Today, we look at the time that the Ricardos were interviewed by “Edward R. Murrow” in an episode of I Love Lucy.
This is “My Name It is Nothin’,” a look at when movies and TV shows feature celebrities, characters and/or famous people without featuring the actual celebrity/famous people. You know, changing the names so that you can tell the story without legal issues.
Interestingly enough, on I Love Lucy, the classic sitcom starring Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz as essentially fictionalized versions of themselves, Lucy and Ricky Ricardo, the show had more continuity than you might expect, as there was a whole arc later in the series about Ricky doing a Hollywood movie.
The movie is a hit, and he becomes a star, leading to episode 7 of Season 5, “The Ricardos Are Interviewed,” where the couple goes on Face to Face to be interviewed by Ed Warren.
Ed Warren, of course, is a stand-in for Edward R. Murrow, the iconic journalist who also did the celebrity interview series, Person to Person, as sort of a quid pro quo with CBS in which he’d do this celebrity interview stuff if he could also do a hard-hitting news magazine, See It Now, as well.
The interview goes awry when some interpersonal drama pops up with the Mertzes believing that the Ricardos plan to move out of their apartment to go live in a luxury apartment and ditch their longtime, dear friends, the Mertzes.
Elliott Reid, the actor who played Murrow, was an expert mimic, and he spent a weekend preparing for the role, and he was SO picture perfect that the audience is obviously kind of shocked when he begins to talk. You can hear an audible reaction from the audience as soon as he begins to speak, that’s how good he was.
If anyone else has a suggestion for a future My Name It Ain’t Nothin’, drop me a line at brian@poprefs.com! My e-mail is the only place where I have a true record of suggestions, as you can’t really search Facebook messages or comments, ya know?
Hohoho! That episode ran today on Pluto TV and had me fooled till I Googled – edward r murrow i love lucy – and landed here. I, who suffer not fools gladly, was fooled!
He really did SUCH a good job, though, so it’s not hard to be fooled!