William Frawley had a reputation for drunken binges and crazy antics, which caused much hesitation on behalf of the others to work with him. Desi Arnaz, however, knew Frawley was the best casting choice, but gave him one stipulation: never be late. Frawley, in all the time on the show, never missed a day.
All four main actors received wide-spread acclaim for their work, but it was Desi Arnaz who never received an Emmy nomination. William Frawley received five noms, but never won. Lucy and Vivian Vance both won for their roles, though Vance was far behind Lucy who won four times on 13 nominations.
I Love Lucy producers had to keep changing the phone number used on the show so that they weren’t numbers actually being used in service. The Ricardos had two phone numbers, while the Mertzes’ ended up with four different numbers.
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One tradition of the show that lasted until the very end was that every time an actor could get the audience to erupt into spontaneous applause, that person was given a silver dollar after the scene.
Desi Arnez would often skip rehearsals and table reads to attend to Desliu Studios business. However, the actor was always able to memorize his lines after reading the script, and would deliver them perfectly at tapings. Arnaz would even memorize other character’s lines to make sure everything was on point.
