she soon came to be dubbed the "Queen of the B's." Among her better-known films from this period are ''Film/StageDoor'', ''Film/FiveCameBack'', and ''Film/DanceGirlDance''.
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9	In 1940 she met the Cuban-born bandleader Creator/DesiArnaz while filming ''Too Many Girls''; the couple fell in love and soon eloped. 1948 saw her cast in a successful radio sitcom called ''My Favorite Husband'', which Creator/{{CBS}} soon decided to develop for television. Ball insisted that Arnaz be cast as her husband on the show and, after a [[{{Vaudeville}} vaudeville]] tour to prove that the pairing could work, the network agreed. ''Series/ILoveLucy'' ensued, becoming a massive hit and securing her legacy as the queen of early TV comedy. It was followed by [[Series/LucyDesiComedyHour a series of specials]] and two more successful sitcoms (''Series/TheLucyShow'' and ''Series/HeresLucy''), which extended her TV stardom virtually uninterrupted through 1974.
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11	During this time she continued to appear occasionally in movies and on Broadway, co-founded Creator/DesiluStudios with Arnaz -- which the couple would continue to run even after their 1960 divorce, until Ball purchased it outright two years later -- and even took the time to mentor an up-and-coming young comedic actress named Creator/CarolBurnett, who soon went on to achieve success in her own right. Her starring role in the film version of the musical ''Theatre/{{Mame}}'' was a notorious flop, however, while an attempt at a television comeback in the [[TheEighties 1980s]] (''Series/LifeWithLucy'') failed.
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13	Her children, Lucie Arnaz and Creator/DesiArnazJr, are actors and singers in their own right; both appeared alongside their mother as regulars on ''Here's Lucy''.
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15	At present, with the exception of ''Here's Lucy'', CBS owns the rights to all series starring Ball, having acquired the rights to ''I Love Lucy'' (and by extension, ''The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour'') when it purchased Desilu's pre-1960 library in 1960, and inherited the rights to ''The Lucy Show'' and ''Life with Lucy'' from Creator/{{Paramount}} (who had inherited the former from Desilu, and the latter from [[Creator/AaronSpelling Spelling Entertainment and its distribution arm, Worldvision Enterprises]]). Paramount has released the entirety of the CBS-owned series on DVD, while MPI Home Video has issued ''Here's Lucy'' and her subsequent specials.
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17	Creator/NicoleKidman portrays Lucille in the 2021 {{biopic}} film ''Film/BeingTheRicardos'' which is set at the time of ''I Love Lucy''. Creator/ChristineEbersole plays a NoCelebritiesWereHarmed {{Expy}} of her in ''Film/LicoricePizza''.
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19	!!Lucille Ball filmography on TV Tropes:
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22	[[folder:Film roles]]
23	* ''Film/BroadwayBill'' (1934) as Switchboard Operator ({{uncredited\|role}})
24	* ''Film/ThreeLittlePigskins'' (1934) as Blonde Girl
25	* ''Film/TopHat'' (1935) as Flower Shop Clerk (uncredited)
26	* ''Film/TheWholeTownsTalking'' (1935) as Bank Employee (uncredited)
27	* ''Film/{{Roberta}}'' (1935) as Fashion Model (uncredited)
28	* ''Film/FollowTheFleet'' (1936) as Kitty Collins
29	* ''Theatre/{{Winterset}}'' (1936) as Girl
30	* ''Film/StageDoor'' (1937) as Judith
31	* ''Film/HavingWonderfulTime'' (1938) as Miriam
32	* ''Film/{{Room Service\|1938}}'' (1938) as Christine Marlowe
33	* ''Film/FiveCameBack'' (1939) as Peggy Nolan
34	* ''Film/DanceGirlDance'' (1940) as Bubbles
35	* ''Film/AbbottAndCostelloInHollywood'' (1945) {{as Herself}}
36	* ''Film/{{Ziegfeld Follies\|1945}}'' (1945) as Dancer
37	* ''Film/EllisInFreedomland'' (1952) as Leyna
38	* ''Film/TheLongLongTrailer'' (1954) as Tacy Bolton-Collini
39	* ''Film/AGuideForTheMarriedMan'' (1967) as Mrs. Joe X
40	* ''Film/YoursMineAndOurs'' (1968) as Helen Beardsley
41	* ''Film/{{Mame}}'' (1974) as Mame Dennis
42	[[/folder]]
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44	[[folder:Television roles]]
45	* ''Series/ILoveLucy'' (1951–57) as Lucy Ricardo
46	** ''Series/LucyDesiComedyHour'' (1957–60) as Lucy Ricardo
47	* ''Series/TheLucyShow'' (1962–68) as Lucy Carmichael
48	* ''Series/HeresLucy'' (1968–74) as Lucy Hinkley Carter
49	* ''The Best of Series/ThreesCompany'' (1982) as Herself
50	* ''Film/{{Stone Pillow}}'' (TV movie, 1985) as Flo
51	* ''Series/LifeWithLucy'' (1986) as Lucy Barker
52	[[/folder]]
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55	!!Lucille Ball and her works provide examples of:
56	* BenevolentBoss: As head of Desilu, while on set and in the office/boardroom she was tough as nails; off-set, she was said to have treated every one of her employees, no matter how small the job, like a member of the family.
57	* BetterAsFriends: Her marriage to Creator/DesiArnaz was a turbulent one due to his infidelities and alcoholism, and the stress of jointly running their production company. After they divorced, their relationship reportedly improved dramatically, and Desi without fail always sent her lilacs, Lucille's favorite flowers, for her major life events, though they never remarried.
58	* TheCastShowoff: Any chance she would get to show off her extensive background as a dancer, she would take it. Within her many sitcoms she could be seen waltzing with Creator/VanJohnson, doing the Charleston with Creator/GingerRogers, tap-dancing with John Bubbles, modding with her son, and of course performing alongside Creator/DesiArnaz, Vivian Vance and Creator/WilliamFrawley.
59	* DyeHard: Although she was initially a brunette, Ball dyed her hair blonde while an in-house model in 1928. She began dyeing her hair red for her role in ''Du Barry Was a Lady'', after a request from MGM, and it remained that way for the rest of her life.
60	* FunnyCharacterBoringActor: While Lucy Ricardo was a kind and kooky woman, Lucille Ball was a consummate professional who could perform comedy brilliantly, but wasn't "funny" in real life.
61	* IAmNotSpock: In the second half of her life she never really broke away from the "Lucy" character she portrayed on ''Series/ILoveLucy'' and her subsequent series, but there's considerable evidence this was at least partly self-inflicted. She generally avoided making appearances out of character during the run of ''I Love Lucy'' ([[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOXw-Px-X-8 her ad with Desi promoting the 1954 March of Dimes campaign]] was a ''very'' rare exception) and, after she stopped appearing in regular series television with the end of ''Here's Lucy'' in 1974, studiously avoided making any other TV appearances unless she was playing "Lucy" again (as in the one-off special ''Lucy Meets the President'' and the short-lived misfire ''Life with Lucy''). Throughout it all, the fact that the character "Lucy" and Lucille Ball had the same name certainly didn't help in separating the character and the actor. The one time she attempted to break away from the "Lucy" character was the 1985 TV movie ''Stone Pillow'', where she played a homeless bag lady living on the streets of New York. She approached the producers of ''Cheers'', a show she admired, with an eye for playing the mother of Diane Chambers, but backed out at the last minute because she felt audiences wouldn't accept her playing anyone other than "Lucy". Once ''Life with Lucy'' failed she seemed to realize that she wasn't bound to that character and was to play the lead in ''Wicked Stepmother'' after Creator/BetteDavis quit... only for her failing health to prevent it.
62	** Oddly, when she was actually ''playing'' the "Lucy" character she was more willing to branch out, starring in ''Yours, Mine, and Ours'' in 1968 and ''Mame'' in 1974.
63	* IndifferentBeauty: She was a very lovely woman, but she didn't mind compromising her beauty and looking foolish if it was for a laugh. Portraying a homeless woman in "Stone Pillow" she was anything but pretty or naive.
64	* WrittenInInfirmity: Ball's second pregnancy became a major in-universe plot point in ''I Love Lucy'', in an influential move--pregnancy had been considered a taboo delicate subject to portray in media beforehand and was not often discussed.

Context Creator / LucilleBall