'She was very complicated. She was a conundrum': who was the real Lucille Ball?

[Jilly_in_VA]

“She was very complicated, she was very loving and she was very mercurial. She was very generous but she came from the Depression and she was very guarded about money. She was a conundrum. She was a paradox of things. But she made me feel like I was the only person in the room, even in a crowd, and she made me feel authentic.”

Lee Tannen, author and playwright, is in full flow as he reminisces about his intense decade-long friendship with Lucille Ball, once the funniest and most famous woman in America. Her 1950s sitcom, I Love Lucy, pulled in 60m viewers and became part of the country’s cultural DNA.

Thirty-two years after her death, the legend is about to be burnished by Being the Ricardos, a biographical drama starring Nicole Kidman as Ball and Javier Bardem as Desi Arnaz, her husband both in real life and on screen. It explores the couple’s personal relationship – they divorced after 19 years but are said to have remained soulmates – and a professional crisis in which their careers were nearly derailed by the “red scare” in Hollywood.

This chapter of Ball’s career is so little known that writer and director Aaron Sorkin was unaware of it when he took on the project.

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2021/dec/07/she-was-very-complicated-she-was-a-conundrum-who-was-the-real-lucille-ball
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I'm probably the only person in the world who doesn't think "I Love Lucy" was funny, but I think she was an interesting person.

[Deep State Witch]

1. The Godmother Of Star Trek

Lucille Ball is revered by Star Trek fans as the "godmother" of that show. She owned Desilu Studios, which she and Desi had co-founded and she took over upon their divorce. Gene Roddenberry pitched the idea of "Star Trek" to Desilu, and she championed the show, even through two pilots and massive production costs.

https://www.startrek.com/news/how-lucille-ball-helped-star-trek-become-a-cultural-icon

[luvs2sing]

2. I didn't think it was very funny, either..

but I always enjoyed watching anything she was in.

[hlthe2b]

3. I thought a handful of episodes were funny. I liked Vivian Vance a lot. The later series were...

frankly a bit cringe-worthy. But they were an interesting pair and she was a real trailblazer for women in the field though and they together shook up the RW racists of this country.