This week marks Lucille Ball’s 112th birthday. The Internet is crowded with tributes from fans 
who never knew Lucy, but who regularly invited her into their homes—and still do, thanks to YouTube, reruns and DVDs. Worldwide, Lucy remains an icon, the last of the great black-and-white clowns.
But there was always a lot more to the lady than double takes and sass. Indeed, she was the first (and the loudest) to insist that the credit for her fame lay elsewhere: “My writers were funny. My direction was funny. The situations were funny. I am not funny. What I am is brave.”
This was not a case of bogus modesty. Lucy was one of a long list of pretty starlets who
arrived in 1930’s Hollywood. The redhead was the only one bold enough to work with the Three Stooges. “I learned just one thing from those guys,” she maintained. “Seltzer up the nose really hurts.” In fact, she learned something far more valuable—how to risk making make a fool of herself without losing her dignity. She would use that skill for the rest of her life, onscreen and off, whether it was stuffing chocolates into her mouth at a candy factory, or drunkenly selling Vita-meata-vegemin, or soberly telling Hollywood executives how she wanted things done.
Lucy’s first husband, Desi Arnaz, was a minor actor, a smart farceur and a brilliant businessman. It was he who created I Love Lucy, convinced CBS to underwrite the comedy, hired the producer, the actors, the writers, the cameraman—everyone down to the company CPA. His wife had never become the 60 foot star she wanted to be. But thanks to his manipulations, Lucille Ball became a 16 inch superstar. When the profits mounted, Desi plowed them back into the business. In a few years he turned Desilu into a show business powerhouse, took over the RKO studios and produced a series of long-running TV shows including The Untouchables and December Bride, the first of the “Senior Sitcoms,” starring a gray-haired Spring Byington. Alas, Desi was also an alcoholic and a womanizer. The Arnaz’s marriage, which had been so passionate at the beginning, hit the rocks in the late 1950’s and broke apart in 1960. So did Desi.
At that point, Lucy could have sold her interest in the company and walked away, just as Desi did. Instead, she remarried (her second husband was Gary Morton, a standup comedian content to sit on the sidelines) and took over the corner office at Desilu. There she oversaw long-running series like Star Trek and Mission: Impossible, as well as feature films. Lucille Ball was the first woman to run a movie studio since Mary Pickford co-founded United Artists in the 1920’s. In the process, she came to resemble another lady who might easily have opted for an easy life—and instead decided to learn the communications empire her husband had commanded for decades.
After the suicide of Philip Graham, his widow Katharine forced herself to master the newspaper business. As publisher she sought out the best talent, learned to use or delegate authority, and in time became a prominent and, on occasion, feared journalist in a highly competitive market. Similarly, the ex Mrs. Arnaz, who had left the biggest financial decisions to Desi, reinvented herself as a powerful, esteemed, and on occasion, feared mogul in a harsh and unforgiving trade.
As we’ve learned this week, the Washington Post that Katharine Graham nurtured has been bought (some would say rescued) by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos. As for Lucille Ball’s Desilu, it was absorbed long ago into the vast maw of Paramount, itself a subsidiary of the vaster maw of Gulf & Western.
No matter. Neither woman was the type to march in feminist parades. They made their point by precept and example, demonstrating to doubters that they could cut through glass ceilings like diamonds. If their institutions have altered, if print is no longer as viable as it once was; if TV situation comedy has become a little too predictable and much too coarse, the week’s events remind us that exemplars of integrity and taste stay in fashion no matter who makes the cover of People. Here’s to you, Katharine Graham. Happy Birthday, Lucille Ball.
Stefan Kanfer is a novelist as well as the biographer of many celebrities including Lucille Ball, Groucho Marx, Marlon Brando and Humphrey Bogart. His latest book, a thriller, is The Eskimo Hunts in Miami.