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Desi Arnaz, Jr. on how I Love Lucy was different from his parents' real-life relationship
When the cameras stopped rolling, things weren't quite as funny.
Any industry can wreak havoc on a relationship, but Hollywood seems deadset on ruining them, specifically. There are so few positive, long-lasting marriages where both partners are tethered to the media industry. That's no coincidence: As if working in a similar field isn't already stressful enough, these folks have to do it under the constant tabloid scrutiny of an adoring public. While there are examples of couples who make it work, they're the exceptions that prove the rule.
Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz were one of Hollywood's most successful pairs, creating a timeless sitcom classic in I Love Lucy. While they were lauded for producing a string of hits, the couple fell apart internally. They might've been a great match onscreen, but behind the scenes, things weren't quite as rosy. With no studio audience to cheer them on, Ball and Arnaz failed to keep their marriage as a safe, healthy refuge from their hard work.
Their son, Desi Arnaz, Jr. spoke at length about his parents' relationship in a 1985 interview with The Toronto Star.
"I learned pretty early," he said, "to relate to I Love Lucy as a TV show and to my parents as actors on it. There wasn't much relationship between what I saw on TV and what was really going on at home. Those were difficult years— all those funny things happening each week on television to people who looked like my parents, then the same people agonizing through some terrible, unhappy times at home, and each of them trying to convince my sister and me separately that the other was in the wrong."
While the viewing audience may have struggled to separate fact from fiction, it seems like Arnaz, Jr. wasn't granted the same luxury. The harsh reality stood in stark contrast with the goofy foibles his parents filmed for the small screen.
It's a shame, ultimately, that those closest to them were unable to buy into the onscreen magic that made Arnaz and Ball such a great pair. However, for the rest of us who were unaffected by their marriage's collapse, the fantasy can live on forever on I Love Lucy.
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