Having a “Bawl” with I Love Lucy

January 13, 2025January 13, 2025 / thewritelife61 / 2 Comments

This month we are learning to love Lucy. We have looked at the career of Lucille Ball, and today we are taking a peek back at the well-loved sitcom, I Love Lucy.

The show starred Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, and William Frawley. The series featured a young housewife, Lucy Ricardo, who lived with her husband Ricky, a nightclub bandleader. Their landlords, Fred and Ethel Mertz, were also their best friends. Lucy and Ethel get involved in a variety of schemes to get into show business. Lucy relies on Ethel and Fred who were in vaudeville earlier in their career. Eventually Lucy and Ricky have a son which coincided with the birth of their son Desi Jr. Lucy and Ethel try Desi’s patience often with their antics. When he gets upset, he starts speaking Spanish. Fred doesn’t have much time for the women’s plots either. After living through the Depression, he is considered cheap and doesn’t tolerate nonsense. In season six, the quartet move to Connecticut.

In 2012, ABC News and People did a joint survey, listing I Love Lucy as the Best TV Show of All Time.

The theme music was composed by Eliot Daniel with lyrics by Harold Adamson.

The show had three directors: Marc Daniels was director from 1951-53; William Asher, who would later produce Bewitched among other shows, was director from 1952-57, and James V. Kern directed 39 episodes from 1955-57.

Jess Oppenheimer was producer for the first 153 episodes; Desi Arnaz was executive producer for the first 124 episodes and producer for the final 26.

Oppenheimer was credited with writing for seasons 1-5, Madelyn Pugh Davis and Bob Carroll Jr. assisted him.

Lucille Ball had been starring in “My Favorite Husband” on the radio and in 1950, CBS wanted her to transition to television. Richard Denning had been her costar on the radio, but now she wanted to do a series with her real-life husband, Desi Arnaz. CBS did not think visitors would buy in to Lucy, the all-American girl, married to a Cuban musician. To prove them wrong, Lucy and Desi created a vaudeville act written by Carroll and Pugh that they performed with Arnaz’s orchestra in New York. The act was a big hit, so Harry Ackerman approved the couple doing the show.

The pilot was ordered in 1951. Oppenheimer, Pugh, and Carroll also made the move from radio to television. Philip Morris decided to sponsor the show. Ball wanted to continue her film career along with television show which was set to air biweekly. Philip Morris wanted the show to air weekly, and they wanted it filmed in New York. Because Lucy and Desi were expecting their first child, they wanted to stay in Hollywood. The couple agreed to reduce their pay by a $1000 a week in order to stay in California and cover the additional expenses of filming. They asked for 80% ownership in the films, with the remaining 20% going to Oppenheimer who shared 5% with Pugh and 5% with Carroll. Desilu (combining Desi and Lucy) became their production company.

The couple hired Carl Freund, who had worked on many big-screen movies, to film the show. He uniformly lit the set so all three cameras would pick up the same quality of the image. He also pioneered “flat lighting,” which lit everything with bright lights to get rid of shadows. The three-camera method became the standard sitcom technique.

A live audience produced a more authentic laugh than the canned laughter some shows used. Both Desi and Lucy’s mothers’ laughter can be detected in these early episodes.

When Lucy needed some rest after having her baby, the company could not finish their 39-episode commitment, so Oppenheimer and Desi decided to rebroadcast some of their favorite episodes instead. This out-of-the-box thinking proved to be so popular that it eventually led to the syndicated market.

When Lucy decided to transition her show from radio to television, Gale Gordon and Bea Benaderet were offered the roles of Fred and Ethel. However, both of them were already transitioning from radio to other televisions series. Gordon had already committed to Our Miss Brooks and Benaderet had agreed to star in The George Burns and Grace Allen Show.

The role of Ethel was then offered to Barbara Pepper, who was a good friend of Lucy’s. However, she was known to have a drinking problem; Wiliam Frawley also was a heavy drinker, so the production staff did not feel comfortable having two cast members with alcoholic issues, so the offer to Pepper was rescinded. Pepper would appear quite often in I Love Lucy and eventually she settled in Hooterville, married to Fred Ziffel.

Frawley never appeared drunk during filming or caused any problem on the show. I did think it was funny though that he had a clause in his contract that he did not have to film when and if the New York Yankees were in the World Series. They made it to the big show every year the series ran except for 1954.

Mary Wickes was then offered the role, but she was afraid working with Lucy would harm their friendship. Director Marc Daniels suggested Vivian Vance who was performing in “The Voice of the Turtle.” Oppenheimer and Arnaz went to watch her performance and hired her on the spot. Lucy was not thrilled with the idea of Vance. She thought she was prettier than her vision of what Ethel would look like. Vance was only two years older than Ball, but the producers agreed to dress her in frumpier clothing. Eventually Ball and Vance became good friends. Vance was the first actress to win an Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actress. When I Love Lucy ended, Ball asked Vance to star in her new series, The Lucy Show.

Unfortunately, Vance and Frawley never warmed to each other the way she and Lucy did. They barely tolerated each other, although they were both always professional on the set.

Lucy and Desi had several miscarriages and when they were able to sustain a pregnancy which resulted in daughter Lucie, they filmed Lucy without ever mentioning that she was pregnant. The sponsors thought it would be in poor tasted to talk about pregnancy. However, in the second season, they were pregnant once again, and the pregnancy was written into the show. They had to use the word “expecting” when talking about the baby. The episode “Lucy Goes to the Hospital” in 1953 was watched by almost 72% of families with televisions, the highest rating for quite some time. It was surpassed by Elvis Presley’s first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show.

The show was on for from 1951-1957 on CBS, resulting in 180 episodes.

I Love Lucy aired on Mondays for its first run. In 1967 the network began offering the show in syndication and it has never been off the air.

I Love Lucy was nominated for Best Comedy/Sitcom in 1952, 1953, 1954, and 1955, winning in 1953. Ball was nominated for Best Comedienne in 1953-1958, winning in 1953 and 1956. Vance was nominated for Best Supporting Actress in 1954, 1955, 1957 and 1958, winning in 1954. Frawley was also nominated for his role in 1954-1958. He never won but he lost to some great actors including Art Carney and Carl Reiner. Only Arnaz was denied a nomination for his comedy skills.

In 1957, Lucille Ball decided to end the show. She and Desi created a new show that wasn’t really new. It took the four main characters from I Love Lucy and moved them to Connecticut. Arnaz changed the format and length of the show, now an hour long, because he said he wanted to change it up before people got tired of the characters. He said this format kept the cast intact but also allowed for a celebrity guest star for Lucy to meet in every episode. In 1960 the show ended, the same year the couple’s real life marriage ended.

Unfortunately, the couple’s marriage dissolved in 1960, and in 1962, Lucy bought Desi’s shares of Desilu becoming the sole owner. She sold the company to Gulf+Western who owned Paramount Pictures.

We all remember the merchandising that accompanies shows in the sixties and seventies like dolls, board games, lunch boxes, etc, but I Love Lucy had more than its share of memorabilia. In 1952 a baby doll was released. Believe it or not, you could purchase an I Love Lucy bedroom set for $199 in the fifties, as well as I Love Lucy his and her pajamas.

The way it ended, I Love Lucy never had a proper finale. I wish I had the time to devote to how much this show changed the course of television, but a weekly blog just can’t contain as much history as there is to tell. I’m sure Lucy would be amazed if she knew that more than seventy years after the show began, we are still watching it and talking about it. Legacy doesn’t get any better than that.

Lucille Ball: A Force To Be Reckoned With

January 6, 2025January 3, 2025 / thewritelife61 / 2 Comments

This month we are learning why We All Love Lucy. We’ll delve into her sitcoms and get to know Jess Oppenheimer and hear about his role in her television life. But today, we are starting with the woman herself, Lucille Ball.

Lucille Desiree Ball was born August 6, 1911, in Jamestown, New York. She was the only daughter of Henry Durrell Ball, a lineman for Bell Telephone, and Desiree Evelyn Hunt Ball. They lived at 60 Stewart Avenue. The family belonged to the Baptist Church there, and many of her relatives were among some of the first European settlers in Massachusetts.

The family moved frequently for her father’s career, but Jamestown always had a claim on Lucy, and they celebrate her in many ways there. The family lived in Montana, New Jersey, and Michigan before her father passed away from typhoid fever at age 27 in 1914.

Her mother returned to New York, living in Celoron, a summer resort on Chautauqua Lake. The road she grew up on is now named Lucy Lane. Celoron had an amusement park with a boardwalk, the Pier Ballroom, a roller coaster, a bandstand, and a stage.

Lucy’s mother remarried four years later. It was her stepfather who encouraged Lucy to audition for his Shriner’s chorus line, which gave her the first taste of what it would be like to be in show business. When she was 16 the family returned to Jamestown.

When Lucy was only 14, she was dating a 21-year-old hoodlum. Her mother was devastated by the situation and finally enrolled Lucy in the John Murra Anderson School for Dramatic Arts in New York City to encourage her in her theater career. Ball did not love the school, and her instructors told her she would not be successful in the entertainment business. Luckily, Lucy did not take their comments to heart. She later said that “one of the things I learned the hard way was that it doesn’t pay to get discouraged. Keeping busy and making optimism a way of life can restore faith in yourself.”

In an attempt to prove the school wrong, Lucy began working as an in-house model for Hattie Carnegie. This was where she first changed her hair. Being a brunette, Carnegie taught Ball to bleach her hair blonde. Her modeling was interrupted for two years when she dealt with the effects of rheumatic fever.

At the ripe old age of 21, Ball returned to New York City to pursue an acting career. She went back to the Carnegie agency and became the Chesterfield Cigarette Girl.

In 1933 she was in Roman Scandals as a Goldwyn Girl; while playing a slave girl, she had to have her eyebrows entirely shaved off, and they never grew back. Some of the things an actor goes through for roles is crazy. After that movie she moved to Hollywood to try a film career. After becoming a contract player for RKO Radio Pictures, she received a decent amount of work. At this time, she met the Marx Brothers, appearing in Room Service. She also worked with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers in several musicals.

When she registered to vote in 1936, both she, her brother, and her mother registered as Communists. During that year she signed a document as a Communist supporting Emil Freed for assembly and was appointed delegate to the State Central Committee of the Communist Party of California.

Ball later claimed she never had a strong political affiliation. In 1944, Lucy can be seen in a newsreel fund raising for Franklin Roosevelt. She also mentioned that she voted for Eisenhower in 1952 when he was on the Republican docket. In 1953 Ball met with HUAC and gave a sealed testimony. She said that she voted Communist at her grandfather’s insistence and did not know she had been appointed a delegate. Before filming episode 68 of their show, her husband and co-star Desi addressed the audience and said Lucy was not a Communist; she was just influenced by her grandfather. He joked that “the only thing red about Lucy is her hair, and even that is not legitimate.”

In the late thirties, she dabbled in radio to earn some additional money. She was a regular on “The Phil Baker Show” and on “The Wonder Show” where she met announcer Gale Gordon.

In 1940 Lucy met Desi Arnaz when they both appeared in the movie Too Many Girls. They fell in love immediately, and before the year was out, they eloped. Arnaz was drafted in 1942, but a knee injury kept him from active service, and he was placed in Hollywood organizing and performing USO shows for wounded GIs.

Lucy finally got her big break in 1943. Arthur Freed was making a movie based on the play “DuBarry Was a Lady”; he bought it for Ann Sothern, but when she turned it down, she recommended her best friend, Lucille Ball.

In 1944, Ball filed for divorce, but the couple reconciled before it went through. Lucy and Desi had Lucie in 1951 when Lucy was almost 40, and son Desi was born during the series and written into the scripts in 1953. Mom and son appeared on the first cover of TV Guide which came out in 1953.

Ball continued to make movies throughout the forties and kept a foot in radio. In 1948 she was cast as Liz Cooper on the radio show, “My Favorite Husband” on CBS.

When CBS wanted to transition the show to television, Lucy wanted Desi to be her television husband. CBS said no, so the couple went on the road with an act to prove the popularity of the them working together and CBS backed down.

The show was incredibly successful. (If you want to learn more details about the series and all the history that it produced, keep an eye out for my blog which will post January 13, 2025.) The couple created their own production company and had many “firsts” with technology producing their show. During filming breaks of the show, Lucy and Desi made two movies: The Long, Long Trailer in 1954 and Forever, Darling in 1956.

After years of turmoil and ups and downs in their marriage, the couple divorced. However, they continued to remain in each other’s lives through their children and their relationship. Later in life, Lucy said “Desi was the great love of my life. I will miss him until the day I die.”

Lucy bought Desi’s share in the production company which produced a variety of shows including Mission: Impossible, Star Trek, and The Untouchables. In 1967 Lucy sold her shares to Gulf+Western, owned by Paramount, for $17 million, which would translate into $138 million today.

Lucy married Gary Morton in 1961. At the time, Morton was a comedian 13 years younger than Lucy. He said he had never seen an episode of I Love Lucy. Ball hired Morton for her production company, teaching him the television business.

For the next decade, Lucy worked on a number of television specials. She also tried sitcom life again. She starred in The Lucy Show from 1962-68 and in Here’s Lucy from 1968-1974. We’ll discuss these shows the last week of January. Many of Lucy’s friends appeared on these shows. Her close friends included Mary Jane Croft, Judy Garland, Ethel Merman, Barbara Pepper, Ginger Rogers, Ann Sothern, Vivian Vance, and Mary Wickes.

Ball kept busy acting during the early 1980s. Desi Arnaz passed away in 1986. In 1988 Lucy had a mild heart attack. She appeared at the 1989 Academy Awards show and she and co-presenter Bob Hope were given standing ovations. She died a month later. Lucy had been a heavy smoker, and her cause of death was abdominal aortic aneurysm which is seen more in smokers.

Lucy always sent flowers to Carol Burnett on her birthday. The day before she died, she ordered them, and they were delivered a few hours after Carol learned of her death.

Lucy was cremated and her ashes were interred in Forest Lawn Cemetery with her mother’s remains. In 2002, both women’s remains were moved to the Hunt family plot in Jamestown. In Jamestown you can find the Lucille Ball Desi Arnaz Museum & Center for Comedy and the Lucille Ball Little Theater.

In 2009 a statue of Lucy was erected in Celoron. Many people called it “scary,” and it became known as “Scary Lucy,” which I totally endorse. In 2016, a more lifelike statue was created to replace Scary, but the scary statue had become so popular, it was left on display with the new one as its neighbor.

📷youtube.com The different sides of Lucy

Those two statues symbolize my relationship with the show. I appreciate the show and everything it did to create the classic age of television. Whether it’s technical filming strategies, the writing, the way the business was run, everything was important in this show. However, I have to admit, it’s not a show I choose to watch. It changed the entire course of television in similar ways that All in the Family would do a few decades later, but I honestly don’t enjoy watching either of these series. That might be a fault in my genes, but I also have to be honest.

However, Lucy Ricardo, while we may think of her as naïve and sophisticated, traditional and unconventional, submissive and disobedient, was an important icon in the way that women thought about themselves in the fifties.

Women had been brought in to work and gain independence while so many men were overseas fighting, and then they were asked to give it all up and go back to a domestic and tranquil life. Leslie Feldman, a political scientist and author of The Political Theory of I Love Lucy, writes that Lucy was “a transitional figure—she’s on the cutting edge. . . Are [women] going to stay home and be wives and mothers? Are they going to go to work? Or are they going to do both? And what if they really do better and earn more money than their husbands? What about that? That’s an element of Lucy too.”

Lucy was a force in show business. While she was not alone in taking control of her own career—Donna Reed, Betty White, and Ann Sothern were also powerhouses in establishing their own companies and running them—Lucy did it with the nation watching her. Even the choices she made about whether to divorce Desi or not were all done in the public eye and were sending messages whether people chose to receive them or not.

Lucille Ball was an amazing actress and an amazing business person. Apart from whether I enjoy watching the show or not, it changed the history of television and the way sitcoms were written, cast, and remembered. Thank you, Lucille Ball, for not listening when your instructors told you that you would never make it in show business. You not only made it in television, you truly made television what it is today.

Celebrating National Kansas Day with Vivian Vance

March 15, 2021May 10, 2021 / thewritelife61 / 3 Comments

As we continue to celebrate National State Days, this week we are visiting Kansas. Our Sunflower star is Vivian Vance. Vivian was born in Cherryvale, Kansas in 1909. Her family moved to Independence when she was six. She knew she wanted to be an actress, but her mother’s strict religious beliefs prohibited her. She began sneaking out of her room at night to perform and eventually moved to Albuquerque, New Mexico where she changed her last name from Jones to Vance.Vivian married Joseph Shearer Danneck Jr. in 1928 at age 19 but they divorced in 1931.

Vivian Vance Hated One Thing About Being On 'I Love Lucy' — Photo: showbizcheatsheet.com

In 1930 she was hired for her first job at the Albuquerque Little Theatre. After appearing in many other plays for the group, the local theater community paid her way to New York so she could study with Eva Le Gallienne.

In 1932, Vance began working on Broadway and was often a chorus member. In 1937 she replaced Kay Thompson in “Hooray for What!” and then began receiving supporting roles. In 1941, she joined Danny Kaye and Eve Arden in Cole Porter’s musical “Let’s Face It” for 500 performances. She would appear in 25 plays with her last being “Harvey” in 1977.

See the source image — Photo: pinterest.com

In 1933 Vance tried marriage again, wedding George Koch, but that relationship also ended in divorce in 1940. Her third marriage to Philip Ober in 1941 would also last only 8 years.

Until 1950 she was offered some small roles in big screen in several films. In 1949, she appeared in her first television series, Philco TV Playhouse.

In 1951, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz decided to launch their sitcom I Love Lucy. Ball was hoping to cast Barbara Pepper or Bea Benarderet in the role of Ethel Mertz. Bea had already taken the role of Blanche Morton on The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show. CBS declined to hire Pepper because they said she had an addiction to alcohol. After many roles as “The Dame” in the movies, Pepper later played Doris Ziffel on Green Acres. It’s interesting that CBS allowed William Frawley to be hired for the show because he had a well-known alcohol problem at that time, but Desi gave him strict rules.

Director Marc Daniels had seen Vance perform in the “Voice of the Turtle” and suggested her for the role. She would play Ethel for 179 episodes. She was nominated for her work in 1954, 1956, and 1957, winning in 1954.

Apparently, she was a very good actress because although she and William Frawley who played her husband Fred had great comedic timing, they could not stand each other. Vivian wasn’t happy that she had to wear frumpy clothing and that Frawley was supposed to be her husband because he was 22 years older than her. He overheard a derogatory comment she made about their age difference, and they never developed any type of cordial friendship after that. However, their coworkers claimed they were professionals and treated each other with respect on the set.

When the sitcom ended, Vance continued to play Ethel on The Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Show. She and Frawley were offered a spin-off series, but Vance passed because she didn’t want to continue working with Frawley. Vance was interested in another show however, and Desilu, Ball and Arnaz’s production company, put together a show called Guestward Ho! for her, but the network rejected the pilot. Desilu made some changes to the show and hired Joanne Dru for the lead. ABC picked it up but cancelled it after one season.

In 1961, Vance married John Dodds, an agent, editor and publisher. They moved to Stamford, Connecticut, and Vance always felt pulled between her marriage and career. In 1974 the couple moved to California. Vivian had no children from her four marriages but was godmother to Lovin’ Spoonful band member John Sebastian.

When Ball put together a new show, The Lucy Show in 1962, she invited Vance to costar on the show. The concept featured Ball as Lucy Carmichael, a widow, raising two children in Danfield New York. Vance played her best friend Vivian Bagley, a divorced mother of one son. After a few years, Vance wanted a bit more control and a bit of controversy developed between Lucy and Vivian. Vivian left the show, but they resolved their differences and she guest starred on the show and joined Lucy on reunion shows and on her third sitcom, Here’s Lucy which ran from 1968-1974.

Vance had very few television roles after leaving Ball’s sitcom, although she did make appearances on Off to See the Wizard, Love American Style, Rhoda, and Sam.

She was best known during those years as the Maxine, the Maxwell Coffee lady starring in numerous commercials for the coffee company. She was paid $250,000 for her three-year contract.

The last time Vivian and Lucy appeared together was Ball’s special Lucy Calls the President in 1977. Not long afterward, Vance suffered a stroke which left her partly paralyzed. She died in 1979 from bone cancer.

Both Ball and Arnaz commented on her death. Desi shared that “it’s bad enough to lose one of the great artists we had the honor and the pleasure to work with, but it’s even harder to reconcile the loss of one of your best friends.”

Ball commented on Vivian’s performance as Ethel: “I find that now I usually spend my time looking at Viv. Viv was sensational. And back then, there were things I had to do—I was in the projection room for some reason—and I just couldn’t concentrate on it. But now I can. And I enjoy every move that Viv made. She was something.” Both Vance and Frawley were inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in March of 2012.

When Lucille Ball and Vivian Vance Said Goodbye For The Last Time — Photo: allvipp.com

Some actors have the ability to adapt to a variety of television roles and we’re grateful for them. Other stars create one that is so memorable it becomes completely entwined with part of our life. Thank you Vivian Vance for being Lucy’s best friend. While we love Lucy’s antics, you are the one the majority of us identified with and for seventy years you have been influencing comedy and making new fans.

Go Green, Green Acres That Is

October 23, 2017October 23, 2017 / thewritelife61 / 6 Comments

In the 1950s, a lot of the top shows were set in residential or suburban areas: Father Knows Best, Ozzie and Harriet, the Donna Reed Show, and December Bride to name a few. In the early 1960s, the rural sitcom became the hottest genre. In 1963 The Beverly Hillbillies was #1, Petticoat Junction was #4, and The Andy Griffith Show was #5. Filmways offered Paul Henning the chance to produce a new rural show with no pilot necessary. Filmways was created in 1952, and the company was behind many successful shows including The Debbie Reynolds Show, The Pruitts of Southampton, Mr. Ed, The Addams Family, and Cagney and Lacey.

PETTICOAT JUNCTION, (top, l to r): Rufe Davis, Linda Kaye (aka Linda Kaye Henning), Mike Minor, Frank Cady, (bottom): Meredith MacRae, Bea Benaderet, Edgar Buchanan, Lori Saunders, 1963-70

Paul Henning approached Jay Sommers to create the new rural comedy. Sommers based the series on a radio show he had written in 1950 — Granby’s Green Acres. Granby was based on a book, Acres and Pains by S.J. Perelman. The radio show only lasted for 13 episodes and starred Gale Gordon and Bea Benaderet. Granby was a former banker who moved to the country to run a farm. He also had a daughter, and the general store owner was a major character, Will Kimble, played in the first episode by Howard McNear. A couple of titles proposed were Country Cousins and The Eddie Albert Show, but the final decision was Green Acres.

Green Acres ran on CBS from 1965-1971 with solid ratings. It produced 170 episodes, all filmed in color. Richard Bare directed most of the shows. At the end of each episode, Eva Gabor would say “This has been a Filmways presentation dahling.”

While the Beverly Hillbillies took a family out of the mountains and put them in Beverly Hills, Green Acres went with the opposite scenario.

The premise of the show was that Oliver Douglas who had been a busy attorney in New York City decides he wants to move to the country to run his own farm. His wife Lisa does not agree. He buys a farm unseen in Hooterville. We are never told where Hooterville is, and I think everyone has their own idea of which state it might be in. The house and farm are more run-down and dilapidated than Lisa ever imagined in her worst nightmare. The citizens of Hooterville are a quirky set of characters.

The debut show was done as a documentary narrated by John Daly, a former newscaster and the host then of What’s My Line. Eddie Albert and Eva Gabor appeared on What’s My Line later in the fall as a thank you to Daly. As you can see below, Oliver’s mother is horrified by his choice.

The theme song is memorable and tells the backstory of the Douglases:

Oliver: Green Acres is the place to be – Farm living is the life for me –Land spreading out so far and wide – Keep Manhattan, just give me the countryside.

Lisa: No, New York is where I’d rather stay – I get allergic smelling hay – I just adore a penthouse view – Darling, I love you but give me Park Avenue

Oliver: The chores

Lisa: The stores

Oliver: Fresh air

Lisa: Times Square

Oliver: You are my wife

Lisa: Goodbye city life

Both: Green Acres, we are there

Snippets of country and New York city were shown while the stars sing, and ends with both of them in the same pose as “American Gothic” by Grant Wood.

Like the Andy Griffith Show, the series worked because of the interaction between these Hooterville citizens who become believable for us. Let’s meet the cast of characters.

Oliver Wendell Douglas (Eddie Albert) – Oliver is intelligent, hard-working, and practical to a fault. He has to deal with a kooky wife, a disapproving mother (played by Eleanor Audley who was only 5 months older than Albert), and the quirky neighbors that surrounded him. However, Oliver has a respect for the wisdom these people have about farming and rural life. Despite the fact that he seems to be the only sane person in the valley, it’s obvious he truly has an affection for the folks he lives with.

Lisa Douglas (Eva Gabor) – Lisa grew up in a wealthy Hungarian family. Her misuse of the English language is one of her endearing qualities. She has a hard time adjusting to farm life. In one episode she is using a stapler to fix Oliver’s socks. While Oliver is telling her how woman for centuries have sewn socks, Fred Ziffel, the most experienced farmer in Hooterville enters the room and tells her he notices she is mending socks; his wife does it the same way. Despite the fact that Lisa did not want to leave the city, she adapts to living in the country quickly and develops an understanding with the neighbors Oliver never attains.

Eb Dawson (Tom Lester) – Eb is the farmhand who lives with the Douglases. He comes off as naïve, but we understand Eb is much smarter than he lets on. He is always trying to get less work for more money. He calls them Mom and Dad which Lisa loves but drives Oliver crazy.

Mr. Eustace Haney (Pat Buttram)- Mr. Haney is the unethical and dishonest salesman who originally sold Oliver the farm, which belonged to his family. He is always showing up to sell them something they need at outrageous prices. [Pat Buttram was Gene Autrey’s sidekick in the movies and tv; Smiley Burnette, Charley, who runs the Cannonball, the local train on Green Acres and Petticoat Junction, was Autrey’s sidekick in radio and movies and Buttram replaced him when he moved on.]

Sam Drucker (Frank Cady) – Sam was a busy guy; he ran the general store, he was the newspaper editor, was the only printer in town, he was part of the volunteer fire department, he was the justice of the peace, and he’s the postman. Apart from Oliver, he was the smartest and most sane person in the valley, and he and Oliver often commiserated about the crazy life going on around them.

Hank Kimball (Alvy Moore) – Mr. Kimball was the county agricultural agent who was supposed to help Oliver adjust to farming. He often loses his train of thought and rarely follows through on the news or information he is supposed to relay.

The Monroe Brothers – Alf (Sid Melton) and Ralph (Mary Grace Canfield) are a brother and sister team that Alf portrays as brother and brother in order get work. Their projects are never finished on time, and rarely finished the right way.

Fred and Doris Ziffel (Hank Patterson and Barbara Pepper/Fran Ryan) – the Ziffels were successful farmers. They had no children, but they had a pet pig that they considered a son.

Arnold Ziffel – Arnold Ziffel was their pet pig and one of the most intelligent people in Hooterville. He understands English, attends the local grade school, lives inside in his own bedroom, can sign his name, and is a bit addicted to television watching, especially westerns. A new pig was used each season because they grew so fast. The Union demanded the pigs be payed $250 a day and were trained by Frank Inn. In 1967 Arnold won a Patsy award.

Some of the other animals featured on the show included Eleanor the Cow; Bertram the rooster; Alice the hen; and Mr. Haney’s dog, Cynthia, a basset hound who had a huge crush on Arnold.

Green Acres had its fair share of guest stars including Parley Baer, Robert Cummings, June Foray, Alan Hale Jr., Elaine Joyce, Gordon Jump, Bernie Kopell, Al Lewis, Rich Little, Al Molinaro, Pat Morita, Jerry Van Dyke, and Jesse White.

The show was 25% surrealism, 25% satire, and 50% just plain fun.

Some of the running gags on the show were the fact that people, except Oliver, could see the credits running, and Lisa often commented on them. A lot of the jokes were at Oliver’s expense. He was the only one in town who could not understand Arnold’s grunts. Also, whenever Oliver got passionate about something, he went into a monologue, usually patriotic, and everyone but him could hear fifes playing.

Lisa’s hotcakes were good for many projects, just not eating. The Douglases had a feud with the phone company because they were supposed to move their phone inside. Whenever they had to use the phone, Oliver had to climb up a phone pole to talk. Oliver had a Hoyt-Clagwell tractor which was usually breaking down, catching on fire, or falling apart.

We also had the stark extremes of sophisticated New York living and rural life. Lisa continued to dress in beautiful gowns and furs. They slept in a huge, expensive bed, with an elaborate chandelier over their heads, but their closet had no back so neighbors walked in on and off. The fire department marching band often practices at Sam Drucker’s store but for all five years whenever they practice, they only know one song, There’ll Be a Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight.

Although Lisa continues to threaten to move back to New York City, aided and abetted by Oliver’s mother, we know she loves him and will never leave without him. Despite their arguments, Lisa and Oliver are frequently seen kissing and hints are given about them retiring to their room together. In real life, Albert and Gabor were dear friends and they are both buried in Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles. Tom Lester, Eb, credited Albert with helping him as an actor and being a surrogate father to him; the two remained close friends until Albert passed away.

There are many cross-overs with Petticoat Junction and the Beverly Hillbillies. Sam Drucker was featured in both Green Acres and Petticoat Junction. Some of the characters visited each other on various episodes. It is funny that Bea Benaderet starred in Petticoat Junction as well as the radio show Granby’s Green Acres which means Green Acres was based on her radio show and was a spin-off of her television show. In 1968, a Beverly Hillbillies Thanksgiving Show united cast members from all three shows.

With 170 episodes, it’s hard to come up with the best five, but after looking at various polls and tv guide reviews, I will do my best to represent the majority’s votes:

“Music to Milk By” – Eb wants to win a radio contest and he has to listen day and night which cuts into his chores, especially when the cow swallows the radio.

“I Didn’t Raise My Pig to be a Soldier” – Arnold Ziffel gets a draft notice. Oliver acts as his attorney before the draft board. They are assuming Oliver is making fun of them with the pig and the real Arnold is elsewhere. After a lot of explanations and some time in jail, Oliver convinces them Arnold is really a pig. The end of the show has Oliver back before the draft board because Ralph Monroe, a woman, who they think is a man, has been drafted.

“The Hooterville Image” – The town agrees Oliver needs to do chores in overalls. He has been farming in a vest and dress shirt. They finally convince him to become more accepted by switching his attire until they see the overalls Lisa’s dress designer came up with.

“The Computer Age” – Ralph Monroe joins a computer dating service. Oliver and Lisa disagree on whether that is a good idea. Oliver thinks it is. He also thinks computers are the best way to run a farm. To prove her point, Lisa uses the service to see if she and Oliver would have been paired up.

“A Star Named Arnold is Born, Parts 1 and 2” – Arnold appears in a play at the local theater. Lisa arranges for an old friend to give him a chance in show business. In the second part, Lisa and Oliver chaperone his trip to Hollywood to star in a motion picture.

Oddly enough the top four were all from season 2, and “A Star Named Arnold Is Born” is from season 3.

In Spring of 1971, Green Acres was still pulling in good ratings. However, the Rural Purge of 1971 got rid of all shows that had country leanings whether they were audience favorites or not.

In full disclosure, I loved Petticoat Junction growing up, and I could not stand the Beverly Hillbillies. I thought Green Acres was okay but if I missed it that was okay too. As I’ve gotten older, I still love Petticoat Junction, and I still don’t care for the Beverly Hillbillies, but I have developed a much greater appreciation for Green Acres. If a show was capable of having a sense of humor, this one did. It never took itself seriously. Eddie Albert was willing to be the straight guy to the rest of the ensemble. The character interaction worked, and no dialogue came off as too zany. The citizens might not have always agreed or understood each other’s lifestyles, but they had affection and respect for each other. Lisa’s reading the credits and different characters addressing the audience brought us in on the jokes and made us part of the Green Acres family. Now when I watch the show, I laugh out loud – a lot! I don’t laugh at the characters, I laugh with them. For being a rural sitcom, this show has some sophisticated humor. If you have not watched the show in a while, you owe it to yourself, as well as the cast and crew who created it, to get to know the folks in Hooterville.