CHATTING WITH SWERTLOW

August 2, 1973

BY FRANK SWERTLOW 

Lucille Ball, the biggest star in the history of television, sits in her spacious Beverly Hills home chatting about her career. 

Suddenly, almost in mid-sentence, she is interrupted by a loud knock at her front door. 

Then another. 

And another. 

“That’s just a fan,” said Miss Ball calmly. “Just say we are not here." 

Miss Ball was about to go on with her conversation when she was asked if it bothered her to have strangers frequently pounding at her door. Politely, she said no. 

But, she admitted, it can be annoying, like the time convoys of tour buses parked outside her home. 

"It was one great colony of carbon monoxide,” she said, adding that she eventually had to invoke a Beverly Hills ordinance to keep buses away. “But if I don’t put myself on a big estate behind gates, I can’t blame them. I’m very happy they feel that way about me." 

While Ball, who began her career in show business during the 1930s, is no longer unraveled by the curious public, several bizarre incidents stand out. 

The strangest, she said, took place on a Sunday afternoon when she and her longtime pal, Vivian Vance, were startled by a roar of police sirens. At the time, Miss Ball was recuperating from an operation on her big toes. Bruce Cabot stepped on one; a horse on the other.  (1)

"This particular afternoon, we are sitting there, and I had these splints on my feet and Viv is under the hair dryer. We didn’t have any makeup on. Suddenly, we hear these sirens. Naturally, we thought they would go away. But they didn’t. We thought it might be an accident. So I hobbled over to the window to see what it was. 

"Well, the place was just alive with police, motorcycle cops; car cops; an officer was standing in the middle of the intersection directing traffic. Then, four or five limousines pulled up. We were watching out the window, and all at once the doors of the limousines opened. ‘They are coming in here,’ I said. 

"I think they were from Thailand, maybe "a maharaja or maharani or something like that. They had saris on, things in their noses. Beautiful women and tiny little men. They all had cameras around their neck.” Once Ball and Vance saw what was happening, they tried to rush upstairs to put some clothes and makeup on. It was too late. Ball was caught struggling up the stairs. 

“They didn’t notice anything. There were 12 people, plus a public relations man, and they just paraded through the house. They wanted to take my picture in the backyard. "I didn’t know who they were. But as they were going out the door, Viv said: ‘We’ll have to drop in on you some day.’ And one of the little men bowed and said: ‘By all means.’  (2)

Right now, one version of a Lucille Ball television show is playing somewhere in the world. It seems Lucille Ball is always on. Clearly, she is the most successful performer in the history of television perhaps the richest. 

~ Chicago Daily News

#    #    #

FOOTNOTES FROM THE FUTURE

(1) Actor Bruce Cabot’s most recent interaction with the redhead was in a 1964 Bob Hope special, “Have Girls, Will Travel”. He also starred with Ball in 1949′s Sorrowful Jones, and 1950′s Fancy Pants, both of which featured horses. Cabot died in May 1972.

(2) Vivian told this same story on “Dinah!” when she surprised Lucille Ball on an episode of Shore’s talk show aired on December 1, 1975, more than two years later. In the television version the foreign guests turned out to be the King of Siam (now Thailand) and his retinue.  The punchline remained the same. 

Frank Swertlow is an awarding-winning journalist who covered a 2002 civil trial against Michael Jackson and the 2005 criminal trial, both for People magazine. He is the co-author of "We, the Jury,” a profile of seven jurors who sent Scott Peterson to death row.