LIZ GOES TO NIGHT SCHOOL

November 18, 1950

“Liz Goes to Night School” (aka “Balancing the Checkbook”) is episode #106 of the radio series MY FAVORITE HUSBAND broadcast on November 18, 1950.

This was the eleventh episode of the third season of MY FAVORITE HUSBAND. There were 31 new episodes, with the season ending on March 31, 1951.  

Synopsis ~ Liz’s arithmetic skills are so bad, George sends her to night school where she somehow winds up in a math contest.

“My Favorite Husband” was based on the novels Mr. and Mrs. Cugat, the Record of a Happy Marriage (1940) and Outside Eden (1945) by Isabel Scott Rorick, which had previously been adapted into the film Are Husbands Necessary? (1942). “My Favorite Husband” was first broadcast as a one-time special on July 5, 1948. Lucille Ball and Lee Bowman played the characters of Liz and George Cugat, and a positive response to this broadcast convinced CBS to launch “My Favorite Husband” as a series. Bowman was not available Richard Denning was cast as George. On January 7, 1949, confusion with bandleader Xavier Cugat prompted a name change to Cooper. On this same episode Jell-O became its sponsor. A total of 124 episodes of the program aired from July 23, 1948 through March 31, 1951. After about ten episodes had been written, writers Fox and Davenport departed and three new writers took over – Bob Carroll, Jr., Madelyn Pugh, and head writer/producer Jess Oppenheimer. In March 1949 Gale Gordon took over the existing role of George’s boss, Rudolph Atterbury, and Bea Benaderet was added as his wife, Iris. CBS brought “My Favorite Husband” to television in 1953, starring Joan Caulfield and Barry Nelson as Liz and George Cooper. The television version ran two-and-a-half seasons, from September 1953 through December 1955, running concurrently with “I Love Lucy.” It was produced live at CBS Television City for most of its run, until switching to film for a truncated third season filmed (ironically) at Desilu and recasting Liz Cooper with Vanessa Brown.

MAIN CAST

Lucille Ball (Liz Cooper) was born on August 6, 1911 in Jamestown, New York. She began her screen career in 1933 and was known in Hollywood as ‘Queen of the B’s’ due to her many appearances in ‘B’ movies. With Richard Denning, she starred in a radio program titled “My Favorite Husband” which eventually led to the creation of “I Love Lucy,” a television situation comedy in which she co-starred with her real-life husband, Latin bandleader Desi Arnaz. The program was phenomenally successful, allowing the couple to purchase what was once RKO Studios, re-naming it Desilu. When the show ended in 1960 (in an hour-long format known as “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour”) so did Lucy and Desi’s marriage. In 1962, hoping to keep Desilu financially solvent, Lucy returned to the sitcom format with “The Lucy Show,” which lasted six seasons. She followed that with a similar sitcom “Here’s Lucy” co-starring with her real-life children, Lucie and Desi Jr., as well as Gale Gordon, who had joined the cast of “The Lucy Show” during season two. Before her death in 1989, Lucy made one more attempt at a sitcom with “Life With Lucy,” also with Gordon.

Richard Denning (George Cooper) was born Louis Albert Heindrich Denninger Jr., in Poughkeepsie, New York. When he was 18 months old, his family moved to Los Angeles. Plans called for him to take over his father’s garment manufacturing business, but he developed an interest in acting. Denning enlisted in the US Navy during World War II. He is best known for his  roles in various science fiction and horror films of the 1950s. Although he teamed with Lucille Ball on radio in “My Favorite Husband,” the two never acted together on screen. While “I Love Lucy” was on the air, he was seen on another CBS TV series, “Mr. & Mrs. North.” From 1968 to 1980 he played the Governor on “Hawaii 5-0″, his final role. He died in 1998 at age 84.

Gale Gordon (Rudolph Atterbury) had worked with Lucille Ball on “The Wonder Show” on radio in 1938. One of the front-runners to play Fred Mertz on “I Love Lucy,” he eventually played Alvin Littlefield, owner of the Tropicana, during two episodes in 1952. After playing a Judge in an episode of “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” in 1958, he would re-team with Lucy for all of her subsequent series’: as Theodore J. Mooney in ”The Lucy Show”; as Harrison Otis Carter in “Here’s Lucy”; and as Curtis McGibbon on “Life with Lucy.” Gordon died in 1995 at the age of 89.

Ruth Perrott (Katie, the Maid) was also later seen on “I Love Lucy.” She first played Mrs. Pomerantz, a member of the surprise investigating committee for the Society Matrons League in “Pioneer Women” (ILL S1;E25), as one of the member of the Wednesday Afternoon Fine Arts League in “Lucy and Ethel Buy the Same Dress” (ILL S3;E3), and also played a nurse when “Lucy Goes to the Hospital” (ILL S2;E16). She died in 1996 at the age of 96.

Bob LeMond (Announcer) also served as the announcer for the pilot episode of “I Love Lucy”. When the long-lost pilot was finally discovered in 1990, a few moments of the opening narration were damaged and lost, so LeMond – fifty years later – recreated the narration for the CBS special and subsequent DVD release.

Bea Benadaret (Iris Atterbury) does not appear in this episode. 

GUEST CAST

Frank Nelson (Ed Trout, President of the West Newton Board of Education) was born on May 6, 1911 (three months before Lucille Ball) in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He started working as a radio announcer at the age of 15. He later appeared on such popular radio shows as “The Great Gildersleeve,” “Burns and Allen,” and “Fibber McGee & Molly”.  Aside from Lucille Ball, Nelson is perhaps most associated with Jack Benny and was a fifteen-year regular on his radio and television programs. His trademark was playing clerks and other working stiffs, suddenly turning to Benny with a drawn out “Yeeeeeeeeees?” Nelson appeared in 11 episodes of “I Love Lucy”, including three as quiz master Freddy Fillmore, and two as Ralph Ramsey, plus appearance on “The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour” – making him the only actor to play two different recurring roles on “I Love Lucy.” Nelson returned to the role of the frazzled Train Conductor for an episode of “The Lucy Show” in 1963. This marked his final appearance on a Lucille Ball sitcom.

Although Nelson is playing a School Board President, he gets to slip into the role of contest moderator, not unlike game show hosts Smiley Stembottom and Freddy Fillmore.

Shimen Ruskin (Richard Hill from West Newton Night School) was born as Shimen Druskin in Vilnius, Lithuania in 1907. He spent 18 years in the Yiddish theater before moving on to Hollywood and roles in 60 films, radio shows, and television projects. He made his screen debut in Having Wonderful Time (1938) which also featured Lucille Ball. In 1942, he played a waiter in Lucille Ball’s The Big Street. Like Ball, he was named as a communist during the ‘red scare’ of the 1950s.  He died in 1976 at age 79. 

EPISODE

ANNOUNCER: “As we look in on the Coopers, it’s afternoon at the Sheridan Falls National Bank and George Cooper has just received an urgent summons to the office of the president of the bank.” 

Mr. Atterbury is quite sure Liz is overdrawn because of a note she’s written on the back of one of her checks:

MR. ATTERBURY (reading): “Dear Mr. Teller: If I don’t have enough money to cover this, please be a lamb and hold this check until next month.”

At the beginning of “Job Switching” (ILL S2;E1) in 1952, an angry Ricky Ricardo reads aloud the note Lucy’s written on the back of her bounced check to the beauty parlor: “Dear Teller, be a lamb and don’t put this through until next month.”

Given an ultimatum by Mr. Atterbury, George barrels home to confront Liz, who immediately dissolves into tears. George reviews Liz’s household accounts. Her addition skills are obviously lacking and her method of accounting is convoluted. Dinner is served an hour early so Katie can go to night school for beginning sewing. George gets an idea to send Liz to night school as well – for arithmetic. 

On a 1962 episode of “The Lucy Show”, Lucy convinces Viv to join her in taking night school courses in chemistry and succeeds in blowing up the lab!  

The following evening, George is eager for them to do something together, but Liz has to do homework!  She convinces George to help her with her math problems.  Liz tries to bring logic to simple addition based on the number of apples ‘Mary’ and ‘Susan’ have and it frustrates banker George.

On another night, Mr. Atterbury visits George while Liz is at night school. He says he is judging a math competition between Sheridan Falls Night School and West Newton Night Night School. He uses the Cooper phone to find out the name of the math champion that will represent Sheridan Falls and is shocked to hear it is Liz Cooper!  Liz comes home and the men want to know how on earth she was selected to compete!  She says it was because of George’s help with her homework that she was selected! 

George decides that they will make an excuse and tell them that Liz cannot be there. Mr. Atterbury wants to say she has a broken leg but Liz is naturally reluctant. In lieu of a broken leg, Mr. Atterbury and George decide to teach Liz arithmetic even if it takes all night!  

At the contest, Liz is very sleepy from pulling an all-nighter. Mr. Atterbury introduces the judges and contestants: Ed Trout (Frank Nelson), head of the West Newton Board of Education; West Newton contestant Mr. Richard Hill (Shimen Ruskin); and Mrs. George Cooper of Sheridan Falls. 

The first question goes to Mr. Hill, who recites the Pythagorean theorem perfectly.

In mathematics, the Pythagorean theorem is a fundamental relation in Euclidean geometry among the three sides of a right triangle. It states that the area of the square whose side is the hypotenuse (the side opposite the right angle) is equal to the sum of the areas of the squares on the other two sides.

In the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz, the Scarecrow (Ray Bolger) is endowed with brains by the Wizard and suddenly spouts the Pythagorean theorem – except he gets it wrong! 

The theorem applies to right triangles, not isosceles triangles . Also the theorem is that the squares of two legs equals the square of the hypotenuse!  The Scarecrow probably should enroll in the Emerald City Night School! 

Liz’s geometry question is a lot simpler – in fact, it is not a geometry problem at all.

MR. ATTERBURY: “If you had three geometry problems and I gave you two more geometry problems, how many would you have?”
LIZ: “Five?”

Staying awake will be a source of comedy for Lucille Ball for the rest of her career. Lucy Ricardo was groggy from too much Dramamine in “The Passports” (ILL S5;E11) and was later exhausted from her commuter lifestyle in “Lucy Wants a Career” (LDCH S2;E4); Lucy Carmichael can’t keep her head up during a classical concert in “Lucy the Music Lover” (TLS S1;E8); and in a 1971 episode of “Here’s Lucy,” Lucy Carter has severe jet lag and has trouble staying awake on an English chat show with David Frost. 

Yawning, Liz inadvertently admits that Mr. Atterbury is her husband’s boss. Ed Trout is outraged, replacing him with an impartial judge – himself!  

Liz is asked how many sides an octagon has. From the audience Mr. Atterbury and George drop hints by talking about what they ATE (8)!  Asking what they are shouting FOR, Liz drowsily guesses four (4). 

Mr. Hill is asked a square root question which he gets wrong. Liz is asked the same question. In the audience Mr. Atterbury quickly figures out the answer: 32, which is also Liz’s age. He shouts out: “Act your age Liz!” But a sluggish Liz guesses 22!  Mr. Atterbury’s constant shout-outs frustrate Ed Trout.

ED TROUT (summing up): “Mr. Hill has missed one, Mrs. Cooper has missed one, and Mr. Atterbury hasn’t missed any!” 

The final question is a complex series of math problems. Hill gets it wrong. Trout asks Liz, who is snoring.

ED TROUT: “I’d like your answer and no help from the audience, please. I’d like your own number.” 
LIZ: “Oh.  5-1-3-4-0.”  
TROUT: “That’s right!”
GEORGE: “I gave up when he asked for your own number!”
LIZ: “Own number? I thought he said phone number!” 

Accidentally answering a crucial final question during a contest judged by Frank Nelson also happened to Ricky Ricardo in “Lucy Gets Ricky on the Radio” (ILL S1;E32) in 1952. Ricky is asked what George Washington said to his troops while crossing the Delaware. A clueless Ricky is getting queasy from his disastrous performance on the show and blurts out: “Please let me sit down. This is making me sick!”  Winner!

 End of Episode