I Love Lucy: The I Love Lucy Show

Lucille Ball worked as a model, performed on Broadway, appeared in movies, was a comedian and starred in her own television show called I Love Lucy. The I Love Lucy show started in the 1950s, during a time when society expected women to be wives and mothers and little else. They were not valued for their intelligence and they were not encouraged to achieve any sort of career success. Women in television shows during this time were not portrayed as mature or independent. Instead, their identity was tightly connected with others in their families, particularly their husbands. They are also consistently placed in the home and almost never in the male world of work. The man of the home was the breadwinner, and his wife was at home and raised

She was forty years old when she started the I Love Lucy show and became America’s number one star with over 16 million weekly viewers (citation). Prior to the I Love Lucy show, women shown on television were wives and homemakers. Lucille Ball changed how the typical woman of the time acted. She married a younger man when it was not acceptable, opening the door for others to follow. In the I Love Lucy show, Lucy did not always act like a lady and she made unfeminine qualities become a little more normal. The I Love Lucy show also changed how women related to one another. In the show, Lucy’s relationship with Ethyl existed on an even playing field, so typical competitive plots over men or status never entered the picture. Their relationship was a source of constant mutual support. Most television series today that include relationships between women that are based on the I Love Lucy show. Thirteen of the Most Epic Friendships From Your Favorite TV Shows include: Gossip Girl, Parks and Recreation, Boy Meets World, Grey’s Anatomy, Glee, Friends, Thats So Raven, Gilmore Girls, New Girl, Orange is the New Black, How I Met Your Mother, Broad City, and I Love Lucy (McGrath). The popularity of these television shows prove that Lucille Ball changed the way that society viewed women who were

Lucy was in an interracial marriage and had to fight the network to portray their marriage in the I Love Lucy show. She often showed support for her show’s African American maid’s equality showing that she was willing to take a stance on civil rights. Many television shows today feature interracial couples. typical interracial couples in television today include: Scandal, Modern Family, Jane the Virgin, The Mindy Project, New Girl, and The Walking Dead (Fitzpatrick). Lucille Ball changed how society viewed interracial marriage.

Lucille Ball changed the way that television sitcoms are produced and changed how society viewed women. She shaped television not only by pioneering elements of her own show, but also by influencing other shows for decades to come. Television shows today all use live film with multiple cameras and use re-runs, syndication and foreign distribution based on what Lucille Ball did with the I Love Lucy show. She was a very shrewd businesswoman and was the first woman to head a major television production company. She showed that it was ok for older women to work and for a woman to be in charge of a