Desi Arnaz

Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III (March 2, 1917 – December 2, 1986), known as Desi Arnaz, was a Cuban-American actor, musician, producer, and bandleader. He played Ricky Ricardo on the American television sitcom I Love Lucy, in which he co-starred with his wife Lucille Ball. Arnaz and Ball are credited as the innovators of the syndicated rerun, which they pioneered with the I Love Lucy series.

Arnaz and Lucille Ball co-founded and ran the television production company Desilu Productions, originally to market I Love Lucy to television networks. After I Love Lucy ended, Arnaz went on to produce several other television series, at first with Desilu Productions, and later independently, including The Ann Sothern Show and The Untouchables. He was also the bandleader of his Latin group, the Desi Arnaz Orchestra. He was known for playing conga drums and popularized the conga line in the United States.

Early life

Arnaz was born in Santiago de Cuba, Cuba, to Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Alberni II (March 8, 1894 – May 31, 1973) and Dolores "Lolita" de Acha y de Socias (April 2, 1896 – October 24, 1988). His father was Santiago's youngest mayor and also served in the Cuban House of Representatives. His maternal grandfather was Alberto de Acha, an executive at rum producer Bacardi & Co.

A descendant of Cuban nobility, Arnaz was a great-great-great-grandson of José Joaquín, a mayor of Santiago de Cuba. The Cuban Revolution of 1933 forced Arnaz and his family to lose everything and flee Cuba. A mob attacked and destroyed the family's houses, property, and livestock. Arnaz narrowly escaped the attack because he was able to hop in a car driving away. His father, Alberto Arnaz, was jailed and all of his property was confiscated. He was released after six months when his father-in-law, Alberto de Acha, intervened on his behalf.

The family then fled to Miami, where Desi attended high school. One of his classmates was Albert "Sonny" Capone, the only child of Chicago mobster Al Capone. Desi initially lived in Miami with only his father, with his mother coming to the United States at a later date and the parents divorcing in the time afterwards. Arnaz's family came to the U.S. with no money and he had to live with his father in a garage that was infested with rats and roaches. In the summer of 1934, Arnaz attended Saint Leo Prep (near Tampa) to improve his English. His first jobs included working at Woolworth's and cleaning canary cages in Miami. He then went into the tile business with his father before turning to show business full time.

Professional career

Musician and actor

After finishing high school, Arnaz joined a band, the Siboney Septet, and began making a name for himself in Miami. Xavier Cugat, after seeing Arnaz perform, hired him for his touring orchestra, playing the conga drum and singing. Becoming a star attraction encouraged him to start his own band, the Desi Arnaz Orchestra.

Arnaz and his orchestra became a hit in New York City's club scene, including a club named La Conga, where he is credited with introducing the concept of conga line dancing to the United States.

He came to the attention of Rodgers and Hart who, in 1939, cast him in their Broadway musical Too Many Girls. The show was a hit and RKO Pictures bought the movie rights.

Arnaz went to Hollywood the next year to appear in the show's movie version at RKO, which also starred Lucille Ball. Arnaz and Ball fell in love during the film's production and eloped on November 30, 1940.

Arnaz appeared in several movies in the 1940s such as Bataan, starring Robert Taylor (1943). Arnaz's portrayal of Felix Ramirez, the jive-loving California National Guardsman, was described by New York Times critic Bosley Crowther as one of several supporting players who were "convincing in soldier roles".

Military service

On April 27, 1943, Arnaz received his draft notice as a foreign national since he was a citizen of Cuba at the time. Later that year he became a naturalized US Citizen and changed his legal name to Desi Arnaz. However, Arnaz was disqualified from overseas service due to hypertension and knee injuries, which caused him pain with prolonged physical exertion, according to his military physical examination. He had injured his left knee prior to his enlistment and injured his right knee soon after enlisting on May 23, 1943, during a baseball game at Camp Arlington. He completed his recruit training, but was classified for limited service in the United States Army during World War II.

He was assigned to direct United Service Organization (USO) programs at the Birmingham General Army Hospital in the San Fernando Valley. It was his responsibility to keep injured soldiers entertained while they recovered in the hospital. Thanks to his Hollywood connections, Arnaz was able to bring celebrities to visit the hospital and boost morale of the soldiers. For example, upon discovering the first thing the wounded soldiers requested was a glass of cold milk, he arranged for movie starlets to meet them and pour the milk for them.

Arnaz served two years, seven months and four days. His primary unit was the 9th Service Command, Army Service Forces. For his service during World War II, he was awarded the Army Good Conduct Medal, the American Campaign Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal.

Arnaz was discharged as a staff sergeant on September 30, 1945.

Career post-military

On December 1, 1945, Arnaz formed another orchestra, which was successful in live appearances and recordings. He sang for troops in Birmingham Hospital with John Macchia and hired his childhood friend Marco Rizo to play piano and arrange for the orchestra. For the 1946–47 season, Arnaz was the bandleader, conducting his Desi Arnaz Orchestra, on Bob Hope's radio show (The Pepsodent Show) on NBC.

In 1951, Arnaz was given a game show on CBS Radio, Your Tropical Trip to entice Arnaz and Ball to stay at CBS over a competing offer from NBC, and to keep Arnaz and his band employed and in Hollywood, rather than touring. The musical game show, hosted by Arnaz and featuring Arnaz's orchestra, had audience members competing for a Caribbean vacation. The program aired from January 1951 until September, shortly before the premiere of I Love Lucy in October.

When he became successful in television, he kept the orchestra on his payroll, and Rizo arranged and orchestrated the music for I Love Lucy.

I Love Lucy

On October 15, 1951, Arnaz co-starred in the premiere of I Love Lucy, in which he played a fictionalized version of himself, Cuban orchestra leader Enrique "Ricky" Ricardo. His co-star was his real-life wife, Lucille Ball, who played Ricky's wife, Lucy. Television executives had been pursuing Ball to adapt her very popular radio series My Favorite Husband for television. Ball insisted on Arnaz playing her on-air spouse so the two would be able to spend more time together. CBS wanted Ball's Husband co-star Richard Denning.

The original premise was for the couple to portray Lucy and Larry Lopez, a successful show business couple whose glamorous careers interfered with their efforts to maintain a normal marriage. Market research indicated, however, that this scenario would not be popular, so Jess Oppenheimer changed it to make Ricky Ricardo a struggling young orchestra leader and Lucy an ordinary housewife who had show business fantasies but no talent. The character name "Larry Lopez" was dropped because of a real-life bandleader named Vincent Lopez, and was replaced with "Ricky Ricardo". The name was inspired by Henry Richard, a family friend and the brother of P.C. Richard of P.C. Richard & Son. This name translates to Enrique Ricardo. Ricky often appeared at, and later owned, the Tropicana Club, which under his ownership he renamed Club Babalu.

Initially, the idea of having Ball and the distinctly Latin American Arnaz portray a married couple encountered resistance as they were told that Desi's Cuban accent and Latin style would not be agreeable to American viewers. The couple overcame these objections, however, by touring together, during the summer of 1950, in a live vaudeville act they developed with the help of Spanish clown Pepito Pérez, together with Ball's radio show writers. Much of the material from their vaudeville act, including Lucy's memorable seal routine, was used in the pilot episode of I Love Lucy. Segments of the pilot were recreated in the sixth episode of the show's first season. During his time on the show, Arnaz and Ball became TV's most successful entrepreneurs.