The TV column

Lucy, Dick and Mary offer colorful Christmases

The colorized I Love Lucy Christmas Special airs at 7 p.m. Friday on CBS and stars (from left) Vivian Vance, Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz and William Frawley as Ethel, Lucy, Ricky and Fred.
The colorized I Love Lucy Christmas Special airs at 7 p.m. Friday on CBS and stars (from left) Vivian Vance, Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz and William Frawley as Ethel, Lucy, Ricky and Fred.

Christmas is the time of year we're all supposed to feel warm and fuzzy and snugly wrapped in childhood nostalgia. Hopefully it works. We all could use a dose of that this year.

Nostalgia? Just forget all those times your Nanna came to visit and sat in the kitchen criticizing the way your mom was making the green bean casserole.

"Hon? You aren't going to crumble up those onions?"

And forget the time your little sister broke your Fort Apache not five minutes after it was out of the box.

Yes, Christmas is the season to drift back to yesteryear and be a carefree kid again. For me, that was the mid-'50s when the family gathered around the new 21-inch Motorola TV set to watch the Christmas specials. Of course, they were in fuzzy black and white back then.

So, what a treat it is to be able to watch colorized versions of those old shows these days. The I Love Lucy Christmas Special airs at 7 p.m. Friday on CBS.

I Love Lucy (1951-57) became one of my favorites after KTHV brought CBS to Little Rock a week after my seventh birthday in 1955.

Come Friday evening, I'll be sitting nostalgically watching the special with the sad remnants of my (now) politically incorrect Rin Tin Tin at Fort Apache Playset (I still have one blue cavalryman and the little cannon that shoots a wooden matchstick).

I can almost smell Mom's bean casserole in the oven.

CBS has aired I Love Lucy Christmas specials for the past four years, combining "The Christmas Episode" with a different, newly colorized second episode. This year the second episode is "The Fashion Show."

"The Christmas Episode" first aired on Christmas Eve, 1956, but never was included in any rebroadcasts or in syndication. In fact, it was thought to have been lost until CBS rediscovered it in 1989.

In the episode, the Ricardos and Mertzes are decorating Lucy and Ricky's Christmas tree and waxing nostalgic about how their lives have changed since Little Ricky (Keith Thibodeaux) arrived. Flashbacks recall some fun scenarios.

Trivia: Little Ricky was born in the episode "Lucy Goes to the Hospital," which was filmed Nov. 14, 1952, and broadcast Jan. 19, 1953. It was seen by 44 million viewers. In real life, Lucille Ball gave birth to Desi Arnaz Jr. a mere 12 hours before the broadcast.

"The Christmas Episode" segues seamlessly into "The Fashion Show," which was originally broadcast on Feb. 28, 1955.

The episode became an immediate fan favorite because Lucy brought in a few real housewives of Hollywood as guest runway models. They included the wives of Gordon MacRae (Sheila MacRae), William Holden (Brenda Marshall), Van Heflin (Frances Neal), Forrest Tucker (Marilyn Johnson) and Dean Martin (Jeanne Martin). Also on board is Hollywood fashion designer/actor Don Loper.

In the episode, Lucy gets Ricky's permission to spend up to $100 on a dress at the swanky Don Loper Salon in Beverly Hills. However, when she gets an opportunity to be in a Loper fashion show, Lucy winds up spending five times her limit -- about $4,521 in 2017 dollars.

As usual, she's got some 'splainin' to do.

Wait! There's Moore! The warm, fuzzy nostalgia doesn't end after the Lucy special. CBS follows at 8 p.m. Friday with The Dick Van Dyke Show -- Now in Living Color!

The hour special presents two newly colorized classic episodes of the black-and-white series that ran from 1961 to 1966 and starred Van Dyke and the late Mary Tyler Moore as television comedy writer Rob and his wife Laura Petrie.

Series creator and co-star Carl Reiner personally selected the two episodes to colorize in order to highlight Moore's impeccable comedic timing.

The special features Season 1's second episode, "My Blonde-Haired Brunette," written by Reiner, followed by the Season 3 episode "October Eve," written by Bill Persky and Sam Denoff.

In "My Blonde-Haired Brunette" (Oct. 10, 1961), Laura dyes her hair blonde to spice things up when she fears the romance between her and Rob is fading. Hilarity ensues.

"Ohhhh, Robbbbb!"

"October Eve" aired April 8, 1964, and is the classic episode in which Laura is horrified by a nude painting of her on display in a gallery. It seems she had posed fully clothed, but artist Sergei Carpetna took, um, artistic license. Carpetna is played by Reiner, who normally played the ego-maniacal Alan Brady.

"I picked two of the funniest episodes we did," Reiner said, "and I remember them fondly because they both showcased our wonderful Mary. I treasure her memory."

Moore died Jan. 25 at the age of 80 due to cardiopulmonary arrest (resulting from aspiration pneumonia, hypoxia and diabetes). Reiner, 95, and Van Dyke, 92, are still spry and soldier on.

The TV Column appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Email:

mstorey@arkansasonline.com

Weekend on 12/21/2017

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