“Little Ricky’s School Pageant”

(S6;E10 ~ December 17, 1956) Directed by James V. Kern. Written by

Madelyn Martin, Bob Carroll, Jr., Bob Schiller and Bob Weiskopf. Filmed October 25, 1956 at Ren-Mar Studio. Rating: 43.4/63

Synopsis ~ Little Ricky is cast as the lead in his school play, with Lucy, Ricky, Fred and Ethel also getting into the act.

The day this episode first aired, actor Eddie Acuff died at age 53. His best-known recurring role was that of Mr. Beasley, the postman, in the Blondie movie series. He did three films with Lucille Ball: Next Time I Marry (1938), Without Love (1945), and Miss Grant Takes Richmond (1949).

After more than five years on television, actors who worked on “I Love Lucy” could be seen most everywhere, on any night of the week, on any channel!

The day this episode was filmed (October 25, 1956), Elizabeth Patterson (Mrs. Trumbull) appeared on CBS’s “Playhouse 90″ in an episode titled “Rendezvous in Black”. Patterson’s final appearance as Mrs. Trumbull had aired two months previously.

On the same night, on ABC, “Wire Service” featured Lawrence Dobkin (left) and Ross Elliot (right), each of whom had done three episodes of “I Love Lucy.”

Finally, that night on NBC, “Lux Video Theatre” featured one of TV’s busiest character actors, Herb Vigran, who made time to appear in four episodes of “I Love Lucy.”

This is the first episode after the Ricardos and Mertzes trip to Florida and Cuba. The trunk that Lucy got locked inside of during “The Passports” (S5;E11) makes an appearance. Apparently it made the trip South after its European travels.

The episode opens with Fred and Little Ricky playing cowboys and Indians (”the last time Fred had hair”) and Lucy on the telephone with Carolyn Appleby. About her trip, Lucy says that she took cha-cha-cha lessons at the hotel which cost just $30 (”$10 a cha”). Lucy likens the cha-cha to the rumba and even demonstrates a few steps. In 1956 the Cha-Cha dance craze had just hit the United States. It was developed in Cuba in the early 1950s by composer Enrique Jorrín.

In 1954, Desi’s pianist Marco Rizo and Kevin Morgan released a song called “Cha-Cha-Cha” (“Sha-Sha-Sha”) which was actually a slow mambo rather than a cha-cha.

Ethel asks Lucy if they want to play bridge, despite previously stating she’d never play with Lucy again. The reason?

ETHEL: “Our television set is broken!”

This line instantly recalls an episode with not one, not two, but three broken televisions: “The Courtroom” (S2;E7, above).

Lucy calls Ricky “a regular Cuban Dr. Spock.” This is another reference to Dr. Benjamin Spock, the best-selling author and pediatrician. In “Nursery School” (S5;E9) Ricky reads from his 1946 book “Dr. Spock’s Baby and Child Care.”

Oops! As Lucy helps take off Little Ricky’s jacket, the front door of the apartment is open. In the next shot, Fred enters the apartment by opening the door.

Little Ricky’s teacher is named Miss Pringle. Like Caroline Appleby, Clifford Terry, and Jimmy Wilson’s overweight mother, these characters remain off-screen.

Hearing that the school wants parental participation, Ricky hopes he doesn’t have to cook Spanish food for 800 people at a school bazaar again. Now that would have made an interesting episode!

While listening to his son talk about the pageant, Ricky Sr. peruses a copy of The Fisherman magazine. Coincidentally, three episodes earlier, Fred perused the same copy of the same magazine while in Miami Beach about to go… fishing!

FOR MORE ABOUT THE MAGAZINES FEATURED ON THE SERIES CLICK HERE!

At first, Ricky thinks he will be asked to direct and produce the pageant, but the PTA assigns the job to Clifford Terry because he runs an orange juice stand and will provide free refreshments at intermission. Orange juice (or orangeade) is a beverage traditionally served at theater and cinema concessions. While seeing "The Most Happy Fella” during “Lucy’s Night in Town” (S6;E22), Lucy tries to get Ricky to vacate his seat by sending him out to the lobby for orangeade. Selling oranges in the theater dates back to Elizabethan times, when ‘orange-girls’ (generally prostitutes) sold the fruit to spectators.

Although the episode was filmed in front of a live studio audience, most of the actual pageant was filmed after the audience had gone home due to the amount of children involved and the technical demands.

The 10-minute pageant is entitled “The Enchanted Forest.”

In it, Ricky plays a Hollow Tree,

Fred plays Hippity-Hoppity the Frog,

Lucy is the Wicked Witch, and Ethel is the Fairy Princess.

Ricky says that Ethel got the role by default because she fits the costume worn by Jimmy Wilson’s mother last year. Lucy intimates that Mrs. Wilson was a plus-sized princess.

Little Ricky plays the leading role of Billy Brown. He was promoted from the ensemble when another little boy got ill.

His ‘sister’ Suzy Brown was played by Candy Rogers Schoenberg.

In addition, the cast of “The Enchanted Forest” consists of 12 gnomes, 12 bunnies, 3 dancing owls…

…and a skunk!

The scenery and choreography for the pageant were designed by Desi’s fishing buddy and friend Pepito Perez (aka Pepito the Clown) and his wife Joanne, who ran a nearby Dance Academy. For years afterward, Joanne used the Enchanted Forest backdrops for their productions of “Hansel and Gretel.” Their school also provided the two dozen other students for the pageant. Candy Rogers was their prize pupil so was rewarded with the lead.

Above is a rare rehearsal photo with the actors in their street clothes and the camera in the foreground.

“The show took 3 days to film. I was pretty distracted by the antics of Lucy in the background. I was the tallest bunny.” ~ Bonnie Brown

“I had such a blast shooting this. I got to meet the actor who played Wyatt Earp [Hugh O’Brien] on his popular western show! I was the blonde bunny with the curls and you can tell which one I am by the string my mother had sewn between the bunny ears. I was also one of the taller bunnies.” ~ Bonnie "Bonita” George

The routine with the bunnies (and possibly the gnomes and owls, too) was used by Joanne in other recitals. Pepito had appeared in the (then) un-aired “I Love Lucy” pilot as well as “The Audition” (S1;E6), where he did his clown act to help pad out an episode that was running short.

The frog and owl costumes is now on display at the Lucy-Desi Museum in Jamestown, New York.

Offstage / screen piano accompaniment (rumored by some to have been provided by Joanne Perez herself) plays "Funeral March of a Marionette” to underscore the entrance of the gnomes. The piece was written by Charles Gounod around 1879, but is probably more familiar as the theme tune of “Alfred Hitchcock Presents” (1955). The music has since become synonymous with director Alfred Hitchcock.

The pageant (and the episode) ends with the entire cast singing a song called “The Witch Has Changed” while Lucy hovers haphazardly overhead on her broomstick.

“The Witch has changed from bad to good
And now she’s acting like she should.
She loves each child eternally
And she loves you and you and me!”

FAST FORWARD!

In 1989, Keith Thibodeaux (Little Ricky) told a reporter from the Chicago Tribune about this episode:

“I was in a school pageant and the script had me forgetting my lines,” Thibodeaux said. “But in real life I was distracted by all the other children on the set, especially the little girls, and I really couldn’t remember what I was supposed to say.” His TV parents, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, were not amused, on camera or off, when Little Ricky forgot how he was supposed to forget. That, Thibodeaux said, was typical of the uptight atmosphere on the set of “I Love Lucy.”

“Funeral March of a Marionette” is heard again “Lucy Meets the Mustache” (1960) when Lucy Ricardo wants to open a sealed letter Ricky has written to his Uncle Carlos in Cuba, so she tries a inserting a knitting needle under the flap, a method she says saw in an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

The music is used again – this time for comic effect – when in “Mr. and Mrs.” (a 1974 Lucille Ball Special), Lucy comes waddling in extremely pregnant. The underscoring emphasized her profile’s similarity to Alfred Hitchcock.

This is not the last time the group will get involved in a PTA show. In Westport, “Lucy Does the Tango” (S6;E20) for the PTA (hopefully without her pockets full of raw eggs).

On “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” Tallulah Bankhead is recruited to be part of the PTA show in the “The Celebrity Next Door” (1957).

Uncle Milty is convinced to be the headliner in the Western Frolics when “Milton Berle Hides Out at the Ricardos” (1959).

On “The Lucy Show”, for a New Year’s Eve treat, Lucy and Viv revive the act they did for their kids PTA show: a silent movie sketch featuring Lucy as Charlie Chaplin.