Life with Lucy

Life With Lucy
Title card for Life With Lucy.
Format	Sitcom
Created by	Bob Carroll Jr. Madelyn Davis
Starring	Lucille Ball Gale Gordon Ann Dusenberry Larry Anderson Jenny Lewis Philip J. Amelio II Donovan Scott
Country of origin	United States
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	14 (List of episodes)
Production
Running time	Appx. 23-25 min.
Distributor	CBS Television Distribution
Broadcast
Original channel	ABC
Original run	September 20, 1986 – November 15, 1986
Chronology
Preceded by	Here's Lucy

Life With Lucy is an American sitcom starring Lucille Ball. The show ran on the ABC network in 1986, and unlike Ball's previous programs, it was a critical and ratings flop. Only eight out of the thirteen episodes that were filmed aired before ABC cancelled the series.

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, widower 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.

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. ABC commited the series to a 22-episode season. 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 characters on 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. The stunts were handled by actor Donovan Scott, who played Lucy's 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.

The show's theme song was performed by Eydie Gorme.

Ratings and cancellation

The cast

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. (This was the only Lucy sitcom in which Vance, who had died in 1979, never appeared.)

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 (the seventh-lowest rated show on TV 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; it briefly aired on Nick at Nite as part of a Lucille Ball-themed marathon in 1994, but otherwise has never been rerun. 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.

In July 2002, TV Guide named Life With Lucy the 26th-worst TV series of all time, stating, in their words, that it was, "without a doubt, the saddest entry in [their] list of bad TV shows of all time".

DVD releases

The series has yet to be released on DVD.

Cast

Main

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

Recurring

• Kellie Martin as Patty

Guest Stars

Life with Lucy had two special guest stars- John Ritter (Lucy Makes a Hit With John Ritter) as himself and Audrey Meadows (Mother of the Bride) as Lucy's sister, Audrey.

Episodes

External links

• Life with Lucy at the Internet Movie Database
• Life With Lucy : The Lucy Shows