Life with Lucy: Why it Failed

[TMC]

John Ritter's guest appearance is pretty much a microcosm for why this show didn't work.



Lucy here, almost physically cripples him and it's all in the name of humor. This just about proved how out of touch her old writers were. Lucy was way too old to be doing her trademark physical comedy anyway. But what really what killed it was the horrible supporting cast - including two grandchildren and a son and daughter-in-law.

[TMC]

Originally Posted by king of comedy

Lucy should have co starred in a supporting role in another sitcom.

Lucille Ball's biggest issue going back decades is that whenever she did jump back into acting, she just kept trying to redo the same show over and over and over and over, trying to recapture the I Love Lucy magic.

[TV Guy]

I always thought her best post-ILL role was in Yours, Mine, and Ours. It was something of a straightman role (except for the drunk scene), but it suited her. She came across as mature and warm. I could have seen her doing a role like that in the 70s - maybe playing a mother/grandmother to an extended family in an hour long comedy/drama a la Eight is Enough.

[folbartman]

I have posted quite a bit here in the past with my review of the show. It's been a long time since I have watched an episode of Life With Lucy. I'd like to write about my current thoughts since Timelife has now released 4 episodes of Life With Lucy.

In 2018 we are living in a world of revivals on television. Nostalgic as ever for yesteryear with casts reuniting, plots we are familiar with and a familiar face on TV is very hot at the moment i.e. Will and Grace, Roseanne/Conners , Murphy Brown and more. If Life with Lucy would have aired today I believe it would have been a success. Yes the show would need to be retooled a tad, but Lucy and Gale are spot on their delivery and the show feels fresh and modern, much like the TV shows revived feel today.

I particularly enjoyed Lucy's performance in the pilot, Mother of the Bride and the John Ritter episode. Each had a spark of familiarity such as Lucy getting in the act, Lucy seeking revenge, or just Lucy being ditsy old Lucy. It worked in Life with Lucy just as well as her previous series.

The world of 1986 was a tad different when Hollywood was still cranking out new ideas like Golden Girls and had hot fresh shows like Facts of Life. To the 1986 standard it may have been a little off, or dated.... But today it would work well.

The audience reaction is amazing in scenes . And reminds me of the past where not much editing was done and adds to the performance . If anyone has seen the recent Roseanne reboot, the laughter seems a bit edited and faded.. making the joke deliveries a little harder for me to laugh.

The show needed a little more time to find it's groove... Like any new show, but by today's standards isn't that far off. TvGuide was wrong when they named it the 22nd worst show of all time.

Thoughts... Disagreements????

Gosh we sure need a Lucy on TV today.

[Yeppi]

How about this, picture it... 1986, instead of trying to reinvent the wheel why didn't she just bring back 'The Lucy Show'? She had Gale Gordon and could've easily coaxed Mary Jane back. Maybe even could've had her Candy Moore and Jimmy back so that she could play the mom/grandmother. Set it back in Danfield if she wants that small home town feel.

OR it could've been 'Here's Lucy' season 7. Have Lucie back as a mom, so that way Lucy Carter can be the Grandmother. Bring in Gale Gordon as Harry Cater. She had every guest star under the moon except Desi. Imagine 1986: the first first episode was Her being taken to a night club for her birthday by her two children Kim & Craig. Meanwhile Harry has to stay back to babysit Kim's children. And WHO is the evenings performer at the club? DESI. Wouldn't it have been special to have had one scene with the four of them in the same room? What a way it could've been to re-introduce Lucy to TV!!!

[Charley Knox]

Originally Posted by TV Guy

I always thought her best post-ILL role was in Yours, Mine, and Ours. It was something of a straightman role (except for the drunk scene), but it suited her. She came across as mature and warm. I could have seen her doing a role like that in the 70s - maybe playing a mother/grandmother to an extended family in an hour long comedy/drama a la Eight is Enough.

Another good Lucy movie is "The Facts of Life" (1960) with Bob Hope. Just like Yours, Mine and Ours, it was not your typical Lucy movie and was even nominated for a best screenplay academy award.

[Yong Fang]

Frankly, the show wasn’t very good. Lucy in the 1980’s tried to revive her old formula of her characters of pratfalls and silliness. I don’t say this negatively, this was her act, and it worked brilliantly in the 1950’s and 1960’s. Tastes on television changed.

My question would be WHY she would want to do a new show? Lucy was (and should have been) extremely wealthy from her old shows, her fame, from years of Desilu. She didn’t need to work since she was already very wealthy. Unless she was in financial straights which she wasn’t, why did she do this show unless she just missed the adulation of the audience. She didn’t need the money. Maybe Gale Gordon did, don’t know.

I for one was never a big fan of her’s in the first place. Her first show was groundbreaking. Very professional, multi cameras, this was mostly of Desi’s doing and Jess Oppenheimer. She rode that fame to two other shows in the 1960’s to the early 1970’s. Her second show which lasted I think until 1974 was old fashioned for that time and mostly to older audiences from the 1950’s. Lucy was supposedly inconsolable that the audience passed her by. It is sad to say, but yes it did. Only the elderly watched it and it was a cheap production (Miller/Boyett?) and no was interested, and the show wasn’t good enough to attract an audience. Like I said that sounds cruel but it’s the truth.

But again, a mystery was, Lucy was already super wealthy, why would she do another show? She did it because she missed the fans and the work. It is sad and it is the human condition (and I am in my 50’s and getting older) that you can’t do what you did before.

It’s sad when people become elderly and still want to do what they have always wanted to do, the brain wants to do what the body cannot. That sucks and that’s the human condition. Also that entertainment is very fluid and what one generation likes doesn’t work for the next generation.

[Hazel Anyday]

I remember watching this when it was on. I was happy to see Gale Gordon & Lucy together again on TV but watching Lucy was sort of painful. No one wants to see an 80 year old woman falling on the floor, taking flying leaps thru the air, & being tossed about by garage doors. It just ain't funny to see very old people doing wild stunts that would normally kill a real old fogie. Lucy apparently didn't see it, I guess she figured what worked once when she was 30 would work again when she's 80.

I really like watching Last of The Summer Wine too about 3 old guys getting into trouble. The show was on british TV for over 30 years, and this show had the same problem. Physical humor that was once funny when they were in their 40's & 50's isn't funny when they're in their 80's & 90's! Literally they had these 80 to 90 year olds in the last 10 years of the show flying off bridges, falling into gulleys, flying off the top of ladders landing in a tree, then falling out of that. It just was once again unfunny and painful to watch these extremely aged men taking 50 foot falls and then they'd just bounce right back up like cartoon characters. Unfunny, each time it happened it looked like a fatal accident right in front of our eyes.