The Lucy Show

I loved the first year of "The Lucy Show" because it was a great showcase for Vivian Vance. Honestly, Vivian was ten times a better actress than Lucy. Viv was real, while Lucy was loud and over-the-top. When Vivian left, the show died really. I hated Gale Gordon! It was so sad - a 60-year-old man yelling at a 50-year old woman! Why was that funny? Viv and Lucy had so much warmth together. It was great fun. Lucy would have done well to have retired from television in 1965 along with Vivian, because "Lucy" shows post-Vivian were just not funny.

Although it was called "The Lucy Show," the core of this program was always the interaction between Lucille Ball, Vivian Vance and Gale Gordon. Having key film crew personnel from "I Love Lucy" certainly didn't hurt. The show did lose some punch when Vance left for she,along with Ball and Gordon, were "The Lucy Show Triumvirate". However, I feel the post-Vance episodes were almost as enjoyable for they featured interesting and entertaining guest stars. The "Main Street" episode featuring Mel Torme, Paul Winchell AND John Bubbles is a delight for musical fans. Check out the sequence showing Bubbles dancing with Lucy. Also, these later episodes still featured Gale Gordon who bounced off Lucy just as effectively as Vance did. Plus, the addition of Roy Roberts as Gordon's boss helped for he and Gordon bounced off each other well.

I tend to disagree with the vast majority of the comments here. While The Lucy Show is not I Love Lucy by any means, it still cracks me up every time I watch it.

And yes, the show lost a little something when Vivian left. She and Lucy had an unbeatable on-screen chemistry. However, that doesn't mean the show should be written off entirely just because Viv's not there. I mean, it's Lucy! You really can't lose.

So, bottom line: Watch it! You won't be sorry. I bought a 2 disc DVD set and watched it yesterday and laughed my head off! Try to find the episode where Lucy babysits the monkeys, it's hilarious.

Anyway, that's just my two cents, and it ain't worth much.

The black and white episodes were the funniest of the entire series. Maybe this has to do with Vivian Vance, who was better here than in the "I Love Lucy" show. I always thought that Viv was the glue that held those earlier episodes together. Who could ever forget the episode about "Crazy Crunch" or of the Christmas episode about "Chris Crinkle".

Add my opinion to the others...Vivian Vance added a great deal of class to all the "Lucy" shows. None was more evident than in "The Lucy Show" when she departed (much too soon). After Vivian left the show it was apparent that Lucy needed a sidekick and various guest stars tried to fill Vivian's shoes but none came close. Once the show was broadcast in color, Lucy doing too much (such as running Desilu) started acting with too many broad strokes thinking that whatever she did would be funny. It wasn't. Some of the later shows were actually embarrassing to watch and you realized that not only were the writer's out of ideas but Lucy should have ended this show years before.