{"id":342125,"date":"2025-12-11T01:35:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T01:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/342125\/"},"modified":"2025-12-11T01:35:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T01:35:08","slug":"lucille-ball-desi-arnaz-series-about-their-lives-in-development-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/342125\/","title":{"rendered":"Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz Series About Their Lives In Development"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tEverybody knows Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz and the legend of \u201cI Love Lucy<\/a>.\u201d But do they really?<\/p>\n

\n\tThere have been several movies over the years about the two icons, including Aaron Sorkin\u2019s recent \u201cBeing the Ricardos.\u201d But the story of \u201cLucy and Desi\u201d goes far beyond the smash success of \u201cI Love Lucy,\u201d and that\u2019s what got Lucie Arnaz<\/a> \u2014 the daughter of the late Hollywood icons \u2014 thinking about doing something bigger. Arnaz has partnered with former NBC Entertainment and WarnerMedia Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt<\/a> to develop what they envision as a three-season deep dive into the lives of Ball and Arnaz, from the couple\u2019s separate tumultuous upbringings to making TV history with \u201cI Love Lucy\u201d \u2014 and then the clashes that led to their eventual divorce.<\/p>\n

\n\tArnaz and Greenblatt have recruited Oscar nominee and Emmy winner Richard LaGravenese<\/a> (\u201cThe Fisher King,\u201d \u201cBehind the Candelabra\u201d) to create the series, which will rely on source material including autobiographies written by Ball and Arnaz, the rights of which have reverted back to their estates. Greenblatt\u2019s The Green Room and Arnaz\u2019s Desilu, too shingles are behind the project, which will also be produced by Green Room content head Jon Wu.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIf you\u2019re really willing to look at the whole thing, there\u2019s quite a story there, and a lot to be learned,\u201d Arnaz said. \u201cIt\u2019s very emotional, and it\u2019s not what people think. It\u2019s not just all about \u2018I Love Lucy.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tArnaz and Greenblatt have put together a pitch deck for the series, with the working title \u201cLucy and Desi: The Greatest Story Never Told,\u201d and plan to start meeting with networks and streamers in the coming months. The timing of the pitch comes as \u201cI Love Lucy\u201d celebrates its 75th anniversary in 2026 (the show debuted in October 1951) and on the heels of two new books exploring the couple: \u201cDesi Arnaz, The Man Who Invented Television,\u201d by Todd S. Purdum, and Arnaz\u2019s own new look at her parents\u2019 relationship, \u201cLucy & Desi: The Love Letters,\u201d which she edited.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAs we take it to buyers, there\u2019s a version of this that could be 10 hours and done, if somebody wants to jump in with that,\u201d Greenblatt said. \u201cBut we want to present it as a multi-season show. We think it\u2019s three seasons of eight episodes. Obviously, we have to find the right buyer and cater to what they want to do. But it needs to have time to breathe. It really is an extraordinary story, from when they\u2019re each teenagers in their separate worlds \u2014 one being Cuba as it\u2019s coming apart at the seams, and one being very WASPy New York. They were both thrust out on their own, quickly at a young age, to try to figure out who they were and find their way in the business. Then they converge in 1940 on a soundstage at RKO, doing a movie together. \u2018I Love Lucy\u2019 is 11 years later, but that\u2019s 11 years when they\u2019re together in a marriage that\u2019s up and down and complex.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tArnaz and Greenblatt were inspired by the timeline of Netflix\u2019s \u201cThe Crown\u201d to similarly divide \u201cLucy and Desi\u201d into different eras. In their pitch, Season 1, \u201cFrom Cuba and Jamestown to New York and Hollywood,\u201d would focus on 1930 to 1940; Season 2, \u201cFamily Life, B-Movies and Radio,\u201d would span from 1940 to 1951; and Season 3, \u201cThe Ricardos Catch Fire, and Beyond,\u201d would look at the \u201cI Love Lucy\u201d era, from 1951 to 1960 and more.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn partnering with LaGravenese (who most recently penned Paramount+\u2019s upcoming \u201cUnspeakable: The Murder of JonBen\u00e9t Ramsey\u201d) and not a comedy writer, Arnaz said it was important to explore some of the darker aspects of her parents\u2019 relationship in addition to the good times. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe story is not all ha-ha. There\u2019s a lot of sadness, there\u2019s addiction, and there\u2019s cheating, and there\u2019s lots of fights for no reason,\u201d she said. \u201cThere\u2019s something to be learned from what they went through and how it\u2019s not that easy to have it all\u2026 They had this wonderful legacy, which just happens to be the funniest show ever. But they\u2019re more than that show. Their lives, individually and collectively, were very exciting and amazing and deep. Finding the right writer was hard because most people might think that, because we\u2019re doing the story of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz that it\u2019s going to be really funny. And it\u2019s going to have great kinds of humor in it. But it\u2019s not \u2018I Love Lucy.\u2019 It\u2019s not a sitcom. Everybody says, \u2018your father invented television,\u2019 but in reality, that\u2019s not at all what he was trying to do. They were just trying to stay together, and do a show.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tArnaz and Greenblatt first collaborated when he produced a 40th anniversary reunion concert benefit for \u201cThey\u2019re Playing Our Song,\u201d the musical that served as her Broadway debut. Around the same time, Arnaz was an executive producer on \u201cBeing the Ricardos,\u201d but ultimately that film focused mostly on one moment in time in the Lucy\/Desi relationship \u2014 and so, Arnaz brought the idea of a much broader look at her parents to Greenblatt, and they started collaborating on what would become this series pitch.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cLucie has this ability to separate herself from being in the middle of it and really see it from an objective point of view,\u201d Greenblatt said. \u201cShe\u2019s the first person to say, \u2018we want to do it warts and all, and we don\u2019t want to just whitewash it and protect everybody.\u2019 It really is complex. Can we get underneath the causes and the reasons for the way they were. We all think they\u2019re the Ricardos. There\u2019s a part of them that\u2019s who they were, but that\u2019s so little of the full picture.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLeGravenese entered the picture when Arnaz and Greenblatt went looking for somebody who could balance the comedy of \u201cI Love Lucy\u201d with the drama of what happened behind the scenes. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cRichard came to mind, as he\u2019s got this great background in writing feature films prominently for most of his life and more recently television,\u201d Greenblatt said. \u201cI love his \u2018Behind the Candelabra\u2019 movie, for which he won the Emmy. When we presented the idea to him, he just lit up. He\u2019s like, \u2018Oh my God, I\u2019ve loved these two people as a fan, and I\u2019ve gone down the rabbit hole on the internet many times.\u2019 He just knew a lot about the story already. Then we all met, and Lucie met him, and he just felt like the right guy.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\tAdded Arnaz: \u201cThere\u2019s been now two TV movies and a feature film and my documentary, but none of those other films ever looked at, \u2018OK, that happened and that happened, but why? Why did he do that? Why did she respond that way?\u2019 I wanted to correct that. If nothing else, I wanted to be able to look at them as people and say, \u2018aren\u2019t they interesting? Imagine, even with all that sorrow and all that loss, he was able to do this. And then he had to drink. Well, why did he have hookers? Why did that happen?\u2019 And so if we can show the early and go all the way to the end, in some way, we might be able to help people understand them even more.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Everybody knows Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz and the legend of \u201cI Love Lucy.\u201d But do they really? There…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":341795,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[171472,236,88,171473,171474,171475],"class_list":["post-342125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-bob-greenblatt","tag-celebrities","tag-entertainment","tag-i-love-lucy","tag-lucie-arnaz","tag-richard-lagravenese"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=342125"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/342125\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/341795"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=342125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=342125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=342125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}