Hollywood folks are reading each other’s mail again.
Just a few months after the release of writer/director Aaron Sorkin’s captivating Being the Ricardos, we now have the documentary Lucy and Desi.
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| Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz weren't merely co-stars of television's most popular show in the 1950s; they were equal business partners in all manner of other activities taking place under the banner of their production company, Desilu. |
Lucie Arnaz has been down this road before, having produced and hosted 1993’s Lucy and Desi: A Home Movie, just four years after her mother died … which was just three years after Desi Arnaz passed. Sweet as it is, grief and loss palpably hovered over that earlier project; this new film, chaperoned by director Amy Poehler and veteran documentarian Mark Monroe, is more measured and methodical.
Ball and Arnaz were a beloved Hollywood family, frequently in the public eye, and constantly the subjects of studio photographs; they also had access to personal film cameras that few people owned in the 1940s and ’50s. We benefit from the impressive abundance of home movie footage — 8mm and even 16mm — and extensive media interviews given by both Ball and Arnaz throughout their lives.
Most notably, Ball spent weeks and months with journalist Betty Hannah Hoffman in the mid-’60s, recounting what turned into a detailed oral history preserved on a couple dozen audio tapes.
This essentially allows Ball and Arnaz to narrate their own stories, as this documentary proceeds. Poehler wisely keeps contemporary talking heads to a minimum, cutting only occasionally to commentary from Lucie Arnaz, Carol Burnett and Bette Midler. The latter two are an apt choice, as both were mentored by Ball; their warmhearted gratitude is obvious.
Ball was a slowly rising film star when she and Arnaz met in Hollywood, during 1940’s big-screen adaptation of the hit Broadway musical Too Many Girls. It was love at first sight, and they eloped not quite two months after the film debuted.
Ironically, as Ball explains via voice-over, they saw very little of each other during the next decade.
She became the “Queen of the B’s,” appearing constantly in a string of lesser-budget dramas, musicals, tear-jerkers and even film noir thrillers. She starred or co-starred in 20 (!) films between 1941 and ’49 … not one of which allowed her to display the comic talent for which she’d later become famous.
Even so, the hard work paid off. The pleasure is evident in Ball’s voice when she remembers how, one day, she overheard a studio head telling somebody to find him “a Lucille Ball type.”
Arnaz wasn’t nearly as successful in Hollywood; after a few unremarkable supporting roles, he was drafted and spent his WWII years directing USO programs. Post-service, he formed what became an enormously popular band, and spent several years touring.
These years are covered via a captivating collection of publicity photos, studio stills, movie posters and archival film clips; it’ll likely be an eye-opening surprise to learn that Arnaz is credited with introducing conga line dancing to the States.
franchise — is, along with Pixar, one of the few contemporary animation houses that understands the need to make story and voice performance as important as the eye-popping visuals.