It's the Dearly Departed Podcast, featuring your host, historian Scott Michaels and filmmaker
Mike Dorsey. Okay, it is uh the next episode of Dearly Departed Podcast.
I'm Mike Dorsey, I'm Scott Michaels, and this is Dearly Departed Podcast,
and today we're talking about one of the greatest sitcoms in history, a
groundbreaking sitcom. I love Lucy. Yeah, it's it's it's it's certainly probably
the biggest and most like you say, groundbreaking, it really established precedent that's
still being used today. So so yeah, huge, hugely popular and hugely
important show. Yeah. So we'll be talking about Lucy and Desi and the
rest of the main cast before we get into that, though, I want
to do in general news. We had two big things related to the Cecil
Hotel come out this past month and you were you were in one of them.
I was, yeah, yeah, yeah. We did an episode of
Ghost Adventures and Zach had done. We both worked with Zach in the past,
and this is something that they brought me in for a historic background on
the hotel. So the hotel, basically, you know, the Cecil Hotel
is notorious and mostly because of the Elisa Lamb story, but the Cecil Hotel
has also had an incredible amount of terrible things happened there over the years.
It's it's it's bizarre, and it leads people to think that it's some kind
of evil portal, and it's not very often that I would say, maybe
they're right, But there's so many terrible things that have happened there, so
many dozens of suicides, murders, overdoses, serial killers, just an insane
amount in one small place. So the Cecil, because American Horror Story Hotel
Season with Lady Gaga was based on the Cecil Hotel, It's got an insane
amount of publicity. So they were quite uh when the hotel was still operating
mostly as a hostel and also as a single room occupancy sort of you know,
transient hotel. The hotel security were really on guard for anyone that would
go in there as a tourist to want to see the kind of death,
you know, weird old place, and and for people who don't know it's
downtown Los Angeles, it's in kind of the skid Row area, um and
it's a very large, large hotel that's like a it's a large hotel.
It's like a hundred years old. Yeah, it's one of the worst places
a hotel could be. But originally it was it was you know, it
was built as a luxury hotel. Then the stock market crash happened, and
you know it then it turned into like a worker's hotel and it's a lot
of um, you know to say, low inc single room occupancy, transient
hotels. People have lived over twenty five thirty years and they pay one hundred
dollars a week or something like that to stay there. So but anyway,
they they they they closed the hotel down because of COVID. There was a
residential portion of the hotel and they moved everybody to the second floor and Zach
and the crew got the rest of the hotel and every room was opened.
So we're you know, the rooms that were able to go with so and
so jumped out the window and landed down the guy down at the sidewalk and
killed them both. We're able to go into that room. We were able
to go into the Richard Ramirez room and into the room where you know,
Alisa Lamb was staying when when she died on the roof. But the room
she was staying in. And it was interesting about the Netflix documentary was that
they represented a room on the fifth floor constantly, but the room that she
was actually staying in at the time of her death was was on the fourth
floor, but they never acknowledged that. But she was in a room with
a couple of people that kicked her out because she was acting erratically, and
then they moved her to a different floor, and that was the room that
she was staying in. But it was wild going through that room and just
i'd going through the hotel and just going, oh, yeah, this happened
there, This happened there, and it was it was creepy. A one
room in particular, there was a murder that took place in sixty four of
a woman they called pigeon Goldie because she she fed the pigeons in Pershing Square
walks away and being in that room, I'm not one to get affected.
In fact, you were with me the other time. I was affected,
literally like I got to get out of here. And that was the Wonderland
House, the top floor, and I was sitting wherever that person was murdered
and h but it was like, you know, this is bad. I
gotta get out. But there was so much going on in this house and
the neighbors heard screaming. I'm just think, you know, what's the drug
viewers again. But it's just amazing that those those things happened and it's such
a quiet area and those house is literally five feet this way and fight it
the other way, and nobody called the cops. And uh, and I
wouldn't. I wouldn't. I know if that psychic, I don't know what
that is. But it was something that I felt very uncomfortable with. I
mean, the hairs, everything, and I've never reacted that way before even
there, so um so, yeah, that was something that was wild.
And then I wasn't in on the Elisa lamb Uh investigation when Zach got and
those guys did it. But when after we were done with my part,
he had one of the producers take me up to the roof and I was
able to walk round up there to see the water tower where she where she
drank. That was wild. It was nighttime, so the view was spectacular
from you know, fifteen stories up. Everything looks good and to the water
tower where she was where she was found, was was pretty chilling. It
was it was a really interesting experience. And so people who don't know.
Elisa Lamb was a Canadian tourist from I think the Vancouver area, and she
um came here kind of. She was twenty one, and she came here
on kind of just a trip on her own around California. She went down
to San Diego and then she came up to LA and checked into a hotel
that she may not have realized was in a as rough of an area as
it was. If you don't know La, you don't you may not know
any better. And then just mysteriously disappeared and was found I believe nineteen days
later, in one of the water tanks up on top of the roof,
floating naked. She had taken her clothes off, and eventually it was ruled
accidental. She had a history of psychological problems, bipolar disorder. She was
on medication. They determined that she had stopped probably stopped taking her medication.
Her family said she had a history of irrational behavior like this. She was
kicked out of that room because she was leaving weird notes on the bunk beds
of the other girls that she was rooming with, and they complained about it.
She was leaving notes like telling them to go home, get out,
go away. She's very strange, and so they think that she just ultimately
had a mental breakdown. But there was a very weird video of her on
the elevator that went super viral all around the world of her acting very strange,
and people thought that it was that she was being haunted because she looked
like she was talking to someone who wasn't there. Um, and other people
thought that she had been murdered. Um, so they it was it's It
got a lot of coverage and then um, this multi part documentary series on
Netflix kind of tackled the whole thing. Um, and you saw that as
well. Yeah yeah, yeah, my friend, honest with you, I
wasn't a big fan of this documentary. I thought I was going to be.
But they could have done it in half the time, and they could.
I mean they're talking heads. Were all YouTube sleuths. A lot of
them were yeah yeah, yeah. I would have wanted to talk to detectives,
her family, you know, things like that, but it was all
it was. It was YouTube. Yeah. They had um Tim Marcia,
who was the Marcia the detective. He's a senior detective in lapd who was
the detective on the case for Robbie Homicide Division, but they didn't use him
as much as I think they should have. Uh. And and then my
friend Greg Katie, who I made to wrap with, he they brought him
and as an expert, he's retired homicide detective, and they came in.
He kind of almost was like an unofficial narrator. He kind of just gave
you the facts of the story as it happened. Um. But Yeah,
they did a lot of the Internet stuff, and I'm very I'm a very
skeptical person. I don't cater to conspiracy that stuff. So I did get
annoyed a few times by how much time they spent on all that stuff.
But then I had to keep reminding myself that that was also part of the
story, because I do remember following it closely at the time, and that
kind of became part of the story. Was all the all the people of
what their crazy theories. Um, but I feel like it was a little
exploitational on. Yeah, I know a lot of time to that that death
metal guy Morbid I think his name was, Yeah, and they were talking
about how you know, he had a song that that kind of mirrored the
events and then you know, he was he was behind it. But you
know, and this is I was looking at the YouTube clip of his it
was like ninety seven views. You know. It's like, I'm not saying
that's a bad thing. I'm just saying they're they're making it sound like this
guy made a living off of this. And there was one weird, you
know, coincidence and uh And I also was worthy of noting is that the
only footage they had the interior of the hotel was cell phone footage. They
had no they got no rights to film in the hotel. Ninety five percent
of that documentary was drone shots on the exterior and the stuff that the use
of the interior was all off people's phone. So I'm you know again,
it could have been done in half the time. And I think they you
know, okay, okay, I think the moment, the moment that they
said that if you pushed that open door button and it stayed open for two
minutes, that was like, right, that solves the questionable because that was
the only watching And I was like, oh wow, that is weird that
the door wouldn't close. And I couldn't remember that when it first came out,
but then and then also the way that they saved until the very we're
spoiling thing. Sorry for people if you've already, if you haven't watched this
yet and you wanted to turn this off and go watch it now. But
the other big thing that they that they didn't, that they didn't, that
they kept from you was the lid and how the maintenance guy that found her
body said that when he discovered it, the lid was open, and all
up to that point they made you believe the lid had been closed, and
they're like, how could she have closed the lid from inside the tank,
and then it comes out it wasn't. And again, if they had just
said you push that button, the doors stay open for two minutes, and
the lid was open, the movie would have been over in like twenty minutes.
For people that don't know. The shocking thing was that she was in
that water tower for nineteen days dead well they don't know for how long,
but clearly for various tomb and people in the hotel were noticing that the water
pressure was down and that it was an odd color, and some people complained
that it smelled or tasted bad because they're pushing teeth and taking showers in this.
In this, you know, woman water and that's what made it even
more shocking. And there's lots of theories about her clothes being taken off,
as I understand if you if you're if you have hypothermia, you feel differently.
And I've done that before where I've been. You know, I grew
up in the Midwest. I grew up where it was freezing and I felt,
you know, my hands were literally frozen and they felt hot. So
you know, you want to you want to. I'm guessing I wouldn't there.
But everything that happened to her is easily explainable now. But you know,
she was kicked out of that game show taping the day before because she
was acting. She wrote a letter to the host. It was very weird
and they were like, whoa, she's a she's a security threat. I
mean to get her out of here. Yeah, So it's all easily explained
with all the components in place. We were never given them all, so
that that is important, you know, But again, it could have been
done in half the time. And look, I I'm not a detective and
I've spent a lot of time trying to solve other crimes for shows and movies
that I've done, so I'm somewhat of an internet sleuth also. But we
need to realize that the general public is not given all the information for a
reason, and it's at the end of the day, it's not our business.
We're not the ones being paid to solve these crimes, and detectives are.
And so they withhold information sometimes for specific reason because they don't want a
they don't want whoever if it is foul play, they don't want the person
know that they're onto them, or they just want to withhold detail so that
if someone comes forward with information that they know they haven't released to the public,
then they know that it's a credible person that they can listen to,
you know. So there's just it's importantly, well, what in the detective
celsus because it's none of your down business, right, it's their business.
They're trying to solve the crime. People fired. It's like, right,
It's like their job is not to please the public. Their job is to
solve crimes. So they'll tell the public if they think it'll help the crime,
if they don't help them solve it, if they don't think it.
Well, they won't tell you, so I get it. Also, I
talk to her. I message our friend Craig Rve, the former corner director
of operations here in La, about just the Cecil in general, and he
said that UM at the Cecil and other hotels like to Cecil. He said,
it was not uncommon for them to report, for one, you know,
a person that was dead in a hotel room, and as he's walking
down the hall to see the you know, the tape residue from the coroner's
tape from other times that they'd been there in the past, he said,
you'd see it's because it was very similar when they were talking in the show
about someone died in that room and someone killed themselves in that room and a
murder happened there and there was an overdose over here. It was like,
you know, you have a seven hundred room hotel that's you know, a
century old and a rough part of town. Yeah, a lot of bad
stuff's gonna happen there over the years. Yeah. I love that they had
that manager who said, is there any room where someone has died in this
place? I really liked her too. I liked her. I thought she
was real. She was cool. Um, but yeah, the show's gotten
a lot of criticism because of all the conspiracy stuff. But that scene where
they showed yeah, because it was easy for they get in the room easy
through the security door, which I one d percent positive the alarm was not
on. And and then and they showed other people going up there with their
with their cell phone cameras and it wouldn't set it off. Well when they
showed they you know this, or she could have taken the fire escape.
And when they showed that footage of the fire escape, I almost lost my
mind. I mean the fire escape you zigzag and you get to the last
floor and just straight up ladder to the roof and there has to be nothing
around you. And I just wanted one fifty feet up in the air.
My knees were given out just watching and I could not stop looking at it
was like it was terrifying. Uh you know, and I can't imagine.
I think if I was in that hotel and there was a fire, I
would seriously look at that going I can't do this, you know. I
would have probably done it, but I would have been so absolutely I would
have frozen. I would have absolutely frozen on that ladder, I wouldn't have
been able to move. And oh it's so terrifying, so terrifying. So
the ghost adventurous thing you did is on I think it's on Discovery Plus.
Yeah, there the Discovers new streaming service and the Netflix one is called crime
Scene, the Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel, and I went specifically about the
Elisia Lamb story. So if you feel so inclined, I was entertained by
both, So check it out. So you had one more bit of news.
Yeah, we we last week. As Troy and I loaded up our
last van load of things from Hollywood. As we're in the car leaving Los
Angeles, I got the news alert that Burt Reynolds was moved to Hollywood Forever
Cemetery. So now, are my neighbor is not birth while my forever neighbor
is because I have a plot there. But but yeah, Burt Reynolds,
after three years of being dead almost was in Florida, and I guess was
on you know, somebody had his eurn. Uh this week was was buried
at Hollywood Forever Cemetery over on San Monico Boulevard across from ear Old Show.
That's great, we got another one. That's awesome, Get another good one.
They're digging him up right, you know. I mean Judy Garland,
she wasn't even around, you know, forty seven years in New York and
grew up and brought her over. So yeah, it's it's some prime real
estate over there. Yeah. That wraps up our current events updates. Um,
and I think we're gonna skip hate mail because we don't have any.
No, it's a love mail now. I mean, I'm tired of the
you know, you look like Uncle faster stopping. They say, Okay,
I know there's nothing original. Oh, speaking of that they are doing.
I just sent this to you to just announce Tim Burton is going to do
and Adams's family spin off series on Wednesday. Adams When Her at School is
the basis for it, and it's the first live action television series that Tim
Burton has ever done. And I believe it's for Netflix. There was a
big bidding war among all the streamers for it and they got it, so
just announced like hours before we recorded this. Interesting. Yeah, that will
be very interesting. I M. Yeah, I like, you know,
the movies are great, you know, Christina Rigi top her it really would,
and it really would be get somebody like Kristen Stewart or something. I
mean, it would just be like, well, I I supposed to be
her school age, so I don't know if that means kid or teenager or
college. I couldn't. I couldn't figure off from what I was reading,
but it'll have to be. I think someone in their teens or early twenties
would be my guess. I just hope they don't make her Gothy. That's
all because you know, Wednesday, it was dark, but she wasn't Gothy.
Yeah, And so I hope that they don't. They don't do that,
but who knows. I mean, I was kind of nervous about the
Adams Family movies when they made them, and I love them, so yeah.
So yeah, the second effect the original. It's time for the main
feature. Um, all right. So from that segue old TV shows to
an even older TV show, I Love Lucy starring Lucio Ball, Daisy are
As, William Frawley, and Vivian Vance m a groundbreaking, as we mentioned
at the top television sitcom that started a fifth nineteen fifty one and ran for
six years, and it was the pioneered sitcom filming techniques. I think it
was the first or one of the first multi caam sitcom shot in front of
a live audience. Uh. They did a thing where they they built the
sets next to each other, which I don't think it had been done before,
so they could easily switch from one set to the other one. Um,
and I think some of there were some other things about it that were
very cutting edge for their time. Yeah, three cameras time that was actually
used, and it was because it was all done like a play before,
you know, it was one one step camera And recently, I don't know
how long ago this footage came out, but you know at the beginning when
they taped or when they filmed out Love Lucy Dadsy would come out and talk
to the audience and then introduce everyone and they all their robes on their makeup,
you know, etc. And they had him talking to the audience and
said, we when we do this thing, you know, it's three cameras
and don't worry, it'll never obstruct your view. You know, watch We'll
give you an example. And it showed like all cameras on time, you
know, right in front of anything. But it was a way of introducing
that and making it funny instead of annoying for the audience when when it actually
did happen for the close ups and things like that. But yeah, it
was hugely popular because they you know, the studio wouldn't back it because it
was, you know, an interracial marriage and uh, and they wouldn't have
anything to do with it. And they and Lucy and Desi felt so strongly
about it. They they put their own money up for it. And good
on them because they didn't sure expect to be a hit, and they rolled
the dice big time to make that pilot and uh. And yeah, not
only interracial, but Desi was you know, he had the thick accent.
He was kind of hard to understand. They kind of broken English, and
they were afraid the audiences wouldn't go along with it or they wouldn't understand him.
And a studio was totally wrong, happily for the rest of us.
Yeah, yeah, that was it was something. It's funny. I know,
I talked to some people that I know that are you know, Latin
in dissent and said that when he would he would go off and start,
you know, talking in Spanish and screaming, and they were like their eyes
would light up. It's like, oh my god, there's somebody speaking Spanish
and I never had that before, so it was kind of fascinating. She
was also the first actress to have a real life pregnancy on television. She
was pregnant in real life on the show. We're gonna stay talking about Lucy
till later, but um, that's just another kind of groundbreaking episode. And
then when her character had the baby, that was the highest rated episode of
the show's history. So Vivian Vance played ethel Mertz. She was notable.
Also, she was the first actress to ever win the Emmy for Outstanding Supporting
Actress, which was a new award that they added in nineteen fifty four,
and she was the original winner of that of that Emmy. Um. And
famously, her and William Frawley, who played her husband, hated each other.
M Yeah, they were both pretty headstrong people. And I think I
think that they were the merchists were supposed to be, you know, significantly
older than Lucille and Daisy or Ricky and the show, so they gave them
really dowdy clothes to wear. And I don't think that Vivian Vance and Lucy
were actually that different in age, but she really had to had to dull
it down. You know, there's stories, I mean, Lucy, we
can go we'll go into it a little bit more about what a perfectionist she
was and she was very Uh, she was a professional. She was there
was you know, don't veer from the script, don't add lib and this
is what you do. And the story is that Vivian Vance was wearing eyelashes
and Lucy literally took them off her. I doubt that happened, but said,
nobody wears eye left the show up me and so she knew the story,
she knew what made it and uh, and she was Lucy, so
you know what she said went but h but I think Vivian Vans had a
hard time being you know, sort of shoved to the sidelines. But it
was all about Lucy and merch. She also was grateful for work and she
and with the age thing, she resented that Frawley was I think twenty two
years older than her and she's supposed to be her husband. So it just
it made her look. Any actor or actress is sensitive about their age and
how they are presented, and so she's being presented as being, you know,
twenty years older than she is in real life, and she feels like
she's competing with the main star of the of the show. Yeah, it's
a tough situation. Um, but they they were professionals, they and supposedly
they got along more, you know, as time went on, her and
Lucille ball Um and got to know each other. And then and then Lucy
Um commented years later, I maybe even been after m Vans has passed away,
but she said that Um Lucy was so wrapped up. Lucy and DESI
were so wrapped up in producing the show. Also, they were so busy
that she she said that she never really sat back and watched what Vance was
doing until she got to watch the reruns years later, and then she said
she just she got a whole new level of respect Um getting to just sit
back and watch her as an audience member at what she was able to do
on screen. So I thought that was interesting too. Yeah, they were.
It's funny. They Marine County where she lived. It's not that far
away, and it seemed like she and you know, Lucy and and Vivian,
we're friends. They hadn't seen each other for years. It's only it's
only right up, really, and I actually understood stood that. But I
watched the other night the Dean Martin roast of Lucy, and oh great,
what they got away with on that show is, oh my god. You
know, I was watching, and I'm surprised and even show it because some
of that stuff is like, really really literally racy. I mean there there's
some really I mean, Dee Martin. Whoever said you know, Dean Martin's
acting drunk is lying. Dee Martin can't even stand up during this show.
He is slurried, you know, glad. His drink is going everywhere,
and he can't barely even read the que cards that he's supposed to be reading.
But uh, but it was Vivian vanced as a little a little vivvy
to Lucy or a little roast of Lucy, and she she I think there
was some resentment in there because Lucy and and and and DESI owned the show
and they were literally the owners of the show. And she said, you
know, I think of my my years on I Love Lucy is the biggest
rip off of my life. And I'm sure that there was an element of
edge to it, and I'm sure she was joking it was a roast anyway,
but I am feeling that she really genuinely felt that, Um, you
know, she should have got a piece of the action. But and she
did come back. She came back in the sixties for Lucy's new show as
a different character, uh and played a divorced divorced a mother, single mother,
which I was also the first time I did a divorcee was presented in
a major primetime series. Um like that. Like that she was, But
she had stipulations that she didn't want to wear the fronty clothes anywhere and more
she wanted to wear a nice outfits and there were she kind of threw her
weight around a little bit more when she came back for the new series.
So yeah, she was an She was a soprano, like an accomplished soprano,
and she and Lucy and Deasy saw her performing I think it was Lajoya
on stage and got to meet her and liked her so much. The there's
a story that I read before all the books came out. There was one
book called Lucy, Ricky, Fred and meth All The Story of I Love
Lucy, And this was published back in the probably early eighties and there's one
story that you know, there was always a story. I don't think it's
true that Vivian Vance was contractually obligated to be to stay twenty pounds heavier than
Lucy. I don't think that's true, but it's been it's been one of
those rumors. But this is a story, and it's a good story.
And because there was obviously tension on the set because Lucy was you know,
she was, you know, you got to do it my way and there's
no room for anything else, no movie. Yeah, And as I understand
it, when when she was pregnant, when Lucy Ball was pregnant, they
moved her dressing room closer to the stage and put you know, Vivian Vance
back and Lucy's dressing her mooch was way far away. And there was a
moment when Lucy O Ball was on stage and the call time was X and
Vivian Vance was you know, going through everything and used to the timing of
her own dressing room and want cables and everything to h to get to this
to the set and uh, and then when she got there, Lucy said,
you're late. And her supposed response was I tell you to go yourself,
but das he's already done that. And you know, it's just it's
kind of but it had to have been hard for to be hard to be
you know, Lucy's you're there and that's where you're going to stay kind of
character. But Lucy knew the chemistry, she knew how it was going to
work, and that's that was the agreement. It just that she was very
serious about it. There wasn't a lot of room my goal. Yep.
And she died with of cancer. Cancer, isn't it? Yeah? And
uh and she said, I guess when when she got hired to be uh,
when she got hired as the part of Vivian Vance, there was a
tension again. But she said upon upon getting the part, she said,
I'm gonna learn to love that bitch. So and she did. She did,
and I and I think by then she had moved to the East Coast,
so she was going back and forth from her house in the East Coast
to shoot in la and that was also causing strain. By that for the
new series that was done in the sixties, that also caused strains. So
she's she kind of as the seasons wore on on that show, she was
in fewer and fewer episodes until they had kind of a falling out over a
disagreement that really was more a miscommunication between their agents, I think over that,
and it basically got communicated to Lucille Ball that Vivian basically wanted to be
her equal on the show. But that's not what she was asking for.
She just wanted a little bit more power, I guess, and for for
what she was going through to be able to still do the show. And
they had a falling out over it, and then eventually they reconciled light years
later and she started doing guest appearances on it again. But yeah, just
anytime I've been in this situation myself, especially in this business, you have
big personalities and their heads, but it just happens. Yeah. But you
know, but also and understandably so, because actors are you know, there's
well there's with any project like this, if it's high profile, there's there's
ego involved. And if you're renegotiating something else, you're like, it's not
gonna happen anymore. You know, we're gonna do things differently this time.
I should get a piece of it right. And I get that too.
If you're gonna renegotiate a whole new thing, or negotiate a whole a whole
new project. Then you know, and you know you're worth this time before
you were, but now you do, and you're like, look, you
know, I bit my I bit my tongue for years because I was locked
into a contract and I know what I agreed to. But now did I
get to set reset things? I don't want to do it this way anymore,
so yeah, I'll get it. And I guess when when Lucy and
Mary Wicks, who was one of those actresses they showed up in I Love
Lucy many times. Most people nowadays know her. She was the nun and
sister act sister Mary Clarence or something like the big one with the nose.
You know, she had thousand episodes of every show. And she and Mary
Wis went to a visit Vivian Vance one last time when she was on her
literally on her deathbad back in nineteen seventy nine, and said that I guess
viv was out of it, but when she walked in, her eyes lit
up and and and uh and they hugged and kissed and profess their love for
each other. And then Mary Wicks said that Lucy cried the entire way home.
Uh so they are. But but yeah, rest in peace, Vivian
Vance. Vivian Bagley on the on The Lucy Show at Murtz ethel May Potter
we never forgot her. Yeah, um so to her her her screen husband
William Frawley, who played Fred Murtz, he had a real problem with with
drink and and as I understand it, when they signed the contract, would
he asked Desi Arnez asked him to be on the show. Uh, he
said, if you ever missed work, you are show up late because you're
drinking. Yeah, you know you're out. And also but he also had
it in his contract that he would be able to have days off in the
Dodger Games. When the Dodgers played, he would he would be able to
take those days off. So but yeah, he had a real drinking problem.
You could see it on the show quite often. Where you look at
him, you can see he had the shakes in a big way. Uh.
And uh, that's that's quite obvious at times that he had a problem.
When he died, he was well, he was living at the l
Royal over on Vine Street. Uh, just passed May West to place well
interested kind of Rossmore, Rossmore kind of becomes yeahs behind yeah, yeah,
and that's where like Peter Dinklage lives in there, and He'll Houser lived in
there, and Draft lived in there. Nicholas Cage lived in there, so
it's a really it's a high end place. But Frawley was living there.
But when Fraley died on Hollywood Boulevard, they dragged him into the Knickerbocker hotel
lobby where he was pretty much dead. And he lived in the Knickerbocker for
many years, but he moved out, so it's just kind of interesting this
end there. So he died on March third, nineteen sixty six. He
was seventy nine of a heart attack, and he was out on the street
near the Knickerbocker and they took him into the lobbies. That yeah, he
was He saw a movie at the Vine Street Theater and he was with his
male nurse. For some reason, they mentioned that all the time a male
nurse. But he had been ill for a while and supposedly required a full
time male nurse. Yet he's still could walk to the bus stop and take
the bus from the movie theater. Yeah, but they say that he was
walking into the bus stopping and he dropped out of a heart attack, and
they dragged him into the knickerbocker and tried to resuscitate him. Paramedics showed up
and it was unsuccessful. They actually took him to the Hollywood Receiving Hospital,
which is on Wilcox at Fountain, which is now a police station, but
that's where the old hospital was, okay, and that's where he was.
He was pronounced of myocardial myocardial insufficiency, basically just a heart attack and uh
and yeah, and he when he died. Uh And apparently this is something
I didn't know. But jumping back to when he was hired, I heard
that Lucy originally wanted Gail Gordon to be that part who ended up being mister
Mooney and every other Lucy incarnation Gail gordons as in it, but Gail Gordon
couldn't do I love Lucy, and that's why they got Frawley, which is
just an interesting aside. But um, but when he died, Desi Arnst
took out a full page ad in the Hollywood Reporter and said Buenos no chase
amigo on it, which I thought was and Desi was supposedly a pall bearer
at the funeral. Very interesting. He was at the Calendan Mortuary, which
is the same people that did d Wood and bout a Legosi over Avar by
the Pantages and peg On Twistle that jumped off the Hollywood Sign. They were
all done at the CAA Calendan Mortuary and he's buried up at San Fernando Mission
Cemetery a little bit north of Los Angeles. So in his last cameo,
I don't know if you saw that the Lucy Show where he's in it actually
where he plays a horse trainer and they're walking through a stable and they talked
a couple of lines and then she says, do you look kind of familiar?
And then that was I guess. Probley's last appearance was so just kind
of a cool little uh nod acknowledgement, giving the fans something because it's a
real sentimental thing and probably probably wasn't the easiest person to get along with,
so it was nice for the fans to see that one last time. Rest
in peace. William Frawley so Ricky Ricardo was Lucille Ball's husband in real life.
Desi Arnez. And one thing I read that I thought was interesting or
funny was that they would crack each other up a lot, you know,
doing the scenes. Of course, they were professionals, so they normally wouldn't
break, but sometimes they would. And you can reportedly see this in the
show. Sometimes certain episodes you can see them kind of break a little bit.
And you can also hear there's scenes where Lucy where Desi isn't on screen,
but Lucille is, you can see you can sometimes hear him laugh camera
at what he's seeing, because she would her antics were so hilarious he couldn't
keep it in, you know, which I think is awesome. I've done
that on some of my documentaries. I've done that myself. I know a
few areas where I can hear myself laugh, and I know only I know,
but I can I hear my hear a little laugh come out of me.
Yeah. He was a little bit more of a free spirit than than
Lucille Ball was, and that was his down ball too. But but you
you know, they were they were really serious business people, serious business people.
By owning the show, they gave them they got they got a chance
to own a studio and Lucy you know, was able to head his studio
after they divorced, So you know, it was changing the way television was
made, how situation comedies were made. I mean they were they were really
important business people in Hollywood and at a time when you know, just be
nice and do your show right, they bought a studio. Yeah, Lucille
Ball was the first woman to head a TV production company, and after they
divorced, she bought out his share of it and hadn't had it all for
herself. Yeah, and together, I mean they they also produced the Untouchables
series. Star Trek is because of them, um, the Mission Impossible TV
series, and one of our Patreon supporters, I'm going to do a little
plug here, Um, Sarah recommended on Patreon that we do a Mission Impossible
TV show episode one of these days. So maybe it was that that's probably
something we'll do also. Um, But a lot of people don't really may
not realize that that, uh, that they It wasn't just the shows that
they were in. They were responsible for some pretty big uh series and other
projects with their company. When eventually she went to bat for Star Trek.
You know, they were they were like science fiction TV sh are you nuts?
Lucy went, now, we're gonna do this, so she was.
She went to bat for it. That was Lucy is responsible for Star Trek.
I love that, yep. So after Desi had his own demons,
um he was. Uh. They nearly got divorced in nineteen forty four.
Lucky for TV fans, they didn't go through with it, but they did
eventually divorce in nineteen sixty and Lucy Lucille Ball described being married to Arnaz as
a nightmare. Um that you know, he would disappear for days at a
time, and she would become a recluse because she didn't want to go out
and have to face like where's DESI questions? You know, and he was
you know, she was always convinced that he was fooling around, which where
well may have been if he's disappearing. Um. But then after they got
divorced, they stayed good friends. They were good as friends, I'm not
good as married couple. They were, I mean she when they were,
I mean it was to say it was rocky is an understatement. I mean
she took a hammer to his head once. You know, she threw a
hammer, well you know, because you know, because that story about him
being unfaithful to her, and he said later on, he goes, well,
these people, these women were hookers. They didn't mean anything. She's
the one I love. But they get into fights and then he get drunk
and then he go, you know, do his thing, and but she
when it got out. One time, it was in the Hollywood Confidential that
this womanizing and she threw a hammer at his head and hit him and he
was knocked out. And then they worked it in that that he had fallen
and hit a ladder or something like that. But it would have been easy
to be, to be mister Lucy. And that was what he was always
going to be, never mind the fact that he was this intelligent businessman who
made these smart decisions, but he was always going to be mister Lucy.
And Um and he and he never felt he'd never in fact, is um
when she was being she he died when the day or two before Lucy was
going to get the Kennedy Center on her. And he said that, uh,
he said his quote because when he died, it was Lucy got the
award a couple of days later. So Robert Stack read something that the DESI
wrote for Lucy and she said, Lucy was the show. Viv Fred and
I he's called him Fred too now William, But he said, uh,
Lucy was the show. Viv Fred and I were just props and I love
Lucy was never just a title and I thought that was he was. He
never took that away from her. He was. He was a disaster as
a human being personally, you know, being that you know Booze and it
was clear at the end of it that you know, you can look at
him and see what the toll it took on his body. Uh, you
know. Later on he produced a TV show called The Mothers in Law with
Eve Arden and Kay Ballard and then their husbands I don't know, two gay
actors that could not be more gay, and then one of them putting.
Then Richard Deak and the other gay actor took over. But but and Desi
showed up on one or two of those episodes. But he he was the
producer of The Mothers in Law, which was another fun sort of sixties early
seventies TV show that that Desi showed up on. But uh, but after
that he sort of he just went into the to the background. He got
married again. He was living in del Mar with his wife Edy right on
the beach. Yeah. Beautiful house. Beautiful house, yeah, really cool
little beach house. And del Are Yeah. And he was into horse racing,
uh and del Mar Racetrack has uh the I think the Desi Arnaz Stakes
kind of in his honor. Um. I don't know if that's still happening,
but they did have it. And he was big into horse racing and
he bred race horses and that was he kind of semi retired. I think
after to some extent he did he still did some projects, but never at
the level that Lucy went on to do in the sixties and beyond. And
then, um, you know, I think to Lucy's Lucille Ball's uh,
you know, personal detriment. Even though he was horrible, he was horrible
to be married too. She was you know, in love with him.
And after they divorced, she remarried. She married a producer named Gary Morton,
and I think after Lucy died, Gary Morton said something to the effect
of, you know, Lucy's finally has what she wanted. She's together with
DESI again. I think that's what team clear. Yeah, they could never
I mean she I think that you know, there's always that one love that
you'll never get over, I think, And and something so public that that
they were you know, people loved them so much together. Um, that
was a When they were divorcing, that was a big deal. That was
really scandalous. It was like when Sonny and Shared were divorced. You know,
although their show was over with I Love Lucy, h it was.
It was really scandalous back then. And you could never meet Lucy without saying,
where's Ricky? And and since they were married in real life, it
had to have been hard to be Gary Morton because he was even a worse
mystery. In fact, in Warhol's diary, Andy Warhol, he saw Gary
Morton showed up at the studio fifty four and uh, and somebody wasn't gonna
they were't gonna let him in, and and he said, you gotta let
him. And that's mister Lucy. Oh, and you're still and and he's
living in there's still living in the house, which we'll talk about in a
bit. There's still living in the house in Beverly Hills that Lucy and Desi
lived in. So you're not only married to this guy's ex wife, but
you're living in their house. That's gotta be weird. That's gotta be a
weird And she's clearly still hung up on him. Yeah yeah that And and
as I understand it, she visited him, you know, in his last
days, and and uh and and somebody I don't know if this is true
or now, but somebody told me that she moved him into the house on
Roxbury Drive at the end so she could sort of look over his after his
because he because he remarried and his ex his new wife then passed away.
Someone wrote you on your findal death page and said had said that they heard
that after his second wife died he briefly or something like that, he briefly
moved into the guesthouse. And how you know, Gary Morton must have loved
that if that happened. You know, but Lucy had those two kids with
with with Desi Arnash, so uh you know they had a they they yeah,
yeah, I mean those kids on their own or a story man.
They they they are you know, they're there's something. It's weird. And
and because everyone wants to think that Lucy is a sad, smiling, lapping
clowning lady, would she was a really serious competitive uh lady. She she
was Noble's bart. She said that she, you know, her kids could
talk to her about anything, But I don't think so. I don't she
spoke that. But I don't think she was that way, because there's all
sorts of stories about her kids sort of rebelling and uh and having real issues
with with with her. Hollywood is full of stories about the kids of famous
people growing up messed up because they grew up in the shadow, and they
also grew up with all oftentimes absentee parents who were busy with their demanding schedules
and aren't around to raise them, and it's just you end up with the
lots of messed up celebrity kids as a result of that. And Desi Junior
grew up to be uh, you know, he turned into a teen heartthrob
in the seventies and dated some famous people and I think he dated Elizam and
Ellie for a time. Um. And I read that Lucy Um commented on
that that she after they after he broke up with her and moved on to
someone else. Lucy's something about how she missed Liza, but Liza could not
be domesticated something like that. That's funny. Well there was you know,
she wanted her kids to grow up and to be professionals on their own.
But then Desi Junior was in the band Dino, Desi and Billy and got
huge. She goes, well, there was that, you know, all
of a sudden, he popped car with his own money. But he was
dating Patty Duke for a while and Patty Duke and he uh Lucy did not
approve. And I don't know, maybe it was at the peak of Patty
do exceptance abuse or something. But also Desi was not eighteen yet, he
was only he was only seventeen, and they wanted she wanted him done,
so she really forced them to break up, and she was gonna She threatened
to Patty Duke that she was gonna get her per statutory rape since Desi was
only seventeen years old. Now, the rumor is that, you know,
very shortly afterwards, Patty Duke became pregnant, and she became pregnant with Sean
and Aston, who is now Sean. And if you look at Sean Aston
and you put his face next to Desi Arnez Junior, it's like, okay,
now Desire and his junior dark features. You know, he's dark eyes,
dark hair, and Shaun Aston is more fair haired, but so is
Patty Duke. But if you put him side to side. There's always been
this rumor that Shaun Aston is actually Desirez Junior's son, and later on it
came out they said that Shaun Aston said it was actually a rock and roll
Um yeah, producer that was his father or something like that. But yeah,
it's like it's like Ronan Pharaoh. You know, you look at him
and put him up to the next doctor's picture and it's like it's like you're
looking at your image. Yeah, so I know, I mean legally,
you know, maybe they, but I if you hold up Shaun Aston's picture
Patty Duke's son, which works out timeline wise to Desi Ernz Junior and uh
yeah, but Lucy did not approve. Did not approve. And it's kind
of ironic because, um, when I was skimming her Wikipedia page, so
I take I take this to be true that m Lucy herself when she was
fourteen, uh started dating a twenty one year old quote unquote hoodlum. It
was only a fourteen year old dating a twenty one year old, and Lucy's
mother did not approve, and that's why Lucy got into acting. Her mom,
even though they had limited funds, got Lucy into an acting school to
try and get her because she knew that Lucy was interested in entertainment, just
to try to lure her away from this guy that she was, the older
guy that she was dating. And it worked, and that's how Lucy became
an actress. So it's kind of ironic. Uh, and uh that that
she then ended up having the same issue with her own kid, Yeah,
over that itself. Yeah. Uh So Desi Arnez passed away on December second,
nineteen eighty six. He was sixty nine from lung cancer. And I
mean he just lived hard and smoked a lot smoked cigars, I think a
lot. And uh and it caught up with them. I guess sure did.
Yeah. So Lucy, Lucy and Desi Arnez, you know, took
the profit to I Love Lucy. They they filmed it for two years at
at the Lust Palm, I don't know what they call it now, but
it was Les Palmis and uh and Santa Monica Boulevard Dad's studio, and then
they took the profits to My Love. Then they moved over to Red Studios
that went on Coca and that's in fact, there's that. There's that picture
of the audience lining up to see I Love Lucy, and it says on
the side of it, there's a sign in the brackets still there that says
the Desilu Playhouse, and it has the audience lining up to see this taping
of this filming of I Love Lucy. And if you look really closely at
this image of the audience lining up on the side of the studio or actually
a couple of lights outdoor ceiling, you know what I mean, like mounted
on the side of the building. Well, one of those days when I
was walking by, it was hanging on a wire, literally a single goal
wire, and I and I and I poked it and it magically floated down
to gosh and actually landers Keepers, this is it. So fred Studios is
looking for their old light. It was, I mean, I look at
these duds, are broken wires fell to the ground and field whatever. But
this was yeah, this shows up from that old picture too. And I
have a lot of stuff here from her last house too, But anyway,
we're gonna get into all that. So they moved I Love Lucy too after
two years to Red Studios which is on Kawanga, and then they took the
profits of My L Lucy and bought r KO Studios and it became Desilu And
they also had an office over in Culver City near the Box a lot too
or by the MGM I thing. But but yeah, they were they.
I mean, they bought a studio. That's that's that's so cool, and
now it's all wants the paramount, as does I Love Lucy and all the
other shows that they mission impossible. And famously, when they negotiated their deal,
they got the replay rights to the show, which at the time that
the studios and networks did not realize had any value because there was no such
thing as as replays and reairs. And then a few years later they realized
that what they'd given them and they bought it back from them for a large
pile of money. They got their rights back. But yeah, so they
very wisely had the rerun rights for a time, back before there was such
a thing as runs. In fact, there's that famous moment and back to
the future, remember where he's watching TV where they're all watching TV. He's
back in the fifties and Marty says, Oh, I think I saw this
a rerun, and again Dad looks, what's a rerun? Yeah. I
don't know if it's true, but I read that that they weren't going to
film it for posterity at first, but they Lucy decided to keep it as
like home movies. I don't know that necessarily true because they didn't have any
kids at that point, but right, that's what they say. So they
were who are they? No, I don't know, but so that was
Desi arnez rest in peace Desi, and that leaves um, you know,
the Lucy herself, Lucille Ball the Great comedian, and I watched I watched
an old episode of Lila Lucy and prep for this show. I watched one
of the early early episodes from the first season where Lucy is she's reading a
crime book, she's getting wrapped up in it, and then she becomes convinced
that Desi is trying to kill her, and it is. It's so it
just reminds you of how funny the show is. There's a scene where she's
strapped pants to herself to keep him from being able to shoot her, and
they're in the room to get there and I think the kitchen together and she's
Bob and weaven like a like a boxer while they're talking, and he's kind
of like, what are you doing? And she's she's so physically so funny.
And to to watch it, you know, sixty some years later and
it's still it's still I guess, yeah, seventy years later now it's the
seventieth anniversary now of the year when the show premiered. It's it's really it's
hilarious. It's it's great when comedy carries over and holds up like that.
And I Love Lucy is definitely one of those shows that holds up. I
think, yeah, yeah, it's it's it's the formula that they've used for
probably for many many shows. But but yeah, and and Lucy herself,
I mean that was a character Lucy. You know, Lucile Ball was not
Lucy in real life, but every every every part she played on every Lucy
show. Life with Lucy I Love you know, it was always the Lucy
character, but it was far far from the real Lucio Ball most definitely.
But she was good at it. She was really good at it. And
they compare La Gilda Radner to her they compare. I'm trying to think of
some other people that they have that physical ability physical comics, you know,
and to that point, she to that point, she was a fan of
Threese Company. And one of her last one of the late things she filmed,
you know, for a few years before her death, was a Threese
Company kind of retrospective special that they did that she kind of hosted and walked
fans through some of the best moments from Threeze Company. And she reported it
was a big fan of it, and you can see why. It was
very, very similar to her her style of comedy that her show was,
you know, twenty thirty years earlier. Wow, I didn't know that.
That's fascinating. Lucy watched the Company. I could see it though. I
mean, it's very It's her and Jack, I think had a lot of
the Jack character had a lot in common that physical comedy and constantly getting into
jams. And yeah, I can totally see how she would have liked it.
But she was you know, she would always say, she'd say that
she's not funny in real life. You know, she always said that I'm
funny on paper, but I am you know, My part is to be
that way. But you know, but I'm not funny in real life.
Although she had an edge to her definitely. There was something that I read
when when Lucy died. You know, this supposedly autobiography was locked away in
this closet and Lucy Arnaz, her daughter, found it and publish it and
the story which which I took away from it, which is something I've repeated
many times and I maybe even said it on one of our podcasts, but
one of the Lucy's favorite things to do. She said that sometimes there'd be
a dinner party and after dinner they'd be standing around having cocktails and cigarettes and
somebody would inevitably, inevitably go and use the restroom. So on that person's
return to the party, Lucy that this person would be walking in and Lucy
would turn to the person to her left and say, well, there she
is, now tell her to her face. So she definitely had an edge
to her. That's hilarious, but uh and and to kind of to that
point, she also liked to say tell people that because I think she had
some she was involved in some comedy classes and stuff like that, and she
acting classes, and she said, you know, you can't learn comedy.
You either have it or you don't. And I think the large extent that's
true. You're either funny or you aren't. But and also, you know,
comedy as a craft, acting as a craft, comedy writing as a
craft. There's a lot of people out there who are funny but can't write
comedy. They're funny to be around, but they can't do comedy. They
can't do stand up, they can't write a hit comedy movie, you know
what I mean. So it's it is, Um yeah, you can't teach
funny, um, but you can learn the craft if you are funny of
developing that into being a professional comedian or comedic actor like she was. Um
So that's yeah, that's really interesting. Um So, when we've already kind
of said a lot about her career, at least what she accomplished in all
the other shows that she produced and was responsible four, and how successful she
was as a businessperson. Um, it is a little weird to watch her
shows in the sixties that are in color after they're getting to know her so
well in black and white, and she they relocated her character while the Lucy
Carmichael character to Hollywood. Thus it became like a parade of guest stars,
you know, and it was like every episode there was somebody famous that you
know. Joan Crawford was on one, and Toolula Bankhead was on one,
and John Lane was on one, and there was one a very famous one
with Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor where you know they should Elizabeth Taylor, I
had this like some ridiculous like sixty five carrot diamond ring and brought it like,
you know, I think it's literally this can't She could only take it
out of the vault like once every five years to wear it. I mean
it was a real It was a real diamond. And they used it on
the show with Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor and it fell off of no,
yeah, it fell off. She took it off to wash her hands,
Elizabeth Taylor and Lucy put it on, couldn't get it off and premise of
the show. So anyway, Richard Burton writes this in his in his diaries,
and I'm going to read this to you, and it's a real insight.
Now. Burton was was an alcoholic, you know, and in a
very pretentious and very opinionated and they were at the top of the Liz and
Dick fame thing too. You know what I mean? They were they were
Everyone was fascinated with these two people. So this is what he has to
say about Lucy. Okay, Now, those who uh, those who have
told us that Lucille Ball was very wearing, were not exaggerating. She is
a monster of staggering charmlessness and monumental lack of humor. She is not wearing
to us because I suppose we refuse to be worn. I am coldly sarcastic
with her, to the point of outright contempt. But she hears only what
she wants to hear, nineteen solid years of double takes and pratfalls, and
despite upstaging and cutting other people's laughs, if she can nervously watching the rays
as she does so. A machine of enormous energy, which driven by a
stupid driver who has forgotten that a machine runs on oil as well as gasoline,
and who has neglected the former, is creaking badly towards a final convulsive
seize up. I loathed her that first day, I loathed her the second
and the third. I loathe her today, but now I also pity her.
After tonight, I shall make a point of never seeing her again.
We work, or have worked until today, which is the last, thank
God, from ten am to somewhere around five pm. And Milady Milady Balls
can thank her lucky stars that I am not drinking. There's a chance that
I might have killed her. Jack Benny, the most amiable man in the
world and one of the truly great comedians of our time, said that in
four days she reduced his life expectancy by ten years. The impactably professional Joan
Crawford was so inhibited by his bonnoth of selfishness that she got herself stupendously crocked
for the entire show and virtually had to be helped to her feet and managed
not without some satisfaction. I dare say, to bug her up the whole
show. And Joan Rivers was Joe cropperd supposedly said, you know, and
they think I'm a bitch. So that is scathing and I'm sure, you
know, exaggerated considerably, but very elequantly well thought out and you know,
and one person's perspective, but it also is um you know, backed up
by some would you know, say, facts, very gross grossly uh you
know, just yeah, fashion. I couldn't. I was like my eyes
are bugged out of my head reading. Oh god, I kind of wandered
too though. You know, anytime there's criticism of someone like her from her
era, how much sexism is it? Was involved in that? And would
they think feel that way if it was a male, a man doing what
she did? Ye, lazing the trail. She had to be who she
was in order to survive in the do what she did basically, and the
fruits of that are or self evident, you know what she accomplished. Yeah,
I can kind of see both sides of it. She said that women's
lives talking about women's lib. You know, she'd been doing this. She
owned a studio for God's sake, you know, women's lib. Oh,
I'm afraid it doesn't interest me one bit. I've been so liberated it hurts.
Right. So she had she knew what work she was proto. She
was proto women's lib. She was precursor to it. Yeah, she knew
what work and in any in any capacity except for the very last life with
Lucy, in every capacity she succeeded in being that character. Really and uh
and her well, it treated her well. Um. So she passed away
on April twenty sixth, nineteen eighty nine, at seventy seven. So she
was the last of the main cast to pass away. Desi had passed away
three years earlier. And um, she was seventy seven, and she died
from an abdominal aortic aneurysm. She had had. She'd been hospitalized, I
believe, for some heart problems leading up to that UM and then had been
released and then and then had severe she woke up a severe back pain,
which is one of the symptoms of abdominal air ortogandriism, and was died at
the hospital. Was declared dead at the hospital. Yeah, she she was
in the hospital for about eight or nine days. She had she had chest
pains and they you know, a doctor came and to go now and within
a couple hours, right, and a table for like eight hours and uh
and um and and they gave her an a order from a guy twenty seven
year old motorcycle accident fatality is where she got it from this this valve.
And and she was recuperating, you know, she was up and she was
walking around her hospital room and everything, and of course the world was morning
that morning. But worried. I remember Jerry's Delly was across the street from
Cedars and her room overlooked it, and they had a big sign, get
well Lucy, I painted on the roof of that. And then uh,
the hard Rock Cafe, which was down in the corner, had a big
sign, get well Lucy. They had a scroll. I don't know whatever
happened to this thing, but it was like an entire block of Hollywood Boulevard
where people were signing get well wishes to Lucy. I mean it was a
you know, it was She's a big deal and uh and um. But
anyway, she she ended up collapsing at the hospital and died suddenly, so
that you know, that was that was a surprise. They she was on
the mend and uh, and everyone thought she'd be out in no time,
but no time happened rather quickly and uh, and that's what she had.
And I think and I think doctors claimed that her her aneurysm that she died,
her aircanyism she had was unrelated to the surgery. I don't know if
that's I don't know if that's true or not. But it was days apart,
so I don't know. A life a time of smoking non builter cigarettes
her teeth. It's nice though, that all those nice outpouring of support happened,
because supposedly she was a bit bitter kind of in the last years of
her life and it didn't help that. You know, DESI died in eighty
six, and I think that was the same year she attempted a comeback show
that got canceled after a couple of months, so she had she got hit
pretty hard, pretty brutal. That show was terrible, and yeah, she
didn't recuperate from that when life with Lucy was was just horrendous and it was
a real shame. It's a real shame. But she was you know,
she was in her upper seventies at that point, and she just did televish,
moved on, and she was still being that character. She was still
portraying that character. We've mentioned this before on the show once or twice,
but her last public appearance was at the Academy Awards with Bob Hope just about
four weeks before she passed away. They came out and I think presented an
award together or something, introduced something. Yeah, it was yeah, and
she looked great. She really, I mean, you know, a lifetime
of smoking was clear, but but she had su stressed and it was cut
up to her, you know, to her her thigh, and she looked
amazing and and it was a nice way to go out being uh, you
know, being greeted that that lovingly by the audience with Bob Hope. And
but I don't think kind of like it's kind of like Chaplain, kind of
like Chaplin coming back towards the end of his life at the Academy Awards and
getting the Standing Ovation. Yeah. Yeah, but she was, Yeah,
so she was. She was cremated and she was placed in a niche with
her mother at Forest on Hollywood Hills and the Columbarium of Radiant Dawn. And
I know that at the top my head of reading that I used to go
there. And then but then her kids bid for her house in Jamestown,
New York, where she grew up on eBay. I guess the house was
on eBay and they bought it within you know, some sort of investors,
and now there's a Lucy Museum in Jamestown. So, against her mother's wishes,
uh, their mother's wishes, they had Lucy and her mother exhumed from
Fort Lawn, the place where they chose to be to now she's a tourist
attraction in Jamesown, Jamestown, New York, which you know, that's just
just the way it is. But um, yeah, but yeah, Lucy,
Lucy herself chose where her final resting place would be and uh and uh
it was not to be but you know her her supposedly, but now I
find it. There was another story that I that I heard about Lucy.
Um, you know Kay, you know who Kay Ballard was. Um,
it sounds very familiar. She was the star of the Mothers in Law,
that show that DESI produced, and she was an old you know, old
pro comic stand up stuff. She was an amazing singer, and she's a
she's a lesbian. I mean, Lucy hung around with a lot of lesbians
and uh and uh, but Kay Ballard was was you know, very there's
a rele to that. And I don't know what it is my bringing out
that she was gay. But anyway, Kay Ballard and Lucy were a close
friends. And this is a story that the Kay Ballard tells. She said,
Lucy and I in Palm Springs, Lucy and I were riding bikes when
a dog came out of the woods. Foaming at the mouth. She just
looked at the dog and screamed to get the gut it here, and the
dog ran back into the woods. Kay ballards as I turned her and said,
that is why you are queen of the world and I am nothing.
That's awesome. But Lucy lived at the same house for till till she died.
They bought the house in the in the fifties on Roxbury Drive, one
thousand Roxbury Drive, and she lived there until the day she died. Unless
she didn't died in the house she lived until the day she died, the
same house she shared with Daisy, same house she brought up her kids,
and the same house she shared with Gary Morton. Gary. Um. So
there's a number This happens a lot. There's a number of If you scroll
through the IMDb for I Love Lucy, there's you see this a lot.
With other shows that were long running. There's certain actors who you've never heard
of, but who appear in a bunch of episodes, always as kind of
a different character, right, they bring back the same person guy or girl
to play various extra parts. Really are a featured extra. Sometimes they have
a line, sometimes they don't, and the one that stood out to me
was an actor named Bennett Green, and he was actually Desi's stand in on
the show. And I've seen this before and stuff I've worked on where he
is a stand in. He's the stand in is there on set every day
anyways. So if you need an extra, you need, you need somebody
to play a messenger at the door or whatever, or a party guest,
why not grab them. They're standing there anyways. So Bennett Green ended up
appearing in fifteen episodes, but always as somebody different. He was a messenger,
he was a delivery man, he was a camera operator, he was
a dock worker, florist, hot dog vendor, party guests, neighbor man
on the street, stage hand in the audience, etc. And then he
also went on to appear in eight episodes in similar supporting parts on The Lucy
Show in the sixties, which is kind of interesting since Deasy wasn't around for
that. He wasn't the stand in anymore, but they obviously, you know,
must have formed some type of relationship with him and kept bringing him back.
Bennett Green passed away on September eighth, nineteen eighty two. He was
seventy seven and he is also at Hollywood Forever, which is cool. Aaron
Spelling. There's a bunch of you, scrow. I mean, there's hundreds
and hundreds of actors and actresses credited on the IMDb, so there's probably a
bunch of cool ones I've missed. But Aaron Spelling played a gas station man
on an episode, so you must have been one of those little bit parts.
And there were also a bunch of celebrity guests who appeared as themselves on
I Love Lucy. The most famous one, I think is William Holden,
and that one of my most famous scenes from the whole show when they go
to Hollywood and she has She's at the brown Derby and Bill brown Derby right
or yeah, it's the brown Derby there, Yeah, and William Holden is
there and she has this hilarious encounter with him, you know, him playing
himself. John Wayne was also in at orson Wells. Bob Hope, Rock
Hudson, Rock Hudson, Van Johnson, and head A Hopper all appeared as
themselves, and there's probably more than a miss but I thought that was kind
of interesting. Um, it's a lot of celebrity guest appearances when they went
to Hollywood. Um, you know, because I'm a little bit of a
well everyone is that lives in La Uh. You know you look in the
background constantly for stuff you recognized. Yeah, because it's almost like a documentary
to some extent. Yeah. Yeah, there's that scene where they first get
the Hollywood and they pull into a hotel and that hotels the Avalon and will
sure you know that hotel your century city, but you know it's got that
kind of mid century kind of breeze block right eerier and you see right into
there. Now when they showed the sets and they're you know, they're on
the set, they're in their room at their hotel room. The view outside
the window was a photograph taken from the roof of the studio where they made
it. Because you could see the Hollywood sign, you could see the Plaza
Hotel, you could see the product. All those signs are still there,
and uh but it was so they basically went on the roof until the course
and blew it up and made it to the exterior of their hotel, which
is kind of a clever idea well easy once they clever. So the Harpo
Marx thing was great. There was there were some really great. I love
the Hollywood episodes. They're my favorites most definitely. So let's talk about ghosts,
shall we. Um You mentioned you mentioned her house in Beverly Hills on
which is at a thousand North Roxbury Drive. Unfortunately, it was a few
years after she passed away. Gary Morton sold it and somewhere at some point
the new owners heavily renovated it, which is really too bad. So it
still somewhat, you know, resembles the original house, but it's kind of
been plastered and part of it was torn down, and it's just it's a
bummer. It's a bummer. It's always a bummer when these houses get especially
one that someone lived in it for a long time like she did. Like
it's a bummer that people don't respect the history and leave them alone. But
there's lots of stories that she haunts the house, and some of the ones
I've found, there's the reports of broken windows and a lot of activity in
the attic, loud voices coming from the attic, furniture in the house getting
moved around, but also boxes in the attic getting moved around. People have
heard the sounds of a party upstairs, before. People have heard the is
Love Lucy theme song come from the These are the current owners you know that
you're claiming or past owners. I don't know if he who owns it now.
And there's a blog called seeks Ghosts that says that I think originated this
story that a friend of Lucille's grove past the property to see the home one
last time. Walls were missing, she was in being renovated. He could
see Lucille's old bedroom and then he noticed the tall, slim redhead peering through
the fence at what was left. And she turned toward him and realized it
was Lucy, and she looked upset and confused, and then she walked around
the south corner of the house and disappeared. Wow. Interesting, Wow,
that's that I've never heard any of these stories. That's really interesting. Um
the attic is where she used to tie up and beat the kids. Oh
nice, just kidding. We got like a Mommy Dearest thing going on here.
I've heard I've heard these stories before and uh, and it seems to
come from multiple sources, so it is interesting. And I mean among people
that are into paranormal investigating and stuff that it is the um the less traveled
places and buildings, or would they say where you know the ghosts like to
hang out basically and not be bothered. So that's attics, crawl spaces,
basements, storage areas, closets, whatever, secret rooms, behind doors,
whatever is where they hang out. So it's interesting that a lot of the
stuff seems focused on the attic of the house. Um and then uh there's
also claims that she haunts the old studio building which is now at Paramount.
I heard that one. Yeah, I've heard that one. No, the
I know it was. It was the one unlast Palmus was I was.
I heard that, dude, I'm not saying one on Lost Palmus where they
filmed the last the first two years of the show. I've heard that,
but um yeah, so yeah she good for her and then she also they
had a ranch house in uh in the Valley and in Chatsworth called Desilu Ranch.
Unfortunately was it was demolished in mid seventies for a subdivision that was built
there, so kind of a bummer. But it was up on Devin Shure
uh so pretty far north. And then um, she all they also had
a place in Palms for Yes, I knew about that one too. You
know, something happened which I don't know what this. I want to go
back to the house in a second, but which they had a few.
They had three funerals for her. One was a private family, a private
one in Los Angeles, and it was funny because Gary Morton was put was
quoted in the in the U I don't know what magazine or newspaper and says,
you know, it's gonna be a private thing. We got a guy
around here that shows where people died, and none of us wanted anything like
that talking about, which was kind of funny. But so they had these
three funerals, went in Los Angeles, went in New York, one in
Chicago. I was living in Chicago at the time, so I went to
the Chicago one, and I can't explain what happened. This is the weirdest
thing. And I don't know this paranormal. It's probably something ridiculous. And
it didn't happen in the in the cathedral either, but I was on my
way. We took a taxi from the office to the funeral, and this
never happened to me before or since. But I was in the taxi.
We're talking about Lucy and I looked up and it was at that very moment
there were like water in my eyes, both my eyes, dripping water directly
into my eyes. There was nothing there. There was no one near me
that did do that. There was nothing in the taxi. But it was
just the weirdest. I can't explain it. I just always attributed it to
Lucy because it happened right then, but it just so it was weird.
I've never heard about anyone else either. But you know, my eyes are
fine now, they're you know, old and decrepit, but uh, but
then, you know, it was just the weirdest thing. I looked up
in boom, these these drops of waters were in my eye. Was just
the weirdest you were. You were in the taxi. It was in the
back of it, so like like it came out of the ceiling. There
was nothing there, nothing, nothing there. I was talking to the person
next to me and I said, what you know, and there was like
nothing. I can't explain it, so I can't say it's super I'm going
to say that was one of the weirdest things that I can't turn It's like
you turned into one of those uh, those Catholic statues that cry maybe so
on a next but it was weird. I can't like you to figure out
what that was. But anyway, so, uh so, yeah, and
Lucy. So I don't I really know the logistics of that house. The
house was empty for probably six years, sitting there on that corner, and
it was just falling apart. I mean people, you know, no one
was living in it, and all of Lucy's things were still in it.
And somebody I knew worked at it was a Universal and I don't know what
the I didn't know how these you know, ownership of what ended up where
I know that The Lucy Show was made at Universal. I don't know who,
you know who actually owned it, but my friend, I think work
for Universal was documenting everything that was in the house, and you know it's
got to look you know, Lucy kept some of her costumes there too,
which was kind of cool. So and also that Lucy Museum was at Universal
Studios for a while down where, you know, down in the on the
lower section of Universal Studio. So Universal must own something with of Lucy,
or at least used to. And uh so, so this house sat there
empty for years and it was literally falling apart. I mean, like the
shutters, which I don't want. They're in a box somewhere. I have
some of her shutters that were just like, you know, we're just falling
literally apart. Uh. We were able to get into the house actually at
one point and it was you know, it was empty at that point and
the walls were falling down and we got my friend got her welcome Matt.
But so it would be amazing. I would love to have that. Yeah,
and it has one of the events which is all you know, all
yellow and nicotined, and you know, because it hadn't been it hadn't been
redone in a very very long time. Yeah. So it cut to about
a year ago. I get this this email out of nowhere from a guy
who says, I have Lucy sink. Do you want it? And I'm
like it was her hair sink and he goes, I have this to you
one and and I'm like from her house on rockspurw I'm like yeah, So
within you know, half an hour, I was at the guy's house and
you know, you can't you know, this is a between us thing.
I mean I could talk about it. Obviously. He gave it to me
because he knows what I do, and I couldn't de vulte who he is.
But he gave me the sink that Lucy had in her house that she
would have her hair dyed every week or so. It had like a little
the little scoop out of it for you to put your head like an hair
dresser studio. Yea, I get it, so so so I have.
And then he gave me this envelope and or two of Lucy's credit cards,
you know, gas cards and stuff like that, to Lucile Bone and he's
like, here, you can have these, because you know, I'm not
going to do anything with him, at least if you haven't, someone will
have someone to be so, you know. So so I have Karen Carpenter's
sink, and I I have Lucy's sink. And then there was a guy
who's probably still selling it on eBay, little vials of the hair dye that
she she used. It was a particular Egyptian type of hair dye that Hannah
that she use. And there was I remember she was not a natural redhead.
She had brown hair, I believe naturally right, Yeah, she wouldn't
a redhead, but the but it was only a particular shade of red and
only a particular type of dye that she would use. Mum. So then
you know, upon little searching, I found an appearance that she did on
the die I think it was Dinah Shore Show and her and Vivian Vance were
on this show together, and this is in the seventies. And they tell
a story about being in Lucy's house and they're getting their hair done and this
is cool because I have the sync now you know, it's sitting like driveway
right now. But um, but and she says, Vivian Van starts the
story, and keep in mind, this is the six this is the seventies,
and and if you watch the Dean Martin Celebrity breads, it's very unpolitically
correct. I mean to the point where it's like people would be, you
know, protesting and demanding death if they were to watch these and to right,
and I'm dead serious, they are so out there anyway. So so
but this is you know, it's a good natured show and good nature of
the Vivian Vance is saying, you know, Lucy and I she was getting
I was getting my hair dyed peroxided, and Lucy was getting her Hannah and
and we've got you know, our toes up. We're getting pedicures and and
we're sitting in Lucy's house and the next thing, you know, this group
of people walked through the house and they're they're dressed up, and they've got
these amazing clothes on and and and they're clearly well it was the you know,
it's Lucy's saying they're from India or Siam, I guess at that point.
And then she goes and they're wearing these clothes and then the women had
the dot the whole thing, you know, walking through their house. So
they're walking literally like a tour bus dropped them off, and you were walking
through Lucy's house and they're walking through you know, this beauty room where you're
giving their hairstyle, and she and Lynn and Vivian Vance says, and we
found out later it was the King as I am, you know, so
walking through Lucy's house as the other box. But it was just it was
it was FASHIONA hear this story and now, you know, having a piece
of it, it's kind of cool too, but uh yeah, it's just
it's a it's a different time and there's a lot of things wrong at that
time. Uh, certainly, But but there's there's nuts. Um. You
know, Lucy was her own mold that she broke. I mean, she
she she was, she was everything, you know, she was the whole
deal, businessperson, successful actress, mother, you know. Yea, and
even even the daughter Lucy Arne said, you know when you're when you're the
daughter of two beyond the realm of comprehension famous people, and uh and and
it's true that had to have been very difficult. And now there's all that
uproar about the uproar but they're making the new biopic and uh and uh yeah,
I guess they've already cast Nicole Kidman as Lucy and uh as your Nash.
But I watched a little in Graham thing that she did and she goes,
this isn't you know. They're not being Lucy and Ricky like you know
them. They're being my parents. And it's not a hack job. This
is a real story and you're gonna get a real look at the way things
were. We're not casting yeah I love Lucy. We're casting them as human
right And uh so it's it's gonna be it's gonna be an interesting project.
Yeah, I think anything like a k wouldn't be wished. It sucked,
you know. So originally Kate Blantchett was supposed to play Lucy in this in
this show, and for whatever reason that changed and uh and they there it's
now gonna be um Nicole Kidman. So people were, I think we're bum
because Kate Blanchett is a is fantastic, She's such a fantastic actor, but
so is Nicole Kidman. So uh, you know, they get the benefit
of it out For me, I hope it. I hope it's good.
Yeah, yeah, most definitely. Did you read well, you must have?
It was big, kind of one of those entertainment funny stories. But
they had the James Town, you know museum Lucy's hometown in her old house
where she grew up in at your Lucy's not buried, but a couple of
years ago there was. It was kind of a scandal because they had the
most hideous Lucy statue there. Remember that, Yes, Oh my god,
it was so bad, horrifying and uh and it was commissioned and approved because
they put it in a park somewhere and for some reason, I just wereth
the eyes in the in the smile just like crazy. It wasn't that the
one where the face was just like it would haunt your dreams, like it
was gonna run you and chew your face up. You know. It was
so I don't know, Like I said, it was approved by somebody and
it was put there and they must have had some sort of ceremony and they
probably unveiled it. Were like, yeah, but that cost a lot of
money. We're just gonna leave it. But they ended up replacing it.
And I don't know what happened to the original Ugly Lucy. But if anyone
has it and doesn't want it anymore, I will be happy to take it.
I would love Ugly Lucy. I think that'll be. I would have
it in front of my museum, my next museum. Oh my god,
I would sew me up. Oh yeah, most definitely. That's awesome.
Is that it? I think? So? I mean the other huge So
we talked about briefly. You know Gayale Gordon, who played mister Mooney and
he followed her for her incarnations of the last Lucy shows. Uh ended up
being you know, she was. He was married for fifty seven years,
died of cancer. Keith Thibadeau was still alive. He played a little ricky
Elizabeth Patterson who played Missus Trumbull, the neighbor upstairs. She died actually in
the in the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel. She's one of the three people that actually
died in the hotel that are famous. I mean people died in hotel time.
So and Mary Jane Croft was also one of her co stars in later
the Lucy Show, I think, and she died in nineteen ninety nine eighty
three in Century Park, Century City. And I don't know. I think
the last story is it's it's not a nice story. But we know that
Vivian Vance and William Frawley they didn't care for each other very much. Right.
According to rumor, Vivian Dance was on set for some show when she
got the news that Fraley died and she and her word reaction, WI was
champagne for everyone. Oh well, um, with that champagne for everyone to
our our listeners, um and uh. And also if we mentioned Patreon,
we do have a Patreon page and Patreon supporters all get early or the five
dollars months ones to get early access to the episodes, and then everybody who
subscribes to Patreon gets um our extra mini shows that we do between these main
ones. So hustle on over to Patreon and look up Dearly Departed podcast.
Uh And and you know, we appreciate all the support to everyone who keeps
backing us up and and supporting the show. It it really means a lot
of it helps. It does. And yeah, and thank you very much
for doing so. And if you don't mind, Mike, I'm gonna give
my my YouTube channel a plus because of course, because that's there is no
more tour. So that's how I'm making a living. But in this,
in this, I mean this, in that or my job now. But
recently, I you know, Dean Martin's house um here in Paul Springs is
abandoned, and I did a good walk around to that the other day and
I put that up on YouTube. When I did the episode of Ghost Adventures,
I did a lot of footage of the cecil. I uploaded that to
my YouTube channel. And so that's what I've been working on. And it's
some you know, some unusual things that I don't think a lot of people
have seen. So so that is and you did, uh you when Don
Wells passed away this past a few weeks ago you put up you opened up
what you have got at her um garage, say what you would even forgotten
what you had gotten. See kind of every box open, reveal of it,
which is cool. How many subscribers are you up to now? I
was like sixty sixty five thousand. I think it's fantastic. Yeah, it's
I've been I've been lucky because people like what I do. So I'm very
and I love it now because I said, without the business and I missed
delete departed tours, but I sure don't miss the hassles. I don't miss
I don't miss the physical hassles of dealing with traffic, of dealing with insurance
and insurance and insurance and you know it just mechanics on the van and it
was so I mean, I can't tell you how relieved it is right now
to have this time, to not have to have that hanging over my head
all the time. And I miss it. God, I do miss it,
but I wouldn't mind, you know. But it's just everything else was
not fun. So there's a ten twenty percent fun and the rest of it
was like aggravating. So now it's kind of cool. I can do what
I do, do what I want, and uh, and I like it
and people, you know, watch my YouTube. It's free. It's free.
Yeah, and it's Dearly Departed Tours online. That's it, yeah on
YouTube. Um and what what did you find again in don Wells that you
got from don Wells's since we mentioned it from her her garage sale, Well,
I found it. I bought a jacket. I bought o her eyelashes,
That's what it was her. Okay, she had a vitamin container.
You know, you got like the long containers Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday and every day had a pair of eyelashes in them, which is pretty
funny. And uh, a prescription for I forget what it was. And
I don't know, you know, it's so funny. It's just the other
day. But it was. I had a ton of stuff I did.
Um, but it was all and I like the reels O wigs, Oh
my god, I got somebody wigs. Oh and go go boots. I
got white Mary Anne wore wigs. Yeah, I know, I know,
but they're all labeled, you know, fall good one, uh, you
know kind of thing. But the favorite episode of Gilligans Island or Where the
girls are singing. They're in a group called the Honey Bees. And uh
and I got this pair of white gogo boots. Now, I looked at
him pretty closely, and I don't think they're the same ones. But people
who watched that video claim they they think that those are the real ones that
she used for the show. I can't That would be pretty cool, and
I don't know how to prove that, but um, but they're pretty Maryann's
go go boots anyway, you know, just even But how many pairs of
gog boots can Mary Anne? Have? You know? How many white gogu
boots did she own here? Yeah? So, uh so, I don't
know if if there anyone out there can you know, identify stuff like that.
And and I'd love to hear from you. Yeah, if you had
to see a screen worn costume from Gilligan's Island from you know, Mary Anne,
I'd be pretty cool. Go go boots. Yeah, well, everybody,
thank you so much, very much, appreciate it. And a toast
of champagne do you all, and we will see you on the next one.
This has been an episode of the Dearly Departed podcast. Dig Up more
episodes at Dearly departedpod dot com and on iTunes and Google Play. See you
next time.