As is now commonly acknowledged, I Love Lucy provided heaping doses of the stylistic DNA that was replicated in the innumerable sitcoms that followed in its wake. Even the much joked-about Desi Arnaz is credited with deciding to shoot the series on film, and also co-conceived the "multi-camera" production method with Fritz Lang's cinematographer, Karl Freund. Freund flooded the set with light, eliminating shadows when actors moved around, and thus allowed one set-up for all three cameras. Simple, but brilliant.
Old Ricky Ricardo had another idea up his sleeve, one that would reap huge financial rewards for the couple's company, Desilu Productions. When the network suits complained about the cost of shooting the series on film, Arnaz made a deal to absorb any additional costs incurred to do so, in exchange for owning and controlling the rights to the show. That may not have sounded so shrewd at the time, but it means Desilu reaped the boundless sums generated by re-runs and syndication in the last 60 years!
But it is Lucille Ball herself who provided the blueprint for success in television comedy — she was the first, and remains to this day, the most powerful woman in the history of the medium. Even her fictional persona, the hapless but lovable red-headed ditz, had a head full of promising get-rich schemes that were all doomed to miserably fail. As such, she may have captured the lightning of post-war euphoria and boundless optimism in a tiny, half-hour bottle. The underdog was never so appealingly innocent and deserving, even if Ricky scoffed at her harebrained schemes.
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