Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz’s Daughter Is Planning an Era-Spanning Series Telling the Two Comedians’ Story
Lucie Arnaz wants to explore the untold parts of her mother’s and father’s life stories
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Lucie Arnaz is teaming up with Bob Greenblatt to share the life stories of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz in a new project
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The team is envisioning a television series that tells the two comedians’ stories, first as individuals and then as they come together and create entertainment industry magic
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Lucie told Variety about the process of sharing the series with different partners and what she hopes to achieve
Lucie Arnaz is ready to share her parents’ stories in a larger capacity.
On Wednesday, Dec. 10, Variety confirmed that the daughter of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz has partnered with former NBC Entertainment and WarnerMedia Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt to share the life stories of each in a new project.
Arnaz and Greenblatt want to lay out the details of the two’s lives “as a three-season deep dive into the lives of Ball and Arnaz, from the couple’s separate tumultuous upbringings to making TV history with I Love Lucy — and then the clashes that led to their eventual divorce.”
“If you’re really willing to look at the whole thing, there’s quite a story there, and a lot to be learned,” Arnaz told the outlet. “It’s very emotional, and it’s not what people think. It’s not just all about ‘I Love Lucy.’”
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Greenblatt agrees that they are hopeful it will be presented to audiences as “a multi-season show.”
“We think it’s three seasons of eight episodes. Obviously, we have to find the right buyer and cater to what they want to do. But it needs to have time to breathe. It really is an extraordinary story, from when they’re each teenagers in their separate worlds — one being Cuba as it’s coming apart at the seams, and one being very WASPy New York,” he told Variety.
“They were both thrust out on their own, quickly at a young age, to try to figure out who they were and find their way in the business. Then they converge in 1940 on a soundstage at RKO, doing a movie together. I Love Lucy is 11 years later, but that’s 11 years when they’re together in a marriage that’s up and down and complex.”
J. Wilds/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz arrive in London with Desi Jr and Lucie in 1959
Arnaz and Greenblatt are in the process of pitching the series, the working title of which is Lucy and Desi: The Greatest Story Never Told, which will draw from Lucille’s autobiography, Love, Lucy, as well as Desi’s A Book, both of which have had rights reverted back to the estates.
While Arnaz is, of course, very close to the story being told, Greenblatt commends her “ability to separate herself from being in the middle of it and really see it from an objective point of view.”
“She’s the first person to say, ‘We want to do it warts and all, and we don’t want to just whitewash it and protect everybody.’ It really is complex. Can we get underneath the causes and the reasons for the way they were? We all think they’re the Ricardos. There’s a part of them that’s who they were, but that’s so little of the full picture.”
Arnaz added, “There’s been now two TV movies and a feature film and my documentary, but none of those other films ever looked at, ‘OK, that happened and that happened, but why? Why did he do that? Why did she respond that way?’ I wanted to correct that.”
