1935-1968
Lucille
Ball and Henry Fonda were more than just co-workers. When Lucy first
got to Hollywood, the two actually briefly dated. Lucy remembers,
“We
worked long and hard, Ginger [Rogers] and I, in front of our mirrors.
We used eye shadow, plenty of mascara, pancake [make-up], deep red
lipstick, rouge, everything we’d been taught in the studio cosmetic
department. Then we went out to Brentwood, that’s where the boys
lived. My date was Fonda. Ginger’s date was [Jimmy] Stewart. Henry
cooked the dinner, and after we ate, Ginger and the boys turned on
the radio in the living room and Ginger tried to teach them ‘The
Carioca.’ I was left doing the dishes. When I finished, we went out
dancing at the Coconut Grove. Freddie Martin’s orchestra. There we
were, Ginger and I in our long organdy dresses, looking just as
summery and smooth as we could. The date stretched into daybreak.
We’d had a hilarious, wonderful evening that came to an end at
Barney’s Beanery. Well, it was dark and we went in and light when we
came out. Hank and Jim took one look at us and said, ‘What happened?’
We said, ‘What do you mean what happened?’ And Jimmy Stewart said,
‘Well, your nighttime makeup is on awful heavy for this time of the
morning.’ And Henry Fonda said, ‘Yuk!’”
In
1975 Fonda told this story at “The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast”
for Lucille Ball. Ginger Rogers was also in attendance. He added that
“If
I hadn’t said, ‘Yuk!’, if I’d behaved myself, they might have named
that studio Henrylu, not Desilu.”
Perhaps
it is a good thing that Fonda and Ball never married as genealogists
point out that they are related – 8th cousins. The pair acted in three feature films together and made
numerous television appearances opposite one-another. Curiously,
although he was sometimes mentioned, Fonda never guest-starred on a
“Lucy” sitcom.
I
Dream Too Much
(1935)
Producer:
Pandro S. Berman
Director:
John Cromwell
Choreographer:
Hermes Pan
Screenplay:
Elsie Finn (story), David G. Wittels (story), Edmund North
Songs:
Jerome
Kern
and Dorothy Fields
Cast:
Lily Pons (Annette Monard Street), Henry Fonda (Jonathan Street),
Eric Blore (Roger Briggs), Osgood Perkins (Paul Darcy), Lucien
Littlefield (Hubert Dilley), Lucille Ball (Gwendolyn Dilley)
Synopsis:
Annette
Monard Street (Lily
Pons)
is an aspiring singer, who falls in love with and marries Jonathan
Street (Henry
Fonda),
a struggling young composer. Jonathan
pushes her into a singing career, and she soon becomes a star.
Meanwhile, Jonathan is unable to sell his music, and he finds himself
jealous of his wife’s success. Concerned about their relationship,
Annette uses her influence to get Jonathan’s work turned into a
musical comedy. Once she achieves this, she then retires from public
life in order to raise a family.
“Lucille
replaced Betty Grable, an eighteen-year-old stock player… in the
minor role of Gwendolyn Dilley, a bleached-blonde gum-chewer visiting
Paris with her parents and little brother.”
~ Kathleen Brady, Lucille
Gwendolyn
Dilley (Lucille
Ball): "Culture
is making my feet hurt.”
TRIVIA
At
this point in her career, Lucy was a platinum blonde. She had dyed it
from her natural mousy brown to get more attention from casting
agents and producers. She did not begin coloring her hair its
trademark red until the technicolor film Du
Barry Was A Lady in
1943.
A
brief clip of Lucy in the film is included in “Hollywood the Golden
Years: The RKO Story: A Woman’s Lot” (1987).
The
Big Street (1942)
Producer:
Damon Runyon
Director:
Irving Reis
Screenplay:
Leonard Spigelgass, based on the short story “Little Pinks” by
Damon Runyon
Cast:
Henry Fonda (Little Pinks), Lucille Ball (Gloria Lyons), Barton
MacLane (Case Ables), Eugene Pallette (Nicely Nicely Johnson), Agnes
Moorehead (Violette Shumberg), Sam Levene (Horsethief), Ray Collins
(Professor B)
Uncredited
actor Hans
Conried
played a waiter. On “I Love Lucy” he played Harry Martin in
“Redecorating” (S2;E8) and Percy Livermore in “Lucy Hires an
English Tutor” (S2;E13), both in 1952. He also did two episodes of
“The Lucy Show,” both as her music tutor Dr. Gitterman in 1963.
‘Queen
of the Extras’ Bess
Flowers
made numerous uncredited background appearances on both “I Love
Lucy” and “The Lucy Show.”
Uncredited
actor Gil
Perkins
(Mug) later turned up on a 1970 episode of “Here’s Lucy”
(S2;E21).
TRIVIA
During
filming, Lucy’s new husband Desi
Arnaz felt
so insecure about leaving Lucy and Fonda alone together that he’d often
pop by the set to keep an eye on them. His paranoia so exasperated
director Irving Reis that he finally banned him from the set.
This
was Lucille Ball’s favorite of her nearly 80 films. She felt her
performance was unjustly ignored by the Academy.
Damon Runyon also created the source material for the hit Broadway musical Guys and Dolls (1950), which starred Robert Alda, who went on to make several appearances on “The Lucy Show.” The two stories share the character of Nicely Nicely Johnson. When the film version was made by MGM in 1955, Lucy and Desi were also under contract to the studio. A brief clip of the film was inserted into the middle of an episode of “I Love Lucy” called “Lucy and the Dummy” (S5;E3), although the clip was removed after its initial airing. Further, when Lucille Ball first came to Hollywood, before becoming a contract player at RKO, she worked for Sam Goldwyn as one of the Goldwyn Girls. In Guys and Dolls, the Hot Box Girls are played by the Goldwyn Girls.
Gloria
Lyons (Lucille
Ball): “Love
is something that gets you one room, two chins, and three kids.”
A
brief clip from the film is seen in “Lucy and Desi: A Home Movie.”
“The
Good Years”
(January 12, 1962)
Produced
by:
Leland Heyward
Directed
by:
Franklin L. Schaffner
Cast:
Lucille
Ball, Henry Fonda, Mort Sahl, Margaret Hamilton (Narrator)
Characters included Teddy Roosevelt, Sandow the Bodybuilder, the Wright Brothers, J.P. Morgan, Lizzy Borden
TRIVIA
This CBS special was billed as ‘Lucille Ball’s return to television’ after leaving Lucy Ricardo behind in April 1960. It would be several more months before the debut of “The Lucy Show” in Fall 1962.
Based
on a best-selling book by Walter Lord first published in 1960 about the years leading up to World War One,
the special was a hodge-podge of sketches and musical numbers about
the time period 1900 through 1920.
Mort
Sahl:
“Lucille Ball came into rehearsal. She had a later call and a lot
of doubts about the script.”
The
90-minute special was a critical failure and has largely been
forgotten. There are few photographs and video copies are held at the Museum of Broadcasting.
“All
About People” (1967)
Director:
Saul
Rubin
Narrators:
Lucille
Ball, Henry Fonda, Jack Benny, George Burns, Carol Channing, Eydie
Gorme, Charleton Heston, Eartha Kitt, Burt Lancaster, Edward G.
Robinson
TRIVIA
This
was a 30-minute black and white documentary made by the United Jewish
Welfare Fund about its history.
After marrying Gary Morton (nee Morton Goldapper), Lucille
Ball was active in Jewish charities. On December 9, 1961, Lucy had appeared on the “Twelve
Star Salute to the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies.”
Burns, Benny, and Gorme, all
later made appearances on “Here’s Lucy.” Edward G. Robinson did
a cameo on “The Lucy Show.”
Although Ball and Fonda are both involved in the project, they likely recorded their narration separately.
Yours,
Mine and Ours
(1968)
Producer:
Robert F. Blumofe
Director:
Melville Shavelson
Screenplay:
Melville Shavelson and Mort Lachman, with story by Bob Carroll Jr.
and Madelyn Davis (Lucy’s TV writers), based on the book Who
Gets The Drumsticks?
by Helen Eileen Beardsley
Cast:
Lucille Ball (Helen North Beardsley), Henry Fonda (Frank Beardsley), Van
Johnson (Darrel Harrison)
Nancy
Howard
(Nancy Beardsley) made three appearances on “Here’s Lucy.” Tim
Matheson
(Mike Beardsley) made an appearance on a 1972 “Here’s Lucy” playing Kim Carter’s boyfriend.
Uncredited
extras Leon Alton, Paul Bradley, Charles Cirillo, George Boyce, Paul
King, Joseph LaCava, and Leoda Richards all made numerous background
appearances on “The Lucy Show” and “Here’s Lucy.”
Synopsis: A widower with ten children falls for a widow with eight, and they must decide about forming a huge, unconventional family.
TRIVIA
Jane Fonda claimed that her father was deeply in love with Lucy and that the two were “very close” during the filming of Yours, Mine and Ours but that Lucy wasn’t in love with him.
After
purchasing the rights to the book the film was based on, Lucille Ball
became very close to the real Beardsleys and even treated the whole
family to a vacation at Disneyland.
In
1959, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, still affiliated with MGM, were
going to star as Frank and Helen Beardsley but the studio had trouble
with the casting until the late 1960s.
In addition, their marriage was then on the rocks, a situation which
would have made working together on the optimistic comedy somewhat
problematic.
Lucy’s
old friend John Wayne was initially considered to play Frank
Beardsley. The role was cast with Fred MacMurray, but he was
replaced by Henry Fonda.
Frank
(Henry Fonda): “I
don’t quite understand. Am I being stupid?”
Helen
(Lucille Ball):
“No,
you’re being a man. Which is sometimes the same thing.”
Lucille
Ball co-produced
the film under her company, Desilu Productions. When the film became
a surprise smash hit grossing over $17 million on a $2.5 million
investment, she hadn’t anticipated the film’s huge box-office success
and failed to provide a tax shelter for her personal profits,
resulting in most of her earnings going toward taxes.
The
success of the film led to Lucy being considered to play Mrs. Brady
in “The Brady Bunch,” a TV sitcom with a similar story of a
blended family. Lucy decided to do her own sitcom, “Here’s Lucy,”
instead.
In
1968, Van Johnson guest starred on “Here’s Lucy” as both himself
and an impostor look-alike in “Guess Who Owes Lucy $23.50” (HL
S1;E11). The dialogue contained references to Yours,
Mine and Ours and
their co-star Henry Fonda.
Van
Johnson Impostor: “I
loved working with that kooky redhead.”
Lucy
Carter:
“Personally,
I thought she was much too young for Henry Fonda.”
Johnson
was in the cast of Too
Many Girls,
the film which introduced Lucy to Desi in 1940. Johnson also
guest-starred on “I Love Lucy” in “The Dancing Star” (S4;E27) in 1955.
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