From the book, "How I Escaped From Gilligan's Island" by William Froug:
"In 1949 I was hired by Lloyd Brownfield, head of CBS Press Information, Hollywood, as a senior publicist for $83.50 a week. That was a living wage at the time. My assignment was to write for the daily mailer, which was sent out to all the CBS Radio affiliates. The mailer was intended to pique their interest in the network's programs and especially their stars.
One of CBS's newest stars was a tall, pretty, young, red-headed woman named Lucille Ball. She had appeared in a number of B pictures and , according to the powers that be in New York, had a gift for comedy. Now she was being given her own radio sitcom, My Favorite Husband.
Brownfield gave me my first assignment: interview Ball and do a feature story on her for the mailer. I walked across CBS's Columbia Square courtyard and entered our big audience Studio A. The large auditorium was dark except for the lit stage where the cast was seated on folding chairs, studying scripts. They were on a rehearsal break. My good fortune, I thought, as I walked toward the stage where Ball was seated.
As I approached she glanced toward me, curiously. "Miss Ball," I said, "I'm Bill Froug with CBS Publicity, and I'd appreciate it if I could have a couple of minutes of your time to do an interview."
She turned in her chair so she was facing me head on. She fixed me with cold eyes and a knotted frown. "Kid," she said, "go shit in your hat."
When I reported the incident to my boss, he broke out into loud guffaws of laughter. "That's Lucy, all right," Brownie said. "Dig up a studio bio of her, rewrite it, and send it out. And, by the way," he added, "welcome to the real Hollywood."
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| Richard Denning with Ball |
8 comments:
hate the sin, not the sinner?
She's in a small club - along with, among others, Celeste Holm and Gene Kelly - about whom I've never heard anyone who was in The Biz in those days say anything bad about their work or good about their personality.
Just like Marilu Henner, but without their talent.
this makes me love her all the more, actually :)
as if we ever had any choice.
Personally, I sooooooo get it.
When I'm on a break from rehearsal, leave me the hell alone!
..Yeah, but if Louella or Hedda walked over instead of some novice reporter, there'd be no "shitting in your hat". Lucy would've been all sweetness and sunshine. Makes me respect Vivian Vance all the more, for having to put up with a (pardon the pun) Lucille BALL-buster like that.
Lucy always idolized her RKO pal Carole Lombard, and viewed her as a role model. But while Lombard was no stranger to blue language, she almost never used it with people she hadn't met, nor was she known for lording over people beneath her on the industry totem pole (one reason crew members adored working with her). Apparently Carole never got around to dispensing that advice to Lucy; pity.
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