NEW TO AMAZON PRIME! Director Amy Poehler’s debut documentary Lucy and Desi is dedicated to the legendary couple whose fame, talent, know-how, and never-ending love for one another touched us all. It is an essential documentary filled with significant knowledge and interest to honor a couple who brought so much to so many. From the couple’s rise as Hollywood’s most influential performers, creators, and business owners to the afterlife of each of them from their divorce, there isn’t a moment where your eyes move from the screen, or your ears are not fully tuned into the commentary and spoken word.
Lucy and Desi is a film where research and attention to detail tell the most authentic version of the couple’s life. It is realized and appreciated with audio cassette recordings, television and film footage, outtakes, archival photos and footage, and a wide range of commentary. Revealing the beginnings of Ball and Arnaz and their rise to become performers and changing showbusiness as we know it, the honesty is unflinching.
“…Ball and Arnaz and their rise to become performers and changing showbusiness…”
Desi Arnaz was Cuban American and broke stereotypes as a Latino. He was also a relentless personality and businessman who changed how we watched television. Lucille Ball was a comedic force and entertainer who never let up performing and producing even after her divorce. She still reigns supreme as one of the legendary female comics of all time. Even after I Love Lucy had ended, she continued with new groundbreaking shows for women and women of a certain age.
Meeting at RKO Pictures, a studio Desilu Productions would eventually own was the beginning of the couple’s most well-known collaborations. There, the couple would operate the most significant television production studio of its time. Desilu Productions would produce I Love Lucy, The Lucy Show, The Untouchables, Mission: Impossible, and Star Trek. Today, it is CBS Studios. Intense work and surviving the throes of critics, Ball and Arnaz, lived a whole life, and even after being divorced and remarrying, their love for each other was ethereal.
Lucy and Desi includes interviews with comedians and entertainers such as Carol Burnett, Bette Midler, Charo, and their children Lucie Arnaz Luckinbill and Desi Arnaz Jr. The overarching story is outstanding and heartbreaking. An incredible amount of material was uncovered and discovered to construct the film. At times, it was a little hard to follow the timeline. However, the documentary makes a lasting impression for the dedication Lucille Ball, and Desi Arnez had to their craft, business, and each other.
Lucy and Desi screened at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.
"…makes a lasting impression..."
