I got some nasty respiratory crud last week that reduced me to a hot and feverish pile of mucus. I got that way a lot when I was a kid. Then, I got to sty home from school. Last weekend, I was forced to stay home from life.
And, as I did when I was young and sick, I did the exact same thing when I was adult and sick. I went to my comfort food on the tube. When I was a kid, you had to wait for "I Love Lucy" to come on once a day in reruns. Now I've got the entire series (plus hour specials) on a shelf in my living room. And, to make myself feel better, I resorted to my very favorite episodes.
Now, with a less fuzzy head, I thought it would be fun to count down my top 10 favorite "I Love Lucy" episodes of all time. Enjoy. Tell me which ones are yours. Oddly enough, you will not find the birth of Little Ricky or the candy conveyor belt or Vitameatavegamin amongst them. Sure, they're great, but everything I truly love comes during the later seasons which featured the most perfect comedy writing ever. I focus more on the Hollywood trip, the European tour, and the year living in the suburbs. Sheer brilliance.
The end of the Hollywood trip and the game is headed back to NY via train. Lucy suspects the guy next door is a jewel thief. And, of course, there is a cord you can pull to stop the train. Hilarity as always from the always welcome Frank Nelson as the conductor. And great slapstick as Fred and Ethel always seem to be in the dining car when the train screeches to a halt.
Condnctor: "Madam, did you stop this train by pulling this cord?"
Lucy: "Well, I didn't do it by dragging my feet."
I love you've seen it. Lucy is hiding eggs in her blouse. Don't ask why. Ricky wants to rehearse a tango. Don't ask why. Just delight in the longest single sustained laugh in television sitcom history. 65 seconds. Time it. That's a long time with no dialogue. And Lucy is remarkable milking every yolk out of the joke. Vivian Vance, in the background, makes this scene work as you anticipate what is going to happen. But, still, the predictable laugh is as organic and raucous as anything you will ever see.
Ricky: "Ethel, are you carrying eggs, too?"
Cue Fred to smack Ethel on her ass with the back of a door.
Your classic Lucy stalks a celebrity plot as she tries to get a glimpse of Cornel Wilde in the hotel room upstairs. Of course, she gets locked on his balcony and...well...tries to lower herself down a hotel hi-rise with a rope made of draperies. Does that make sense? It sure does to me.
In this episode, the work of Vivian Vance needs to be showcased, especially in the scene where she tries to divert Ricky's attention from the fact that Lucy is hanging outside the terrace. She is absolutely masterful and, frankly, is the glue that holds this series together week after week.
Ricky: "Where's Lucy?"
Ethel: "Um, I don't know."
Ricky: "Oh, she's probably hanging around the hotel someplace."
Ricky's band is headed to a European tour on a luxury liner. At this point in the series, the production values were as luxurious. All the money showed up on screen. And, for this episode where Lucy naturally misses the boat, they built this mock-up of a real deck on a honest-to-God luxury liner. Everything, as per usual, was shot in front of a live audience and must have been astounding to watch.
Lucy (to helicopter pilot who will dangle her on a cord over the boat): "Have you got enough gas to fly this thing all the way to Europe? I've got a credit card. Money is no object."
Oh, my Lord. The fight in the grape vat between Lucy and the real Italian grape stomper is so real that it's scary/funny. As I was told by the Lucy writers, the lady didn't speak English and got a little carried away wrestling Lucy to the bottom of the grape vat. A truly marvelous moment in the series that again demonstrated the fact that this show needed to be shot in front of a live studio audience for that energy to be displayed on screen. The only way to travel.
Ricky: "Is she out there socking up luckle coller???"
This episode proves that all those crazy tour buses trolling Hollywood these days are not a new thing. They existed back in 1955 and Lucy and Ethel rode one. She sees a grapefruit hanging off Richard Widmark's backyard wall...and...well... Indeed, the scene inside the tour bus is the most hilarious part of the script as Lucy gets into a verbal tussle with the bus driver. There are some location shots used which just happened to be on the street near the backyard wall of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz' own home. Hell, why not?
Ethel (to Fred on phone): "I'm in Beverly Hills and Lucy's in an awful jam. Never mind, 'what else is new?'"
It never fails. Whenever I take visiting friends to the footprints at the Chinese Theater, there's always at least one tourist standing on John Wayne's footprints and announcing that "John Wayne's block is loose." It's amazing that this is still happening sixty years after the episode was produced. While the scene where they actually steal the cement is wonderful, the true comedy comes in the scene at the end when Lucy is trying to pretend she is asleep while her foot is encased in a block of cement. In this one, Desi Arnaz shines through as he tries to lift the "sleeping" Lucy.
Ricky: "You gaining weight or something???"
Unofficially this is an "I Love Lucy" two-parter and the huge story commands it as we deal with the aftermath of the footprint heist. John Wayne appears to prevent Lucy and Ethel from going to jail and the scene where they meet him is perhaps one of the best written scenes ever. They meet the star wearing...wait for it...pocketbooks on their heads. It is impossible to replicate the comedy here. It's screwball but yet it makes perfect sense.
Lucy (gushing over John Wayne): "In 'The High and the Mighty,' when your engine went out, my engine went out right along with it. That was real acting, boy."
To be technical, this is the favorite "I Love Lucy" episode of my writing partner. There are so many terrific throwaway lines and gags here that you have to watch it ten or twelve times to get them all. Of course, I've seen it over 100 times.
Headed back from Europe, Lucy tries to bring back a 25-pound cheese for her mother by disguising it as a baby. She didn't count on being stuck next to another mother with an infant. Lucy perennial guest star Mary Jane Croft is great here as Lucy does her best with the pretend baby. Later on, the episode features the always welcome Frank Nelson as the customs agent. Again, there is such remarkable writing that we have never gotten since.
Lucy: "Baby? Oh, that wasn't a baby. (whispering) It was a piece of cheese."
This is perfection and the one episode that made me wish I had written it. Indeed, Bob Carroll Jr. and Madelyn Pugh did and it is a textbook for Advanced Placement Comedy Writing.
You are lucky for any sitcom to have one absolutely hilarious comedy scene. This one gives us two: the scene in the Brown Derby and, of course, the famous "putty nose" scene at the end. This is the only "I Love Lucy" episode that was Emmy-nominated for comedy writing. Sad to say, they never won. Criminal! I have probably seen this episode 150 times and I still find new things and nuances.
Of course, Lucille Ball makes a big deal that the putty nose catching on fire was an accident. I, however, was shown the actual script by Madelyn Pugh Davis. Um, it's right there in the stage direction. Whatever. This is the Lucy episode that raises and sets the sun and the moon for me.
Ethel (talking about Ava Gardner): "She's just people like you and me.
Fred: "She may be people, but she's not like you and me."
Bravo to all those folks behind these episodes and the greatest sitcom ever produced. And a special tip of the hat to the writers. After all, they're the ones who make the comedy world go round.
Dinner last night: Spent the evening in the ER with a busted patella, so nothing really else. Except for a little morphine.
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