star trek and lucille ball

Lucille Ball is the reason we have 'Star Trek' — here's what happened

Lucille Ball kept the Starship Enterprise in flight.

The comedy icon's company, Desilu Productions, was responsible for  Gene Roddenberry's original "Star Trek" series.

Desilu was  one of the largest independent production companies in Hollywood and of course was the driving force behind Ball's star-making vehicle "I Love Lucy," which ran from 1951 to 1957.

But it was also responsible for "The Andy Griffith Show," "The Untouchables," "The Dick Van Dyke Show," and more. 

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Ball and then-husband and eventual "I Love Lucy" costar Desi Arnaz formed Desilu in 1950. Ball made most of all of the creative choices while Arnaz handled the business. The two worked as partners for years until they divorced in 1960, and Ball purchased Arnaz's share of the company in 1962.

Ball was the head of a major studio, and thus  one of the most powerful women in Hollywood at the time.

When the landmark "The Untouchables" ended its run in 1963, Desilu desperately needed another big hit. Herbert Solow, who was hired to find projects for the studio, brought Ball two proposals: one for  Roddenberry's  "Star Trek" and another for "Mission: Impossible."

It was clear that the "Star Trek" pilot would be expensive to film, but Ball — who actually believed the series was about traveling USO performers — overruled her board of directors and got the pilot produced.

The pilot, titled "The Cage," famously flopped . However, NBC pulled an unlikely move and ordered a second pilot, which came to be called "Where No  Man Has Gone Before," only retained Leonard Nimoy's Mr. Spock from the first pilot, and became the show it is known as today. Ball agreed to finance this reshoot, again over the preferences of her board of directors.

So Ball is the one who let "Star Trek" live long and prosper. Thanks, Lucy.

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Published Aug 6, 2023

How Lucille Ball Helped Star Trek Become a Cultural Icon

The actress and her studio helped bring The Original Series to life.

StarTrek.com

The journey to get   Star Trek : The Original Series  on television was a long and arduous one, but series creator Gene Roddenberry had help from an unlikely heroine. Without the help of this woman and her studio, the franchise may have stalled and never seen the light of day. And so today, on the anniversary of her birthday, let's think fondly of the incomparable  Lucille Ball .

Ball is, of course, most familiar to the world as the comedic star of  I Love Lucy , the show she produced and starred in alongside her husband Desi Arnaz. The success of the sitcom, which ran for six years, allowed her and her husband to purchase their own studio, Desilu Productions. When Arnaz and Ball divorced in 1960, she took over the studio herself, making her one of the most powerful women in Hollywood.

Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz outside the gates of Desilu.

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Four years later, Roddenberry came to Desilu with an idea for a pilot that would grow into  Star Trek . Ball bought the series, even if she didn’t quite understand it; allegedly, she thought the title referred to a group of traveling USO performers during WWII. Author Marc Cushman wrote of the actress in  Inside Star Trek: The Real Story  that, "She may have initially misunderstood the  Star Trek  concept, but TV's ‘wacky redhead,’ known for playing a character that had always had a harebrained scheme up her sleeve, had learned well from Desi Arnaz. He had been called crazy many times by Industry insiders, but always proved his critics wrong.”

Still, she supported his space western vision, even as some board members were resistant to the idea. It was thanks to her that “The Cage” was produced in the first place. Ball stood by the show through two pilots being shot and a massive budget, and the rest is history. A studio accountant named Edwin "Ed" Holly is on the record as saying "If it were not for Lucy, there would be no  Star Trek  today."

"The Cage"

Without the support of Ball, “The Cage” would have been the end of  Star Trek . Second pilots are rarely commissioned, not without someone with some power backing them up. NBC could have passed on  Star Trek  overall, but Ball, who believed in the project, stepped in, and saved the day in a move that would’ve made every Starfleet captain proud. The comedian is one of many talented women who are among the many reasons that the  Star Trek  has endured into the 21st Century. Ball is simply one of the first.

Her belief in  Star Trek  is why we have  Star Trek  as it stands today. Ball was more than just a comedian and a beloved television icon, she was a savvy producer who deserved credit for her work behind the scenes, including helping to achieve Roddenberry’s vision. For this, we can all love Lucy.

Stay tuned to  StarTrek.com  for more details! And be sure to follow @StarTrek on  Facebook ,  Twitter , and  Instagram .

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This article was originally published on November 22, 2019.

• Behind The Scenes

New Star Trek documentary reveals Lucille Ball’s surprising sci-fi influence

Without Lucy, we’d never have reached the Final Frontier.

The history of sci-fi owes its existence to the history of sitcoms. While WandaVision recently threw several famous old-school sitcoms into a Marvel blender, the success of Lucille Ball and her sitcom empire back in 1964 allowed for science fiction TV to take a massive leap into the mainstream.

Without I Love Lucy and The Lucy Show , Star Trek — the most pivotal sci-fi series of them all — would have never existed. And thanks to the new History Channel docuseries, this important pioneer in TV history is finally getting the respect she deserves.

The first episode of the new 10-part documentary series The Center Seat , which premiered Friday, focused in part on the history of Lucille Ball and her studio, Desilu Productions (named as a portmanteau of her name and that of husband/co-founder Desi Arnaz).

For the historians, archivists and experts interviewed in the documentary — from Larry Nemecek to John Tenuto , Maria Jose Tenuto , and Marc Cushman — few of its findings are new. But for fans unfamiliar with Star Trek history, it must have been shocking to learn of Ball’s influence on the series. For the first time, Lucille Ball has been identified as a star of Star Trek’s early phases.

Narrated by Gates McFadden of Star Trek: The Next Generation fame, The Center Seat is produced by Brian Volk-Weiss, probably most famous for his other documentary series, The Toys that Made Us . Made with a similarly jaunty vibe, The Center Seat has fun with its parsing its primary sources and offers information dumps in quirk ways. But it’s entirely sincere (and factually correct) in devoting half its premiere’s runtime to Ball’s involvement in the iconic sci-fi franchise.

Were it not for Ball, Star Trek would never have happened. Here are three reasons why:

Lucy and Desi in 1955.

3. Ball needed new series — and Star Trek fit the bill

After her divorce from Arnaz in 1960, Lucille Ball had another hit sitcom that followed I Love Lucy ; a somewhat lesser-known series titled The Lucy Show . But although several shows were filmed at Desilu Studios, Ball didn’t have another show that Desilu outright owned . When Desilu producer Herb Solow came to Lucy with Star Trek , she saw an opportunity to snag a show she could call her own.

The cast of Star Trek, after its first season.

2. Lucy and Desi invented reruns

Part of Ball’s foresight in popularizing Star Trek was connected to the fact that she and Arnaz pioneered the concept of reruns with I Love Lucy . Before I Love Lucy , the idea that creators could monetize reruns of TV series was unheard of. In The Center Seat, historian Marc Cushman makes it clear that what Lucille Ball wanted from her producers at Desilu Studios was to “bring me a show that can rerun as long as I Love Lucy .”

Although Star Trek: The Original Series was canceled after only three seasons, its availability for reruns in the 1970s — and beyond — is what kept the franchise alive.

Leonard Nimoy as Spock in the SECOND pilot episode for Star Trek, “Where No Man Has Gone Before.”

1. Ball greenlit Star Trek after its pilot failed

The Center Seat claims that Ball was “the mother” of Star Trek. Is this true? Short answer: yes!

Although Ball wasn’t involved in the creative side of Trek , she was pivotal in financing the series. As the experts in The Center Seat make clear, what makes Ball’s support of Trek so unusually historic is that she refinanced a second pilot episode after the first episode — “The Cage” — was rejected outright. As Gates McFadden says in the documentary: “Lucy was only too happy to put her money where her famous mouth was.”

The idea that Desilu Studios would put up money for a second pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” was unheard of in 1965. (It’s equally unheard of now.) As McFadden says at the end of the first episode, “Without the bravery and determination of Lucille Ball, who defined Hollywood and expectations, well, Star Trek probably wouldn’t exist at all.”

The Center Seat will air the first four episodes of the 10-part series on the History Channel on Fridays. Six additional episodes are also available on History Vault, the network’s subscription video service.

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How Lucille Ball saved 'Star Trek'

Gene Roddenberry's quirky little sci-fi drama found an unlikely champion in comedy queen Lucille Ball. Even after production costs ballooned and the first pilot bombed, the famous redhead steadfastly stood behind the show.

This article originally appeared in Entertainment Weekly's Ultimate Guide to Star Trek .

Lucille Ball, the undisputed queen of television in the 1950s and 1960s, had already earned a place in television history with her immortal 1951–57 sitcom I Love Lucy . The financial success of her blockbuster hit, costarring then-husband Desi Arnaz, allowed the couple to buy the former RKO Studios adjacent to the Paramount lot in Los Angeles in 1957.

They named their new company Desilu Productions, and it quickly became one of the largest independent production companies in Hollywood. Lucy had a good eye for spotting proposals with mass appeal, and their company was responsible for producing or filming series like The Andy Griffith Show, The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp and The Dick Van Dyke Show . When Lucy bought her ex-husband's share of the firm in 1962 (they divorced in 1960), she became the most powerful woman in television.

While many series were being shot at Desilu, the studio was in dire need of original programming of its own following the end of The Untouchables in 1963. Herbert Solow, hired to help locate new projects for the studio, brought two notable proposals to Desilu in 1964. One was Mission: Impossible ; the other was Roddenberry's quirky sci-fi idea. When Lucy's longtime network CBS said no to Trek , Solow and Roddenberry took it to NBC. Science fiction was alien to the network's schedule, but it ordered a pilot.

According to Solow in Marc Cushman's history These Are the Voyages , Lucy initially thought Star Trek was about traveling USO performers. But her support for the show was necessary as it became clear how expensive the pilot would be. Lucy overruled her board of directors to make sure the episode was produced.

Her support was even more critical when NBC rejected the initial pilot, "The Cage," in early 1965. NBC ordered a second pilot — introducing Shatner as Kirk — which Lucy agreed to help finance, again over her board's objections. Star Trek made the fall 1966 schedule, and the pilot won its time slot (though it later suffered in the ratings). "If it were not for Lucy," former studio executive Ed Holly told Desilu historian Coyne Steven Sanders, "there would be no Star Trek today."

Star Trek had been on the air for less than a year when Lucy sold her studio to the new owner of Paramount Pictures, and it later became Paramount Television. (It's now part of CBS Television Studios, connected to the same network that gave Lucy her start.) Meanwhile, the executive who bought Star Trek for NBC, Grant Tinker, went on to found the next big husband-wife TV-production company with his famous spouse, Mary Tyler Moore.

Ahead of the release of Star Trek Beyond and in celebration of the 50th anniversary of Star Trek: The Original Series , EW has an inside look at the beloved franchise. Entertainment Weekly 's Ultimate Guide to Star Trek is on sale now .

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We Wouldn't Have Star Trek Without Lucille Ball

The 'I Love Lucy' star was instrumental in shaping the future of the science fiction series.

It's hard to imagine a world without Star Trek . The exploration of the final frontier has led to multiple TV series — including the bedrock of Paramount+'s offerings — as well as novels, movies, and even comic books. But that wasn't always the case. In fact, Star Trek 's original pilot was received fairly poorly. But the series would find new life due to a surprising source: Lucille Ball . In fact, the I Love Lucy star is responsible for bringing Star Trek to television screens.The process, however, was a rough one as Ball had to deal with executives who didn't exactly see the value of the sci-fi series.

RELATED: 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' Season 2 Trailer Beams Up 'Lower Decks' Crossover, Klingons, and More

Lucille Ball Backed Star Trek When No One Else Would

Ball rose to prominence with I Love Lucy , which became one of the most popular sitcoms in history. This success let Ball and her husband Desi Arnaz form their own production studio, Desilu Productions . Under Desilu, TV shows including The Untouchables and Mission: Impossible enjoyed popularity — even spawning film adaptations of their own down the line. Ball and Arnaz eventually divorced in 1960, but Ball ended up buying out the remaining shares of Desilu by 1962. This made her one of the first female producers to head her own studio, and she'd use her clout to secure the rights for Star Trek .

First she had to convince her board members that the show was worth it. The original series pilot, "The Cage," didn't exactly set the world on fire. In his autobigraphy Up Till Now , William Shatner — who was up for the role of Captain Christopher Pike — revealed that NBC thought "The Cage" was "too cerebral," "too intellectual," and "too slow." Granted, those are words that have become synonymous with Trek , but when you're attempting to launch a television series those are hardly the adjectives one wants to be associated with a show.

Ball eventually stepped in and financed a second pilot titled "Where No Man Has Gone Before," which would serve as the series premiere proper for Star Trek: The Original Series . Many of Desilu's board members objected to spending so much time and money on the project, but Ball stood by Gene Roddenberry 's vision. Inside Star Trek: The Real Story author Marc Cushman made it clear that Ball had learned quite a few lessons from her ex-husband Arnaz when it came to taking crazy gambles.

But though Ball definitely saw the promise of Roddenberry's vision for Star Trek , the creator himself was less than forthright when it came to the nature of their relationship. Despite Roddenberry hyping up his personal connection with Ball, the two never met as she was busy with I Love Lucy in addition to helming her own production company. In fact, Ball almost fired Roddenberry when she learned he had been having an affair with his wife to be Majel Barrett. There was also the matter of Ball misunderstanding the nature of Star Trek . She apparently thought it was a show about actual Hollywood stars traveling across the globe for USO shows! Despite these roadblocks, Ball remained a major part of funding Star Trek: The Original Series and making sure it got on the airwaves.

The Seeds Of 'Star Trek: Strange New Worlds' Lie In Ball's Approval

Ball bankrolling Star Trek gave Roddenberry the clout he needed to hire the cast he wanted, including Shatner and Forest DeKelly . Prior to playing Kirk, Shatner was actually considered for the role of Captain Pike before being rejected. DeKelly, who'd go on to play Leonard McCoy, was deemed "too sinister" for "The Cage." Barrett, who played the mysterious "Number One" in "The Cage," would later go on to play several roles in the Star Trek franchise including Christine Chapel in The Original Series and Lwaxana Troi in Star Trek: The Next Generation . In fact, the only character who reprised their role from the original pilot was Leonard Nimoy as Spock.

"The Cage" would later influence the two-episode story "The Menagerie," which saw Spock commandeering the Enterprise in order to complete a mission that Pike had embarked upon years ago. Large portions of "The Cage" were used for flashback sequences, mainly because Trek 's special effects were starting to take a toll on the production schedule . The gamble ultimately paid off, as "The Menagerie" is considered to be one of the best episodes of The Original Series .

These days, "The Cage" is best known as the foundation of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds . While Pike (played this time by Anson Mount ) had previously appeared in Season 2 of Star Trek: Discovery , Strange New Worlds fleshes out his character as well as the various members of the U.S.S. Enterprise . From delving into Spock ( Ethan Peck ) and his struggle with his dual nature to the history of Number One/Una Chin-Riley ( Rebecca Romijin ), the characters who were only briefly glimpsed in "The Cage" are now as beloved as the original crew of the Enterprise .

In a way, Strange New Worlds owes its success to the fact that Lucille Ball was willing to take a chance on Star Trek . The franchise's journey to television paralleled Ball's rise to running her own studio. Both have stood the test of time, and more than earned their place in pop culture.

Star Trek: The Original Series and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds are available to stream on Paramount+.

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Star Trek: Lucille Ball’s Unsung Role in its Origin Story

Without the I Love Lucy star, Star Trek could have remained a failed pilot

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Star Trek is one of those franchises whose origins have become so mythologised its practically a superhero origin story. Every fan knows the story of Gene Rodenberry, ex-US Air Force pilot-turned-beat cop-turned TV producer. We have all heard about his original “ wagon train to the stars ” pitch, and his idea that stories about alien worlds could be used to address real issues on our own planet.

But one name you might not associate with the earliest days of Star Trek is Lucille Ball. When director Brian Volk-Weiss set out to make The Center Seat: Celebrating 55 Years of Star Trek , one of the things he set out to change was that a lot of the history of Star Trek that had been covered by books and journalism had never been seen in a documentary, and Lucille Ball was the most egregious example of that.

“This has bothered me since high school, maybe even junior high,” Volk-Weiss tells us. “I did the whole opening episode on this topic, which is how can we keep talking about Gene Rodenberry as the father of Star Trek and never talk about Lucille Ball?”

Even if you’re not an aficionado of vintage sitcom, Lucille Ball is a familiar face and name. Gillian Anderson’s character Media paid memorable tribute to her in American Gods . The first episode of WandaVision was an homage to her wildly successful show, I Love Lucy . Aaron Sorkin’s latest film, Being the Ricardos , documents Ball and her husband, Desi Arnaz, during one week of the production of the show. That was recently joined by the Amy Poehler-directed documentary Lucy and Desi , which goes behind-the-scenes on the star and her marriage using audio recordings provided by the family.

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Ball and Arnaz would eventually channel the success of their TV show into purchasing their own studio, forming the portmanteauing their names to form Desilu Productions, a name that will be familiar to anyone who watched Star Trek to the end of the credits.

When Ball and Arnaz eventually divorced in 1960, Ball took over the studio herself, becoming one of the most powerful women in Hollywood. That clout would become an essential part of the Star Trek story.

Ball had risen to prominence thanks to I Love Lucy pioneering the rerun on broadcast television, and so to make a name for her studio she wanted a show that could do equally successfully with rerun rights. Star Trek was to be that show.

“Gene’s great, I’ve nothing against Gene, but a script is nothing without money and she didn’t just finance the pilot once, she financed it twice,” Volk-Weiss says.

This is part of the story that is probably more familiar to Star Trek fans. Before there was the version of Star Trek we all know and love, there was the pilot episode, “ The Cage .” It saw the Enterprise encounter the mysterious, alien Talosians.

Rodenberry’s first pick for the show’s heroic Captain Pike, William Shatner , was unavailable, and so instead Jeffrey Hunter was cast in the role. At the same time, Rodenberry’s choice for the ship’s doctor, DeForest Kelley, was turned down for being too sinister thanks to his villainous Western roles.

The resulting pilot, which had already been one of the most expensive ever filmed at over $600,000, received a lukewarm response, and the entire Star Trek franchise could have ended there. But Ball stepped in and financed another pilot.

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“That would be considered insanely risky in 2022,” Volk-Weiss points out. “To do that before syndication existed was nuts.”

The second pilot, “Where No Man Has Gone Before,” saw Rodenberry finally manage to bring Shatner and Kelley onboard, as well as Nichole Nicholls as Uhura. It also saw the introduction of the “Galactic Barrier”, a concept the franchise is still getting storylines out of today.

Meanwhile, the original pilot has gone on to enjoy a second life, first as the two-part original series story ‘The Menagerie’, then with Captain Pike returning in Star Trek: Discovery and even meeting the Talosians again.

“The original pitch was ‘Lucille Ball turns the lights on, Rick Berman turns the lights off’,” Volk-Weiss says of his documentary series.

But with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds set to return this May, described by executive producer Henry Alonso Myers as “the longest pilot-to-series pickup in the history of television,” Lucille Ball’s impact on Star Trek may not be done yet.

Star Trek: The Center Seat is available to stream now on IMDb TV in the UK

Chris Farnell

Chris Farnell is a freelance writer and the author of a novel, an anthology, a Doctor Who themed joke book and some supplementary RPG material. He…

Why Star Trek Never Would Have Happened Without Lucille Ball

"Star Trek" has amassed a cult following since its introduction as a TV series back in 1966. Since then, the franchise has grown to include several TV series, movies, and even animated shows. It's hard to believe that "Star Trek" wouldn't have happened it wasn't for the backing of one of the entertainment industry's most powerful women at that time — Lucille Ball.

Lucille Ball was a fixture on television screens as the star of the sitcom "I Love Lucy," which aired from 1951 until 1957 on CBS. The show was produced by Desilu Productions, which was owned by Ball and her then-husband, Desi Arnaz, who was also her co-star in the series. "I Love Lucy" was such a huge success that the independent production company looked into creating more television shows. Arnaz and Ball divorced in 1960, and Ball bought her ex-husband's shares in the company, which made her the sole owner of the business and the first woman to run a television studio, per Women's History .

In the 1960s, Desilu Productions was desperate to launch another successful show. Ball was looking at two proposals that were brought to her attention — "Star Trek" and "Mission: Impossible" (via Business Insider ).

Lucille Ball fought for Star Trek

Desilu Productions' board members were against choosing "Star Trek" as filming for the pilot episode alone would be costly for the company. However, Lucille Ball , as the head of the business, overruled the majority and gave the green light for producing "Star Trek". As the story goes, Ball initially thought that the show was about traveling USO performers — artists who provided entertainment for troops, as reported by Entertainment Weekly . Ultimately, Ball believed in "Star Trek" creator Gene Roddenberry's project, and the pilot episode titled "The Cage" was filmed.

That wasn't the start of the sci-fi show, however, as NBC didn't like the pilot and rejected it for being "too cerebral." It seemed that "Star Trek" wouldn't be seen by the public but miraculously, NBC ordered a second pilot — an extremely rare occurrence in the entertainment business — to be shot. NBC likely wouldn't have given the show a second chance if it wasn't for the backing of Lucille Ball (via Star Trek ). The second pilot, titled "Where No Man Has Gone Before," had a completely different set of actors from the first pilot, save for Leonard Nimoy who retained his role as Mr. Spock. The second pilot was a success and gained NBC's approval.

Lucille Ball lost Desilu Productions

NBC ordered 16 episodes for the first season of "Star Trek," but again, Desilu board members tried to stop Lucille Ball from proceeding with the project as they were fearful that the cost to produce the show would bankrupt the company. Ball wasn't to be deterred, though, and production started, per Heavy . The first episode aired on September 8, 1966. A few years after its airing, Ball's own daughter, Lucie Arnaz, pushed for the board to cancel "Star Trek" as it was the most expensive show Desilu was producing. Again, Ball refused and said that she liked "Star Trek".

Desilu executives kept on trying to convince Ball to pull the plug on the show's second season, but she refused, believing that "Star Trek" will be a hit. However, production costs were piling up and in the middle of the second season, Ball was left with no choice but to sell Desilu Productions to Paramount. Shortly after, "Star Trek" became an international success under Paramount and aired in more than 60 countries. Sadly, Desilu ran out of funding before it was able to get its investment back and reap the rewards.

How Lucille Ball Helped Save “Star Trek”

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The comedic redheaded star of the I Love Lucy sitcom from NBC has further impacted television than many realize. She starred alongside her husband Desi Arnaz, who starred in the show as Ricky Ricardo. She broke many records, including having been the first woman to be seen on a TV show pregnant. Following it was her spinoff, The Lucy Show .

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In 1957, Lucy and her husband bought RKO studios near Paramount pictures. This decision turned into what is now known as Desilu Productions, the production company they produced I Love Lucy under. In no time, Desilu was producing The Andy Griffith Show, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp, making it one of the most successful and largest independent production companies. When Arnaz became her ex-husband, after they split in 1960, Lucy bought all of her husband shares. From the 50s to the 60s, she was one of the most well-recognized women, and with that maneuver, she became one of the powerful women on television. Ball later sold her company to the owner of Paramount Pictures, which later changed to Paramount Television., which is now owned by CBS television.

So, what’s Lucille Ball got to do with the science-fiction tv show S tar Trek ? Pretty much everything. Without her, there would be no Starfleet, no Spock, and no Klingon as we know it. In 1963, multiple separate occurrences converged to create the perfect opportunity. First, The Untouchables finished filming at Desilu Productions, Desilu needed an original program, and CBS passed on Gene Roddenberry’s science fiction television show Star Trek . Herbert Solow was hired by Desilu to find new projects; he found Star Trek and Mission: Impossible. Herbert Solow said, according to a Marc Cushman television history recount in These Are The Voyages, Ball initially thought the show was about traveling performers.

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The board of Desilu, however, didn’t seem to want to produce the show. Nor did NBC, although they’d ordered a pilot. Ball overruled the unanimous vote from the board to not finance the show and said she would. “The Cage,” the original pilot o f Star Trek: The Original Series was rejected in early 1965. This was when her support of the show became even more dire. They reshot the pilot, ordered still again by NBC, and made a few changes such as adding William Shatner as Kirk, and Ball’s company produced it. The next fall, Star Trek was added to the NBC network. In the words of a former Desilu studio executive, “If it were not for Lucy..there would be no ‘Star Trek’ today .”

Watch: Remember When Johnny Carson Asked Lucille Ball When She Lost Her Virginity

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Lucille Ball Suffered Life-Changing Sacrifices For Star Trek

The TV studio Desilu was founded in 1950 by Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, which you can probably tell by the name. The famous performing couple initially pitched a TV adaptation of the marriage-based radio sitcom "My Favorite Husband" to the execs at CBS, but that show eventually mutated into "I Love Lucy,"  more explicitly sold as a vehicle for Ball. To this day, "I Love Lucy" remains one of the most popular sitcoms of all time, and every modern comedy show contains traces of its DNA. The series ran for 180 episodes over six seasons, ending its run in 1957. Lucy and Desi divorced a few years later, and Ball became the sole owner of Desilu. 

Desilu oversaw a wide spectrum of shows, from sitcoms like "Our Miss Brooks" and variety shows like "Shower of Stars," but also Westerns like "The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp" and adventure programs like "Whirlybirds." When Ball took over sole ownership in the 1960s, her plans became far more ambitious. Ball oversaw the later seasons of notable shows like "The Untouchables," as well as "Mannix," "Mission: Impossible," and, most importantly to this article, "Star Trek." 

According to stories told in the 2016 book "The Fifty-Year Mission: The Complete, Uncensored, Unauthorized Oral History of Star Trek: The First 25 Years," edited by Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross, Ball was incredibly keen to promote "Star Trek." Despite being a relatively expensive show, and one that wasn't earning boffo ratings, Ball continued to push and push for the series. Sadly, her insistence on producing Gene Roddenberry's sci-fi program contributed to Ball selling off Desilu entirely. It seemed that her business legacy would have to end to launch a new one. 

I Love Lursa

Marc Cushman has orbited  "Star Trek"  for many years, but his most famous contribution involved pitching the story that would eventually become the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" episode "Sarek." Cushman also authored or co-authored several notable sourcebooks related to Trek, including 2013's "These Are the Voyages: TOS Season One,"  and "These Are the Voyages: Gene Roddenberry and Star Trek in the 1970s, Volume 1 (1970-75)."  In addition to "Star Trek," Cushman also wrote for other high-profile shows like "Beyond Belief: Fact or Fiction" and "Diagnosis Murder." Perhaps most impressive was Cushman's main career — under the nom de plume Cash Markman — as a writer of erotic films. As Markman, he wrote multiple "Sex Trek" movies, including "Charly XXX," "Sex Trek: The Man Eater," "XXX Trek: The Final Orgasm," and "Sex Trek V: Deep Space Sex."

Cushman, being learned in the world of "Star Trek" knew all about Lucille Ball's struggles with Desilu in the mid-1960s. It seems that people around Ball advised her not to invest in "Star Trek," but she defied them and did it anyway. Cushman told the following story: 

"Lucille Ball lost her studio because of 'Star Trek.' She had gambled on the show, and you can read the memos where her board of directors is saying, 'Don't do this show, it's going to kill us.' But she believed in it. She moved forward with it, and during the second season, she had to sell Desilu to Paramount Pictures. Lucille Ball gave up the studio that she and her husband built, it's all she had left of her marriage, and she sacrificed that for 'Star Trek.'

It's worth noting that Paramount has owned "Star Trek" ever since. 

'What would Desi do?'

Although Ball and Arnaz have separated, it seems that Lucy still respected her ex-husband's keen business acumen, preferring to take business cues from his old habits. Cushman stated it thus: 

"Desi wasn't there anymore. So Lucy is asking herself, 'What would Desi do?' because she really loved and respected him. 'Desi would get more shows on the air that we own, not just that we're producing for other companies.' That was her reasoning to do 'Star Trek' — and she felt that this show could, if it caught on, rerun for years like 'I Love Lucy.' And guess what? Those two shows — 'I Love Lucy' and 'Star Trek' — are two shows that have been rerunning ever since they originally aired."

So Ball perhaps knew what she was doing. She believed in "Star Trek," and felt that it was to be an important part of the Desilu identity. That it was put in eternal syndication was perhaps the largest contributing factor to the franchise's longevity. Sadly, Ball herself didn't get to ride that train very long. Cushman recalls that Trek was just too expensive to maintain. He said: 

"Lucy's instincts were right about 'Star Trek,' that it would become one of the biggest shows in syndication ever. The problem was that her pockets weren't deep enough. They were losing $15,000 an episode, which would be like $500,000 per episode today. You know, if she could have hung on just six months longer, it would have worked out, because by the end of the second season, once they had enough episodes. 'Star Trek' was playing in, I believe, 60 different countries around the world. And all of that money is flowing in." 

Before those six months were up, Desilu was already sold.

The fake smile

Cushman even knew about Ball's attempts to flee the sale. Evidently, she delayed signing the contract with Paramount by leaving town for a few days. Cushman seems to feel that Ball was heartbroken over everything. He said: 

"She had no choice but to sell. She actually took off and went to Miami. She ran away because it was so heartbreaking to sign the contract. They had to track her down to get her to do it. There's a picture of her cutting the ribbon after they've torn down the wall between Paramount and Desilu, and she's standing next to the CEO of Gulf and Western, which owns both studios now, and she's trying to fake this smile for the camera, and you know it's just killing her."

The New York Times reported at the time that Ball was to remain president of Desilu after the sale. One can see the photo Cushman is referring to online . Ball seems to be smiling in the picture as Charles Bluhdorn, wearing shades, looks at her cutting the ribbon. the ribbon was made of 70mm film strips. Immediately after the 1967 sale, Desilu was effectively defunct, and Paramount Television was born. "Star Trek" was permitted to survive and survives to this day . Even through various studio schisms and re-mergers, "Star Trek" has persisted. It seems that Lucy gave the show its one final push into immortality before backing off and letting others take the reins. 

Ball, meanwhile, lost the studio with her name on it. One might say it was a heartbreaking sacrifice. 

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‘She was very complicated. She was a conundrum’: who was the real Lucille Ball?

Aaron Sorkin’s Oscar-tipped drama shows behind the scenes of the much-loved sitcom I Love Lucy. Here those who knew her look back on her unusual career

“ She was very complicated, she was very loving and she was very mercurial. She was very generous but she came from the Depression and she was very guarded about money. She was a conundrum. She was a paradox of things. But she made me feel like I was the only person in the room, even in a crowd, and she made me feel authentic. ”

Lee Tannen, author and playwright, is in full flow as he reminisces about his intense decade-long friendship with Lucille Ball, once the funniest and most famous woman in America. Her 1950s sitcom, I Love Lucy, pulled in 60 million viewers and became part of the country’s cultural DNA.

Thirty-two years after her death, the legend is about to be burnished by Being the Ricardos, a biographical drama starring Nicole Kidman as Ball and Javier Bardem as Desi Arnaz, her husband both in real life and on screen. It explores the couple’s personal relationship – they divorced after 19 years but are said to have remained soulmates – and a professional crisis in which their careers were nearly derailed by the “red scare” in Hollywood.

This chapter of Ball’s career is so little known that writer and director Aaron Sorkin was unaware of it when he took on the project.

She was 24 when, in 1936, she registered to vote as a member of the Communist party to please her cherished grandfather (her father had died of typhoid fever when she was three). She thought little more of it, or about politics at all, but was hauled before the US House of Representatives Un-American Activities Committee in 1953.

When the influential columnist and broadcaster Walter Winchell broke the news, and newspapers followed up, Ball seemed doomed to the same fate as other Hollywood stars and screenwriters blacklisted by the communist witch-hunt. She braced herself for booing from the studio audience at the next recording of I Love Lucy.

But before she walked on set, Arnaz warmed up the audience by quipping: “And now. I want you to meet my favourite wife – my favourite redhead – in fact, that’s the only thing red about her, and even that’s not legitimate.” (Ball had gone from brunette to blond to red.)

Arnaz had saved the day. The crowd cheered. And the corporate powers behind I Love Lucy declined to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.

Speaking by phone from Stuyvesant, New York, Tannen says: “Lucy was the most apolitical person I know but it was a big deal and the only reason why her career was not ruined was because she was so beloved and Desi helped her through that point. There were people that committed suicide over this. This was a horrible, horrible, horrible time in America’s history.”

Ball had a previous career in Hollywood, making 75 films over 18 years at almost every major studio. She married Arnaz, a Cuban-born musician and actor who became a naturalised US citizen, in 1940. A decade later they went on a vaudeville tour, formed their own production company, Desilu (which produced Mission: Impossible and Star Trek), and conjured up the era-defining I Love Lucy.

Ball played Lucy Ricardo, a zany housewife with big dreams, while Arnaz (the first person to call her “Lucy” rather than “Lucille”) took the role of Ricky Ricardo, a Cuban-American bandleader. The show gained a huge national audience that would now be unthinkable in the fragmented era of streaming and continues to have a devoted worldwide following.

Tannen reflects: “ It’s timeless. It’s endless. It skirts parody. It skirts politics, it skirts racism. It skirts everything. It’s just damn funny. The writers were in their 20s – they were kids – and they knew how to write and it was a new medium and we laugh at it today. Funny is funny. Lucy always said, you don’t cut funny, and she’s right. It’s just funny. ”

Ball and Arnaz had two children, Lucie and Desi Jr, but could not hold the family together. They divorced in 1960 after she could no longer bear his alcoholism and extramarital affairs. Tannen continues: “ To me, the more successful they became, the more unsuccessful they became, meaning professionally and personally.

“She told me that she never would have left him if they weren’t so famous and so in the public eye. The looks that she got from all the people in Hollywood and the women who were her friends who he fucked: she couldn’t take it any more. It was really the womanising and the drinking and he couldn’t deal with the success. ”

Ball took over as head of Desilu Productions, becoming the first woman to lead a major studio. She married standup comic Gary Morton in 1961 and remained his wife until her death from an aneurysm in 1989. But Tannen, a distant relation of Morton, is convinced that Arnaz was the great love of her life.

“Oh, not even close,” he says. “ I say in my book that the day Desi died was the day she started dying. It was such a love affair that unquestionably she loved him until the day she died. And I believe he loved her.”

Tannen first met Ball briefly when he was very young, then again in 1980 when they hit it off and became inseparable. “It was this kind of kismet relationship. She became like a surrogate mother and I became like a surrogate son because you don’t have all that baggage – although we had baggage.

“I was probably with her more than her children in those years, 1980 to 1989. It’s a very bittersweet last decade, a few triumphs, a lot of disappointments and heartache. She died too young as far as I’m concerned and I still miss her every day.”

Tannen turned his decade with Ball into memoir, I Loved Lucy, which he adapted into a play of the same name and which, he hopes, might yet become a film. He indulged her love of backgammon, travelled with her and was in the audience when she received a Kennedy Center Honor in 1986 – five days after Arnaz’s death.

“That was my first decade of coming out as a gay man and she was coming into the last decade of her life, not that she knew it at the time,” he says tenderly. “I was unsure about my sexuality and she was unsure about a lot of things and so we sort of saved each other .

“I told her about being gay before I told my parents and I was so nervous about telling her and she was like, ‘What the hell? Why the hell didn’t you tell me in the first place that you’re gay?’ She was around gay men her whole life. So I loved how authentic she was with me and how authentic I was with her. That word keeps on cropping up.”

In a recent interview in the Hollywood Reporter, Sorkin was forced to defend his casting of Kidman and Bardem and raised eyebrows among Ball devotees by asserting: “It’s not a show that if we took a fresh look at today, we’d think was funny.” Being the Ricardos is likely to raise the question: has I Love Lucy stood the test of time?

Kathleen Brady, who interviewed Ball when she was 74 and wrote a biography, Lucille: The Life of Lucille Ball, says: “The show is still part of American culture. I meet some people who are sophisticated and when they hear that I met Lucille Ball, they get so excited. I think the fact that show gives us so much joy means that yes, it is still relevant .”

Brady, whose latest book is Francis and Clare: The Struggles of the Saints of Assisi, adds: “She seems to be an oppressed housewife but this is about the struggle against power, which is a classic comic device, and it is about upending power, which, Lord knows, she was able to do .

“Before she would go on to ride the New York City subways and get a loving cup stuck on her head, she would vacuum the house, she would make sure little Ricky was taken care of – she was a really good housewife. I suppose if one wanted to be very serious, one could see Lucy Ricardo as a tragic figure but nobody wants to be serious when they are dealing with I Love Lucy because they’re just laughing too hard.”

A new generation of Ball fans includes Carrie Cooke Ketterman, a 35-year-old singer and author who lives in Corydon, Indiana, who started watching I Love Lucy at her grandmother’s house when she was five or six.

“I was being nosy one day and I was going through her VHS tapes and I was like, ‘What is this I Love Lucy?’ and I popped a tape in and I was hooked,” she recalls. “I thought she was so funny. I guess it was mostly her expressions that drew me in and these zany situations that she would get herself pulled into. I became a lifelong fan after that.”

Ketterman, a natural redhead, and her husband Jeff play Ball and Arnaz in a tribute show, touring festivals around the country. She adds: “Theirs was a very unique relationship. You can see in the photos and some of the home videos and what you’ve read about them, they genuinely loved each other.

“Of course it wasn’t perfect by any means. They both were so passionate and creative it’s normal for them to butt heads. They were under so much stress to keep Lucy going, especially once they saw what they had.

“But I think that love was real. It was always there, even if it wasn’t always the best at times. They were meant to be together and, as much as you want that happy Hollywood ending – they stayed together forever and ever, the end – real life doesn’t work like that sometimes.”

Being the Ricardos is in cinemas on 10 December and Amazon Prime on 21 December

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• Nicole Kidman
• Aaron Sorkin

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Star Trek Wouldn't Exist Without... Lucille Ball?

Comedy pioneer Lucille Ball is still recognized today for her groundbreaking television comedy, but it turns out she also played a pivotal role in the exploration of the final frontier. Though many may be surprised to learn of it, Ball was a key figure in the success of the original "Star Trek" series, which spawned a massive multimedia franchise that's still going strong today, not to mention the immeasurable influence it casts over the entire science-fiction genre.

The story can be found on the official "Star Trek" site, celebrating how the "I Love Lucy" star was crucial in her behind-the-scenes role of bringing the show to the airwaves following a failed pilot episode.

In 1964, when "Star Trek" creator Gene Roddenberry was trying to get the show produced, Ball was the sole head of the Desilu production company following her split from Desi Arnaz. She bought the series from Roddenberry without fully grasping its concept; the story goes that she initially thought it was about a troupe of celebrity USO performers entertaining the soldiers during World War II.

Ball championed the series during its rocky first steps

The first pilot episode of "Star Trek," entitled "The Cage," holds an infamous place in the series' history. Were it not for Lucille Ball, "The Cage" would have likely been the first, last, and only adventure of the USS Enterprise . Instead, Ball fought hard and even invested her own money in a second pilot episode, which made it to air and kicked off the pop culture phenomenon we know today.

Unfortunately, Ball suffered life-changing sacrifices for "Star Trek," and the show's unusually expensive production budgets eventually led to her selling off Desilu. Noted "Star Trek" scholar Marc Cushman put it in no uncertain terms:

"Lucille Ball lost her studio because of 'Star Trek.' She had gambled on the show, and you can read the memos where her board of directors is saying, 'Don't do this show, it's going to kill us.' But she believed in it. She moved forward with it, and during the second season, she had to sell Desilu to Paramount Pictures. Lucille Ball gave up the studio that she and her husband built, it's all she had left of her marriage, and she sacrificed that for 'Star Trek.'"

Ball's instincts told her that "Star Trek" had the potential to be a massive enduring hit, one that would continue to be successful in reruns and broadcasts all over the world. She was proven more right than she ever could have dreamed but sadly wasn't able to reap the financial benefits after selling Desliu to Paramount Pictures, which still holds the rights to the "Star Trek" franchise today.

Without Lucille Ball, Star Trek Would've Failed Before Its Pilot Episode

Star Trek is a franchise going strong after almost 60 years, but without Hollywood legend Lucille Ball it wouldn't have gone past its pilot episode.

• Lucille Ball's creativity saved Star Trek from being a failed TV pilot and shaped its iconic characters.
• Desilu Studio's investment in Star Trek paved the way for the creation of the beloved sci-fi series by Gene Roddenberry.
• Ball's business acumen and support for innovative TV shows led to the longevity and success of Star Trek, changing TV history.

The name of series creator Gene Roddenberry appears at the end of every Star Trek episode or film. However, another television legend is equally, if not more, responsible for the massive franchise that continues today with Star Trek: Discovery Season 5 on Paramount+. If it weren't for I Love Lucy creator Lucille Ball, Star Trek would've been one of the thousands of failed pilots in TV history.

Ironically, if it hadn't failed, Strange New Worlds wouldn't have its central characters: Captain Christopher Pike, Number One, or Mister Spock. These were the characters Roddenberry wrote into Star Trek 's pilot episode titled "The Cage." Roddenberry took a circuitous route to television production, taking stories from his time in the military, working as a pilot and as a police officer. His first show was called The Lieutenant , from which he did most of his casting for Star Trek . However, when pitching the show to the three networks at the time, they all passed on it. Roddenberry only had a single-page memo, and Lucille Ball had the imagination the network TV executives lacked . As the head of Desilu Studio, she invested the studio's own money to get NBC to take a chance on the revolutionary sci-fi series.

How Lucille Ball Became a Television Mogul with Star Trek and Mission: Impossible

How gene roddenberry almost blew star trek's budget on starship research.

Like many actors in her era, Lucille Ball came to Hollywood with dreams of acting, singing and dancing on the big screen. While she had some early success, she found her niche performing on a radio comedy program called My Favorite Husband . This eventually evolved into the groundbreaking I Love Lucy , a series on CBS starring Lucy alongside her then-husband Desi Arnaz. The show became a massive hit, but its longevity comes from the ingenuity of its stars.

Arnaz and Ball didn't want their show to look blurry like their contemporaries, so they shot on 35mm film. This meant the shows could be rebroadcast repeatedly, inventing reruns and, eventually, syndication of television shows . Later, after I Love Lucy ended its run, and the two studio namesakes ended their marriage, Lucy ran the studio alone. During the height of the show's popularity, Desilu purchased film powerhouse RKO Studios, leasing out set space to series like The Dick Van Dyke Show , The Andy Griffith Show, and countless other classic television series.

Ball wanted Desilu to own the shows filmed on its lot, too. She knew that a successful series that could air in syndication for years, or even decades, was where the real profit would be. Other executives were skeptical, but at a time when Hollywood had almost no women in positions of power, she was the deciding vote in her studio. Lucille Ball was the one who decided what series went into production and which ones didn't, which is how the world got Star Trek .

In 1964, Gene Roddenberry, a former LA police officer and scriptwriter fresh off his first canceled series, came to Desilu and was signed to a three-year contract to create pilot episodes of TV series for the studio. He pitched many different ideas, but the one he wanted to do most was what he called " Wagon Train to the stars." The only pilot he ever really developed was the Star Trek one, after all. Ball knew she couldn't put all the space-eggs in one basket, so she also encouraged the development of other shows, including a spy thriller called Mission: Impossible .

Herbert F. Solow, an assitant to VP of Television at Desilu Oscar Katz, became an early champion for the show. He quickly got meetings with networks to pitch the series. Ironically, CBS (now part of Paramount) passed on the series, but the folks at NBC were interested. They commissioned a pilot called "The Cage," starring Jeffrey Hunter as Captain Christopher Pike and Majel Barrett as his first officer, "Number One."

How Lucille Ball Helped to Save Star Trek

Gene roddenberry named george takei's character sulu for an important reason.

NBC was willing to take a chance on Star Trek , but they weren't fully sold. "NBC...still considered Gene a novice at the game of producing and they were not at all sure that a small studio like Desilu could produce what was, in effect, a small science-fiction movie every week," Stephen E. Whitfield wrote in The Making of Star Trek . Still, after eight years with no new series on the air, Desilu needed the series to work as much as Roddenberry. Desilu split the $600,000 budget of "The Cage" with NBC. This arrangement mirrored how the studio would share the burden of production once the series did get picked up. This meant that each season of Star Trek cost the studio hundreds of thousands of dollars, and they wouldn't get their money back unless it was a hit, which it didn't seem destined to be until Lucille Ball did the unthinkable and saved Star Trek from the dustbin.

The network decided against picking up Star Trek , calling the pilot episode too cerebral and weird. Yet, Lucille Ball knew the series could work, and the producers were encouraged to keep negotiating with NBC. Ball wasn't a fan of Star Trek , though she probably liked that Roddenberry wanted to put women characters in positions of power. Rather, she understood the potential for the series, both in the present and the future. She may not have enjoyed the business, but she knew television. This may have convinced them to give it another go. The budget for the second pilot was smaller, and filming was fraught. Director James Goldstone said he saw Lucille Ball sweeping on set, her comedic way of both showing support and telling them to finish the job. This time, with William Shatner as Captain Kirk, Leonard Nimoy as Spock and the rest of the familiar characters, the USS Enterprise took off on its journey.

NBC agreed to produce the series maintaining the funding arrangement. Desilu supplied $85,000 to NBC's $100,000 for each episode of the first season. It almost sunk the studio. Star Trek became one of the two most expensive series produced by Desilu, with the other being Mission: Impossible . The cost of producing these expensive shows was so high the board thought she'd never make the money back. She'd already overruled the all-male board to make the series, so she couldn't ignore them. Still producing two popular network series made Desilu attractive to others in the industry. In 1967, one year after Star Trek debuted, Gulf and Western purchased both Desilu and its next-door neighbor, Paramount studios, merging them into a single company . The rest is Hollywood history.

How Syndication Saved Star Trek and Lucy's Business Reputation

Star trek: the original series critical ratings, star trek has always been 'woke' - some fans just forgot.

Reluctantly, Lucille Ball arranged the deal and agreed to sell off the studio she built. She wanted to get back to acting and producing her own series, without worrying about budgets, studio rental agreements and the other headaches she endured as the head of Desilu. Today, Mission: Impossible and Star Trek are the studios' biggest and most profitable franchises, as it again appears to be up for sale to Skydance Media . Because of her innate understanding of television and how great series had longevity, Lucille Ball saved Star Trek . And even though she couldn't save her studio, the properties whose creation she oversaw are what is keeping Paramount afloat to this day. In fact, over all the years of syndication, box office receipts, home media sales and licensing agreements, Gene Roddenberry's universe might be the single most profitable thing Paramount has ever produced .

Though, iIt didn't start that way. The exorbitant Star Trek budget was one of the first things Paramount cut. NBC retaliated against this move by burying the show on Friday nights, almost ensuring cancelation. A fan-led letter-writing campaign saved it from cancelation at the end of Season 2, but this battle went far beyond their power. However, since Desilu insisted on retaining the rights to reruns, that meant Paramount owned them now . Almost overnight, Star Trek became a bigger hit in syndication than it ever was on NBC. The television format made possible by Ball and Arnaz's invention turned the (canceled) series Paramount purchased from her into financial success.

The reason Star Trek: The Next Generation was sold directly into syndication in 1987 is because Star Trek: The Original Series was still the highest-rated syndicated program two decades after new episodes ceased. Lucille Ball may never have been fully content with the sale of Desilu, but her business instincts were proven right with time. She went back to performing and acting, starring in shows and making appearances until her death in 1989. However, her vision and ingenuity changed television many times over, including saving Star Trek when no one else believed in it. She changed the medium with I Love Lucy and then, by supporting Star Trek , she is responsible for the first-ever multimedia narrative universe lasting for 60 years with no signs of slowing down.

Sources: The Center Seat: 55 Years of Star Trek on Prime Video, StarTrek.com

The Star Trek universe encompasses multiple series, each offering a unique lens through which to experience the wonders and perils of space travel. Join Captain Kirk and his crew on the Original Series' voyages of discovery, encounter the utopian vision of the Federation in The Next Generation, or delve into the darker corners of galactic politics in Deep Space Nine. No matter your preference, there's a Star Trek adventure waiting to ignite your imagination.

Remembering Lucille Ball, Pioneering ‘I Love Lucy’ Star and TV Mogul, on Her Birthday

By Cynthia Littleton

Cynthia Littleton

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Lucille Desiree Ball

Born: Aug. 6, 1911 in Celeron, N.Y.

Died: April 26, 1989 in Los Angeles

Best known for: CBS comedy series “ I Love Lucy ” (1951-1957), “The Lucy Show” (1962-68), “Here’s Lucy” (1968-74). As Variety‘ s Tom Gilbert observed after her death, “Ball’s elastic facial expressions and precise comic timing catapulted her into an American institution.”

Autobiography: “Love, Lucy,” published posthumously in 1996, from a memoir Ball wrote in the mid-1960s.

Awards: Emmy wins for lead comedy actress in 1953, 1956, 1967 and 1968. Hollywood Foreign Press Assn.‘s Cecil B. DeMille Award, 1979. Academy of Television Arts & Sciences’ Governors Award, 1989

Behind the scenes impact: With her husband and “I Love Lucy” co-star Desi Arnaz , Ball was a TV pioneer who etched an enduring template for TV sitcoms shot on film, which ignited the syndication marketplace for TV. Known for her signature flame-red hair color, Ball was also the first woman to head a major TV studio, Desilu Productions, which she and Arnaz formed to produce “I Love Lucy.” The pair built Desilu into a powerhouse TV studio that produced or provided production services for such 1950s and ‘60s TV series as “Star Trek,” “Mission: Impossible,” “The Untouchables” “Our Miss Brooks,” “Make Room For Daddy,” “December Bride” and “Whirlybirds.” Ball took over the company a few years after she and Arnaz were divorced in 1960. In 1967, Ball sold Desilu for $17 million to Gulf + Western, which bought Paramount Pictures around the same time.

Why she mattered: Ball fought the systemic racism of her era when CBS executives balked at having her star in a TV series with her real-life husband, the Cuba-born bandleader. The executives thought America would never accept a show revolving around a multi-ethnic marriage. Ball and Arnaz proved them wrong by touring the country in 1950 with a cabaret comedy act that was a smash hit. By spring 1951, Ball and Arnaz had deals with CBS and sponsor Philip Morris for the series that became “I Love Lucy.”

Her big break: Ball studied acting in New York and moved to the West Coast in the early 1930s. As a leggy ingenue, she landed numerous uncredited roles including one as a Goldwyn Girl in 1933’s “Roman Scandals.” She bounced around in bit parts at Columbia Pictures and 20th Century Fox before securing a seven-year contract at RKO in 1935 ( Daily Variety noted that Ball was one of four “girls” to land deals with RKO). She was a player in mostly mediocre comedies during her time at the studio — with notable exceptions such as 1937’s “Stage Door.” She met Arnaz when the two were cast in 1940’s “Too Many Girls.” The pair tied the knot in Greenwich, Conn., on Nov. 30, 1940.

First appearance as a redhead: 1938’s “The Affairs of Annabel.” Before that she’d been a brunette and a blonde.

Last public appearance: Ball appeared as a presenter with Bob Hope on the 61st annual Academy Awards telecast held March 29, 1989, less than a month before she died. She received a rousing standing ovation that left her “noticeably overwhelmed,” as Variety observed.

Deep dive: Lucille Ball is the definition of a TV icon — so much so that she was formally christened “the first lady of television” at an Academy of Television Arts & Sciences event in 1969.

Ball famously conceived the notion of starring in a TV comedy with Arnaz as a means to stabilize their marriage at a time when her husband was often on the road touring with his band. She had been starring in a radio show for CBS, “My Favorite Husband,” that was so popular CBS decided to adapt it for the fledgling medium of television. At every step, Ball and Arnaz made “I Love Lucy” on their own terms — starting with writing the $5,000 check to finance the production of the pilot. The start of the series was heralded by Desilu with an ad in the Sept. 5, 1951, edition of Daily Variety .

CBS and Philip Morris expected the show to air live from New York, as was the standard for most other TV comedies in that day. Ball and Arnaz didn’t want to move away from the West Coast, where they lived on a spacious five-acre ranch in the L.A. suburb of Chatsworth that was also dubbed “Desilu.” Arnaz came up with the idea of shooting the show on film. CBS and Philip Morris told the couple they would have to take a pay cut to help offset the additional expense. In exchange, Desilu got full ownership of the episodes after their initial airing.

“I Love Lucy” blossomed into a massive hit within weeks of its debut on Oct. 15, 1951. America fell for the antics of Lucy and Ricky Ricardo and their neighbors, Fred and Ethel Mertz (played by William Frawley and Vivian Vance). The line between fact and fiction blurred in January 1953 when Ball gave birth to her second child, Desi Arnaz Jr., on the same day that America watched the Ricardos become parents to Little Ricky. The momentous episode delivered massive ratings.

The success of “I Love Lucy” allowed Ball the unique pleasure of buying the Hollywood studio where she had once been under contract. In 1958 Desilu sealed the deal to buy two studio lots from RKO for $6.1 million. One was at the corner of Melrose and Gower (right next door to Paramount Pictures); the other was what is now known as the Culver Studios in Culver City (next door to Sony Pictures). That same year, Desilu sold the rights to 180 “I Love Lucy” episodes to CBS for $4.5 million, a windfall that helped finance Desilu’s expansion as a production and production services company. By 1957, Desilu had more than 800 employees and $21 million in revenue. The company had an initial public stock offering on Dec. 3, 1958, making Ball a rare example of a female corporate officer in Hollywood at the time. By 1962, Ball had bought out Arnaz’s share of the company and went solo as Desilu president.

Ball’s decision to divorce Arnaz after the couple ended their run on CBS in 1960 was a shock to the general public. But America never stopped loving Lucy, and Ball never stopped working. Although “The Lucy Show” and “Here’s Lucy” didn’t have the same pop culture impact, her shows were highly rated. She married comedian Gary Morton in November 1961.

After making mostly forgettable movies in the 1930s and ‘40s, Ball tried to make a splash on the big screen with the 1974 adaptation of musical “Mame.” But the movie was a flop.

Ball had two notable TV projects in the 1980s. The 1985 TV movie “Stone Pillow,” featuring Ball in a rare dramatic turn as a New York City bag lady, earned strong notices. “La Ball is on a roll,” Variety enthused in its review. But the following year, Ball struck out in her fourth sitcom attempt. The much-ballyhooed comeback vehicle “Life With Lucy,” produced by Aaron Spelling for ABC, was canceled after just a few episodes.

Ball and Arnaz had a tumultuous marriage, by many accounts, but the bonds between the former partners in life and business ran deep. Arnaz died at age 69 on Dec. 2, 1986. Two days later, Associated Press reported that Ball was seen weeping at the memorial service for Arnaz. “He was a great part of our innovation in this business,” Ball told the AP.

As many of Ball’s co-stars noted over the years, the first lady of television was generous and loyal to the end. Her daughter, Lucie Arnaz, paid tribute to the beloved icon with an ad in Daily Variety on the one-year anniversary of her passing.

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Star Trek Demythifies How The Iconic Lucille Ball Saved The Franchise & Helped It Become A Cultural Phenom!

August 9, 2023

Star Trek Demythifies How The Iconic Lucille Ball Saved The Franchise and Helped It Become A Cultural Phenom!

Star Trek reports .

How Lucille Ball Helped Star Trek Become a Cultural Icon The actress and her studio helped bring The Original Series to life.

The journey to get Star Trek: The Original Series on television was a long and arduous one, but series creator Gene Roddenberry had help from an unlikely heroine. Without the help of this woman and her studio, the franchise may have stalled and never seen the light of day. And so today, on the anniversary of her birthday, let’s think fondly of the incomparable Lucille Ball. Ball is, of course, most familiar to the world as the comedic star of I Love Lucy, the show she produced and starred in alongside her husband Desi Arnaz. The success of the sitcom, which ran for six years, allowed her and her husband to purchase their own studio, Desilu Productions. When Arnaz and Ball divorced in 1960, she took over the studio herself, making her one of the most powerful women in Hollywood.

Four years later, Roddenberry came to Desilu with an idea for a pilot that would grow into Star Trek. Ball bought the series, even if she didn’t quite understand it; allegedly, she thought the title referred to a group of traveling USO performers during WWII. Author Marc Cushman wrote of the actress in Inside Star Trek: The Real Story that, “She may have initially misunderstood the Star Trek concept, but TV’s ‘wacky redhead,’ known for playing a character that had always had a harebrained scheme up her sleeve, had learned well from Desi Arnaz. He had been called crazy many times by Industry insiders, but always proved his critics wrong.” Still, she supported his space western vision, even as some board members were resistant to the idea. It was thanks to her that “The Cage” was produced in the first place. Ball stood by the show through two pilots being shot and a massive budget, and the rest is history. A studio accountant named Edwin “Ed” Holly is on the record as saying “If it were not for Lucy, there would be no Star Trek today.”

Without the support of Ball, “The Cage” would have been the end of Star Trek. Second pilots are rarely commissioned, not without someone with some power backing them up. NBC could have passed on Star Trek overall, but Ball, who believed in the project, stepped in, and saved the day in a move that would’ve made every Starfleet captain proud. The comedian is one of many talented women who are among the many reasons that the Star Trek has endured into the 21st Century. Ball is simply one of the first. Her belief in Star Trek is why we have Star Trek as it stands today. Ball was more than just a comedian and a beloved television icon, she was a savvy producer who deserved credit for her work behind the scenes, including helping to achieve Roddenberry’s vision. For this, we can all love Lucy.

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Anton Yelchin's Chekov Accent In Star Trek Was Inaccurate On Purpose

V iacom, the parent company of Paramount, underwent a dramatic split in 2005, causing the TV rights to "Star Trek" and the movie rights to "Star Trek" to be divided among two separate companies. This meant that if the movie-owners wanted to make a new feature film, they would have to license "Star Trek" iconography from the TV-owners. Under the conditions of such a liscense, a movie had to look legally distinct from the old TV show. What a headache.

This situation led to the creation of the Kelvin-verse, a "Star Trek" continuity that took place in a parallel timeline. The 2009 "Star Trek" movie featured the same ships and characters as the 1966 "Star Trek," but altered into something similar-yet-different. New actors played younger versions of the 1966 originals, and the U.S.S. Enterprise was now twice as big. Director J.J. Abrams also made the new movie more dramatic, action-packed, and full of explosions. There's some debate among Trekkies as to whether or not the Kelvin-verse is in the spirit of "Star Trek" or if it should be considered an autonomous media entity. 

What everyone seemed to agree on, however, was the new film's savvy casting. The newer, younger actors all did exemplary jobs of capturing the looks, mannerisms, and personalities of their 1960s counterparts. They were youthful, more impulsive versions of the characters we knew, but held the same appeal. 

The role of Ensign Pavel Chekhov, previously played by Walter Koenig, went to the late Anton Yelchin. Yelchin captured Koenig's cockiness, Russian-centric ego, and dazzling charm. He also recreated Koenig's broad Russian accent, a notable feature of the character. 

In 2009, Yelchin spoke with TrekMovie , and he revealed that the accent was deliberately broad; it wasn't supposed to sound authentic. He also explained why he made that decision. 

Read more: Lucille Ball Suffered Life-Changing Sacrifices For Star Trek