Desi Arnaz

Desi Arnaz (March 2, 1917 – December 2, 1986) was a Cuban born musician, actor, comedian and television producer.

He was born Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha, III in Santiago, Cuba, to a wealthy family. His ancestors had been among the recipients of the original Spanish land grants in the eighteenth century, and his father served in the Cuban House of Representatives and became the youngest mayor that Cuba's second largest city, Santiago de Cuba, had ever had. After a 1933 revolution, Arnaz and his parents fled to Miami, Florida. Arnaz worked at different odd jobs to help support the family, including cleaning out bird cages.

He began his career as a professional musician in 1936, playing guitar and percussion for a Latin orchestra. He then took a pay cut to work in New York City for Xavier Cugat, his mentor, whom he later described as world-class cheapskate but an excellent teacher. Arnaz returned to Miami six months later to lead his own combo. It was there he introduced American audiences to the Conga Line, which soon became a national rage. He formed his own orchestra and returned to New York.

Arnaz was also a successful recording artist, beginning in 1937, and had a hit with the voodoo-flavored "Babalu" (1946), his signature song, which was recorded at RCA Victor.

In 1939, he starred on Broadway in the successful musical Too Many Girls. He then went to Hollywood to appear in the 1940 movie version at RKO, which starred actress and comedienne, Lucille Ball. They married in 1940 and initated divorce proceedings in 1944, but reconciled before the interlocutory decree became final.

He and Ball were the parents of actress Lucie Arnaz (born 1951) and actor Desi Arnaz, Jr. (born 1953).

Arnaz appeared in several movies in the 1940s, most notably Bataan (1943). Shortly after he received his draft notice, but before he was actually inducted, he injured his knee. Although he made it through boot camp, he was eventually classified for limited service, and ended up directing U.S.O. programs at a military hospital in the San Fernando Valley. In his memoirs, he recalled discovering that the first thing soldiers requested was almost invariably a glass of cold milk, so he arranged for beautiful starlets to greet the wounded soldiers as they disembarked and pour milk for them. After leaving the Army, he formed another orchestra, which was successful in live appearances and recordings. After he became engaged in television, he kept the orchestra on his payroll throughout the period he remained an active producer.

He produced and starred in I Love Lucy, in which he played a fictitious version of himself, Cuban orchestra leader Ricky Ricardo, and starring his real-life wife Lucille Ball as Ricky's wife Lucy. In the original pilot, Ricky and Lucy were successful showbusiness figures (he a band leader, she an actress) whose glamorous careers interfered with their efforts to maintain a normal marriage. Market research indicated, however, that this scenario would not be popular, so Arnaz changed it to make Ricky a struggling young orchestra leader and Lucy a plain housewife with showbiz fantasies but no talent at all. Initially, the idea of having Ball and the distinctly Latino Arnaz portray a married couple encountered resistance, for he was told that his Cuban accent and Latin style would not be agreeable to American viewers; but Arnaz overcame these objections by auditioning the proposed television show before live audiences with great success.

With Ball, he founded Desilu Productions. At this time, most television productions were broadcast live, and since the largest markets were in New York, the rest of the country received only kinoscope images--the result of placing television cameras in front of television sets and relaying the transmission, resulting in extremely poor quality. There he developed the multicamera setup production style using adjacent sets that became the standard for all subsequent situation comedies. The use of film enabled every station around the country to broadcast high-quality images of the show. Initially, Arnaz was told that it would be impossible to allow an audience onto a sound stage, but he worked with the famous cameraman Karl Freund to design a set that would accomodate an audience, allow filming and also adhere to fire and safety codes.

Arnaz also pushed the network to allow them to show Lucille Ball while she was pregnant. According to Arnaz, the CBS network told him, "You cannot show a pregnant woman on television." Arnaz consulted a priest, a rabbi and a minister, all of whom told him that there would be nothing wrong with showing a pregnant Lucy or with using the word "pregnant." The network finally relented and let Arnaz and Ball weave the pregnancy into the story line, but remained adament about eschewing use of "pregnant," so Arnaz substituted "expecting," pronouncing it "'spectin'" in his Cuban accent.

Also worth noting is the firm stance Arnaz and Ball took as to "basic good taste," avoiding racial or ethnic jokes, poking fun at the handicapped, and the like. Arnaz recalled that the only exception consisted of making fun of Ricky Ricardo's accent--and noted that even these jokes worked only when Lucy, as his wife, did the mimicing. "When Fred and Ethel made fun of Ricky's accent, they didn't get a laugh. Interesting, isn't it?" Arnaz said.

In addition to I Love Lucy, he produced December Bride, The Texan, Make Room for Daddy, The Mothers-in-Law, The Lucy Show, Those Whiting Girls, Our Miss Brooks, and the pilot episode of The Untouchables. all Top Ten shows in their time. He is also credited with the invention of the rerun.

Arnaz's marriage with Ball began to collapse under his serious problems with alcohol, drugs and womanizing. According to his memoir, the strain of operating the production company had greatly worsened as it had grown much larger. Arnaz was also suffering from diverticulitis, probably as a result of alcohol abuse. He and Ball divorced in 1960; she was 49 and he was 43.

After the divorce, Arnaz retired from active participation in show business, except for a memorable guest hosting stint on Saturday Night Live in 1976. In 1963, he married his second wife, Edith Mack Hirsh. They eventually moved to Del Mar, California, where he lived the rest of his life, making only an occasional TV and movie appearance.

He died in Del Mar at sixty-nine years of age from lung cancer. He was cremated and his ashes scattered.

Desi Arnaz has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, for contributions to Motion Pictures at 6327 Hollywood Boulevard, and for television at 6220 Hollywood Boulevard.

Filmography

• Too Many Girls (1940)
• Father Takes a Wife (1941)
• Four Jacks and a Jill (1942)
• The Navy Comes Through (1942)
• Bataan (1943)
• Screen Snapshots: Hollywood in Uniform (1943) (short subject)
• Cuban Pete (1946)
• Desi Arnaz and His Orchestra (1946) (short subject)
• Jitterumba (1947) (short subject)
• Holiday in Havana (1949)
• I Love Lucy (1953) (unreleased compilation film of episodes from the show).
• The Long, Long Trailer (1954)
• Forever, Darling (1956)
• Salsa (1976) (documentary)
• The Escape Artist (1982)

External links

• Desi Arnaz at IMDb
• Desi Arnaz at the Internet Broadway Database