Glen's Lucy Page

Happy 50th To Lucy!

July 12, 2001

Fans of "I Love Lucy" are finally getting a chance to really get into the "Lucy experience," as a moving tribute celebrating the show's 50th anniversary is laughing its way across the country. Lucy moments like the great "grape smashing" from the "Lucy's Italian Movie" episode are being re-created for fans who can actually step into the scene and reenact every hilarious Lucy maneuver. ET caught up with LUCIE ARNAZ for the details on the tribute to her famous parents!

ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT: So tell us about the "I Love Lucy 50th Anniversary" experience.

LUCIE ARNAZ: Well, it's the 50th birthday of "I Love Lucy," and we wanted to find some way to celebrate it so that fans across the country could find a way to experience the "I Love Lucy" show in a way they've never experienced it before -- sort of on a historical level, with how it was created and who those people were, where they came from, and in an interactive way. They could be Lucy for a moment ... stomp grapes in a big vat or work with chocolates on a conveyor belt; try to learn the "Vitameatavegemin" spiel ... and we've created this traveling exhibit that does all of that and more.

ET: Is that strange to you, the way you say "Lucy experts," that somebody else out there would be an expert, either on your parents or on the television show? Does that still seem weird to you?

LUCIE: I'm really glad there are those other people who are experts (laughs) so it doesn't have to be us all the time. I mean, I have not made my life learning about every episode in "I Love Lucy," I was busy living my own life. There are people who just love this show and have studied it and memorized it and they're the trivia people. It's great that those people exist because I go to them for information.

ET: Did your parents ever think the love affair with "I Love Lucy" would go on this long?

LUCIE: I don't think they ever assumed that it would last 50 years, certainly, and I know they were delighted in their later years that the show was still on-the-air, and was shown in 80 countries and in seven different languages, it made them very proud. My mother used to say, "We've raised three generations!" She was very proud that children could watch the show and that parents felt safe raising their kids watching the show, that it was clean humor, still funny, not corny. They never poked fun at politics or religion or ethnicities -- except for my father's accent, and he was the one who always came out right, so it was good.

The "I Love Lucy 50th Anniversary" exhibit will be stopping in Milwaukee from June 28 through July 8, in Costa Mesa from July 13 through July 29, Sacramento from Aug. 17 through Sep. 3, Albuquerque from Sept. 7 through 23 and in Dallas from Sept. 28 through Oct. 21.