Life With Lucy Information & Life With Lucy Links at HealthHaven.com

Life With Lucy
Format	Sitcom
Created by	Aaron Spelling Productions
Starring	Lucille Ball; Gale Gordon; Ann Dusenberry; Larry Anderson; Jenny Lewis; Philip J. Amelio II; Donovan Scott
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	13 (5 unaired)
Production
Running time	30 minutes per episode
Broadcast
Original channel	ABC
Original run	September 20, 1986 – November 15, 1986

Life with Lucy is an American sitcom starring television icon Lucille Ball. The show ran on the ABC network in 1986, and unlike Lucy's previous smash hits on television, it was a critical and ratings flop.

[edit] Premise

Ball played a widowed grandmother who had inherited her husband's half-interest in a South Pasadena, California hardware store (the other half being owned by his partner, Curtis McGibbon, played by Gale Gordon). Lucy's character insisted on "helping" in the store, even though when her husband was alive she had taken no part in the business and hence knew nothing about it. The unlikely partners were also in-laws, her daughter being married to his son, and all of them, along with their young grandchildren, lived together.

[edit] Creative control and production

In order to get Ball to agree to a new series, ABC allowed her complete creative control, no requirement to make a pilot episode, and no requirement for testing before focus groups or other tryouts. As all of Ball's previous TV efforts had proven to be hugely successful, the network acquiesced to these demands, even though she was at the time 75 years old and her long-time co-star Gale Gordon was 80. Gordon's "slow burn" comic timing was reminiscent of his previous character in The Lucy Show and Here's Lucy, and he was coaxed out of retirement in Palm Springs on the condition that he would be paid for a full season, regardless of whether the show was renewed.

Most of the episodes were written and supervised by longtime Lucy writers Bob Carroll Jr. and Madelyn Davis, who had previously worked on I Love Lucy in the 1950s, The Lucy Show in the 1960s, and Here's Lucy in the 1970s. Ball did agree to network concerns about the need to avoid physical comedy, such as the pratfalls and other stunts she had done in her previous shows, because of insurance and injury concerns due to her age. Those stunts were instead handled by actor Donovan Scott, who played her co-worker in the hardware store, though Lucy did participate in low-risk physical scenes, such as one where a room completely filled to the ceiling with soapsuds, or an electronic rocking chair went berserk and knocked her back and forth.

[edit] Cancellation

Fourteen episodes were written, thirteen filmed, but only eight actually aired. On the day of the last filmed (but unaired) episode, producer Aaron Spelling learned of the show's cancellation by ABC; he decided to tell Lucille's husband Gary Morton, who decided not to reveal the news to her until after filming had ended. The last episode to be aired, "Mother of the Bride", featured Audrey Meadows, who was going to be cast as a regular to give the show a new direction and Lucille's character a comic foil and partner, similar to the role previously played by Vivian Vance in Lucy's previous series.

Life With Lucy's premiere episode on September 20 made the Nielsen's Top 25 (#23 for the week) for its week; however, subsequent episodes dropped steadily in viewership. It ranked only 73rd out of 79 shows for the season, with a 9.0/16 rating/share. The short-lived show was never syndicated, nor was it ever released on home video. Biographies of the actress reveal that she was reportedly devastated by the show's failure, and never again attempted another series or feature film; her subsequent interviews and other TV appearances were extremely infrequent. Lucy's last public appearance was as a presenter on the 1989 Academy Awards telecast in which she and fellow presenter, Bob Hope, were given a standing ovation. She died a month later, in April 1989.

CBS Television Studios currently owns the rights to this series as it owns the Aaron Spelling library; it also owns all the other series starring Lucille Ball (except Here's Lucy).

[edit] Cast

Lucille Ball .... Lucy Barker
Gale Gordon .... Curtis McGibbon
Ann Dusenberry .... Margo Barker McGibbon
Larry Anderson .... Ted McGibbon
Jenny Lewis .... Becky McGibbon
Philip J. Amelio II .... Kevin McGibbon
Donovan Scott .... Leonard Stoner

[edit] Episodes

1. "One Good Grandparent Deserves Another"

Curtis McGibbon (Gale Gordon) has just returned home from his Hawaiian vacation with the idea of moving in with his son, Ted (Larry Anderson). He arrives to learn that Ted's mother-in-law, Lucille "Lucy" Barker (Lucille Ball), Curtis's business partner is deciding to move in with her daughter, Margo (Ann Dusenberry) who happens to be married to Ted! So now, Curtis doesn't just have to deal with the stress of working with Lucy, he has to live with her too!

2. "Lucy Makes A Hit with John Ritter"

John Ritter happens to be in town doing a play. He stops by the hardware store to buy some door-handles for the set. Lucy tries to be helpful, but ends up being hurtful. She ends up inadvertently hurting his hands and his foot. Lucy then insists that Ritter stays at the house with them. But, when John Ritter's co-star and leading lady drops out of the play, Lucy rushes to the aid by joining as John's co-star.

3. "Love Among the Two-by-Fours"

Lucy's old flame (and a business prospect for Curtis) comes to the store one day. After a date with her old flame, Lucy decides she doesn't share the same feelings he has for her.

4. "Lucy Gets her Wires Crossed"

One day, a talk-show host comes to the Hardware store, Lucy talks him into inviting Curtis on the show for a "Mr. Fix-It" segment. Curtis ends up allowing Lucy to do the segment with him after urging for grandchild Becky (Jenny Lewis). Lucy tries to glue a lamp together, but ends up gluing herself to Curtis!

5. "Lucy is a Sax Symbol"

Lucy finds her old saxophone while trying to look for things for a garage sale. She then encourages Becky to take up playing it. However, Becky finds playing the saxophone unsatisfying, as does Curtis.

6. "Lucy Makes Curtis Byte the Dust"

Lucy and Curtis buy a computer to help organize the books at the shop. When she uses it to order some un-returnable merchandise, Lucy tries to get to the bank to stop the check from arriving at the bank—and accidentally informs them that Curtis had died.

7. "Lucy, Leagle Beagle"

While trying to pass off her grandson Kevin's teddy bear as her own during a clean-up sale (to avoid Kevin from being taunted by friends), Lucy sticks it in a bag. The bag is then purchased with the teddy bear in it, so Lucy stars putting reward posters around town. When a woman finally comes back for the reward, she begins to ask for a lot more than the $50.00 that Lucille is offering.

8. "Mother of the Bride"

Lucy's sister Audrey (Audrey Meadows) comes to town to see Margo and Ted renew their vows. Sister Lucy's excitement is diminished when Audrey begins to make all the wedding arrangements, which results in a cake fight between the sisters.

Unaired Episodes

9. "Lucy and the Guard Goose"

The hardware shop is robbed when Lucy foolishly leaves the key in plain sight. She then decides the shop should be guarded by a goose. But the goose never gets a chance to scare the thieves because it is too busy scaring the owners!

10. "Lucy and Curtis Up a Tree"

Margo and Ted are very worried that Curtis and Lucy are spoiling their children. This situation isn't helped out when Curtis decides to build Kevin a tree house, which causes a fight between the couple. While working on the treehouse, Lucy and Curtis decide to relieve Ted and Margo's burden by arguing over who will move out—and Kevin walks off the ladder, leaving the two of them trapped.

11. "Lucy's Green Thumb"

Lucy makes health shakes for the family and they show their appreciation by pouring them into an ailing plant. When the plant shoots up overnight, Curtis thinks he has a million dollar plant growing supplement—but Lucy can't seem to remember what she put into it!

12. "Breaking Up is Hard to Do"

Curtis sells Lucy his share of the shop so he can retire. Lucy goes all-out for a solo-ownership celebration and winds up nearly broke. So she interviews candidates to take over Curtis's position before finally settling on Curtis—who found retirement less satisfying than he expected.

13. "World's Greatest Grandma"

Lucy is jealous that everyone else in the family has a trophy to boast about. Becky encourages Lucy to join a talent show and win the trophy as the grand prize. After trying singing, dancing, telling jokes, and doing magic, Lucy settles on reciting a song. But when she loses, the grandkids give her a trophy for being the "World's Greatest Grandma".

There was an episode #14 which was written but never produced. It was a Christmas episode and was titled "Twas the Flight before Christmas".

[edit] External links