(S3;E12 ~ December 21, 1953) directed by William Asher, and written by Jess Oppenheimer, Madelyn Pugh and Bob Carroll, Jr. It was filmed on November 19, 1953. It was the 78th episode of the series.
Synopsis – Instead of playing cards or watching TV, the four take a magazine quiz that leads to Ricky inventing a former girlfriend to make Lucy jealous. When the girlfriend turns out to be real – and in town – Lucy has nightmares about Ricky leaving her for the sexy Cuban dancer.
The title of the marriage quiz is…
“How to Rate Your Marriage or Is Your Spouse a Louse?”
To make Ricky jealous, she lists the names of the men she’s dated. In real life they are the names of the cast and crew of the show:
- Billy (Asher), director
- Maury (Thompson), camera
- Jess (Oppenheimer), writer
- Jerry (Thorpe), assistant director
- Bob (Carroll Jr.), writer
- Bennett (Green), Desi’s stand-in
- Phil (Arnold), actor
- Danny (Cahn), editor
- Argyle (Nelson), production manager
- Bud (Molin), editor
- Wilbur (Hatch), conductor
- (Buddy) Noble, bass player
- Karl (Freund), cinematographer
- Frank (Inn), animal trainer
- Henry (Molin), editor
- Johnny (Speak), boom operator
- and Kenny (Morgan), actor and Lucy’s brother-in-law!
The ‘magazine’ is more of a pocket book. It is called “Pocket Reporter” and the back cover advertises a product called Titianola. Titianola is a red hair dye that is mentioned in the 1935 musical film Redheads on Parade! The plot seeks to reverse the trend of platinum blondes set by Jean Harlow by having a movie sponsored by Titianola. Lucille Ball was NOT in the film, although Irving Bacon, who played Ethel’s Father Will Potter was, as was frequent “I Love Lucy” extra Bess Flowers. At this point in her career, Lucille was still a brunette, but wore blonde wigs in several films. She didn’t dye her hair red (using a Henna Rinse) until 1943. Whether this ‘magazine’ was a prop leftover from Redheads on Parade is unknown.
Lucy also reveals that she met some of these men at Junior College. In real life Lucille Ball left high school to go to New York City and did not attend college. There is no future mention of Lucy Ricardo going to junior college.
In this episode Little Ricky is played by the Mayer Twins. This is their ninth appearance on the series. There are actually four actors playing Little Ricky in this episode alone!
The newspaper that reports that Carlota Romero is playing the Opal Room is called The New York Gazette – a fictional newspaper – although the back page (the arts section) names it The Daily Record.
The same exact headline “Bond Issue Defeated” turns up again in
“Lucy’s Club Dance” (S3;E25). Hollywood prop newspapers were often sourced from Earl Hays Press, which specialized in providing prop newspapers for movies and TV. It was not uncommon for the template to remain the same while the headline or photos pertaining to the story were inserted as needed.
Hiding the paper from Lucy, Ethel says that “Daddy Warbucks has left Little Orphan Annie again.” The famous comic strip Little Orphan Annie was a daily fixture of most national papers from 1924 to 2010.
Lucy was unfavorably compared to Orphan Annie when her home perm and handmade dress are a failure in “Lucy Wants New Furniture” (S2;E28).
The episode features a lengthy dream sequence, something that won’t be repeated until “Lucy Goes To Scotland” (S5;E17).
In this dream, Lucy is darning a sock while Ricky reads a magazine. The name of the magazine is Vacation, although there is no record of a magazine by that name published in the early 1950s. Perhaps the title is symbolic of Lucy thinking Ricky desires a ‘vacation’ from marriage? Lucy dreams Ricky leaves her for a castanet-playing Carlota portrayed by Lillian Molieri, a Nicaraguan-born actress who later returned to play one of Ricky’s relatives in “The Ricardos Visit Cuba” (S6;E9).
Oops! Little Ricky’s rabbit ears hat is on in the medium shots, but off in the close-up insert shot before falling off when Lucy picks him up.
More Oops! When Carlota dances around the apartment viewers can see where the carpet ends at the ‘fourth wall’. For a moment, the bottom of the camera comes into the frame at the lower left of the screen. The camera error was edited out of for the DVD but you can still see the plaster line of the floor.
After some tossing and turning (plus the usual wavy screen), the dream continues nine years later (1962) with Lucy and Little Ricky begging outside Ricky and Carlota’s theater. Here Little Ricky is played by an uncredited young actor who looks a lot like Jerry Mathers, who would later become known as the Beaver in “Leave it to Beaver” (1957-63). Mathers has denied being in the episode. Lucy’s dream then advances 25 years in the future (1978), where she is still begging in front of the theater, but now with a grown-up Little Ricky on her knee. Unfortunately, there is no record of who played this second dream Little Ricky. Counting the Mayer Twins, who played the real Little Ricky, this episode featured four actors playing the role! All told, by series end, there were eight actors who played Little Ricky!
There are also three un-credited “fans” of Ricky and Carlota in the sequence: two girls, and a boy with a flash camera. The the first scene they are young, but in the second (25 years later) they are senior citizens – still dressed in the same clothes.
In the show’s final scene, Jerry, Ricky’s agent (Jerry Hausner), reunites Ricky with Carlota in the flesh – literally. When Ricky asks her what she’s been doing, she replies “putting on weight mostly.”
This Carlota is played by Rosa Turich. Turich and her husband had a Spanish language comedy act called Felipin y Rosita.
Classic Costumes
This is one of more than 25 episode in which Lucy wears the now-iconic blue polka-dot dress designed by Elois Jenssen. In 1988, the dress was recreated on Hamilton Collection Lucy dolls. As an ‘in joke’ the dress turns up in a garage sale scene during a 1971 episode of “Here’s Lucy.”
Similarly, Ricky / Desi wears ‘his favorite necktie’ – a wardrobe item that was repeated many times on the show.
They also wear their matching pajamas! They were sold commercially by Harwood in 1953.
Because the original telecast was just four days before Christmas, the episode concludes with the ‘four Santas’ tag created in 1951. Ricky leads them all in a chorus of “Cascabeles” (“Jingle Bells”) and says “You Americans steal all our good songs!” At the end of the verse, we notice there is a fifth St. Nick (played by Vernon Dent) – supposedly the real Santa Claus – who vanishes into thin air. This is the third and last time this holiday tag will be used until it was expanded to a full Christmas episode in season six.
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