I Love Lucy : Season 1

It's the Mertzes' eighteenth wedding anniversary. Ethel longs to celebrate it by going to the Copacabana, while Fred wants to attend the fights. As can be guessed, an argument soon ensues among the couples. Ethel and Lucy decide that they will go to the club-with dates! Now, this is perfectly fine with Fred, but Ricky is worried. So he and Fred call an old friend, Ginny Jones, for dates so that they can go to the nightclub and spy on their wives. Coincidentally, Lucy and Ethel have also called

In order to keep the honeymoon from ending with Ricky, Lucy consults a book that leads to all sorts of hilarious situations as Lucy tries to follow the book's advice.

To her dismay, Lucy finds out that she's put on 22 pounds since marrying Ricky. Complications arise when one of the girls in Ricky's new show quits, making a vacancy for a dancer who can wear a size twelve costume. At the auditions the next morning, Lucy tricks Ricky into saying that if she loses enough weight (12 pounds) in four days, then she can be in the show. Thus, she starves and exercises, with Ethel as her coach. In one funny scene, she tries to steal food from the Mertzes' dog Butch,

After becoming too involved in a murder mystery book, Lucy believes that Ricky is trying to murder her.

After hearing a radio quiz show, and having Ricky answer all the question correctly, Lucy manages to get herself and Ricky on the show. Little does she know that Ricky knew the answers beforehand. The show is called ""Females are Fabulous,"" a title that Lucy justifies elaborately. In this episode, Frank Nelson makes the first of many cameos as Freddy Fillmore.

Ricky's band is to be auditioned for television, and Lucy is trying to ""get into the act."" When Lucy substitutes for Buffo the clown, the producers want to sign her, not Ricky, and Lucy is confronted with problems. Ricky sings his trademark ""Babalu`"" for the first time in this episode

Lucy suddenly becomes interested in numerology and superstitions. After advising Ricky that it's a good day for him to make deals, she realizes that she read yesterday's horoscopes and that today is actually a bad day for Ricky. She thus says "no" to a very important business call for Ricky from Mr. Meriweather. In the process of putting things right, Lucy conducts a seance. Classic Ethel quote: "Ethel to Tillie, Ethel to Tillie, come in Tillie."

""Men are nothing but a bunch of messcats,"" insists Lucy Ricardo, while Ricky insists that ""a man's home is his castle."" To make a point, Lucy divides the apartment in half, so that Ricky can be as messy as he likes on his side. But when Ricky's press agent, Kenny Morgan, lines up a publicity spread in Halfbeat Magazine, Lucy decides to teach her sloppy husband a lesson by turning the Ricardo apartment into a regular pig pen. Little does Lucy know that this photographer is not from the

Ricky returns home with a $3,500 mink coat that he has rented for an act at the club. Lucy immediately jumps to the conclusion that it's her anniversary present. Lucy is so delighted with her ""present"" that she eats, sleeps, and even does the dishes wearing the mink. Ricky decides to get the coat back by having Fred dress up as a theif and ""steal"" it, but before he does, a REAL burglar almost makes off with the coat! When Lucy learns from Ethel of his plan, she decides to teach her hubby a

When Lucy opens a telegram addressed to Ricky ordering him to appear at the Army's Fort Dix, she assumes that he has been drafted. Ethel suspects that Fred has been drafted as well. Their suspicions are confirmed when they see them drilling in the living room with brooms. They don't know, however, that Ricky and Fred are practicing a dance routine for a servicemen's show. To get their men ""ready for the army,"" Lucy and Ethel take to knitting blankets and other things for them. They also plan

Ricky returns home with a $3,500 mink coat that he has rented for an act at the club. Lucy immediately jumps to the conclusion that it's her anniversary present. Lucy is so delighted with her ""present"" that she eats, sleeps, and even does the dishes wearing the mink. Ricky decides to get the coat back by having Fred dress up as a theif and ""steal"" it, but before he does, a REAL burglar almost makes off with the coat! When Lucy learns from Ethel of his plan, she decides to teach her hubby a

Lucy volunteers for Ricky's Parisian apache dance number for an upcoming Tropicana show. And Ethel finds the perfect person to teach her the basic aspects of Apache dancing-Jean Valjean Raymand, who is the nephew of the woman who runs the French hand laundry. This Frenchman has more than dance lessons in mind, however. When Ricky finds him hiding in the hall closer, fireworks commence. Jean challenges him to a duel behind Radio City Music Hall, but they ultimately decide to stage a fake fight in

Ethel wants Ricky to a headline a benefit show for her women's club, but Lucy refuses to ask him, unless she can be on the bill, too. After plenty of coaxing on the part of Lucy, Ricky finally says that he'll do it. But Lucy then gets a chance to look at the act that she and Ricky will be doing for the benefit. Ricky has all the punch lines! She decides to rewrite the jokes and teach her husband a lesson.

Lucy,as usual, spends too much money on a dress. So she tells Ricky that she will get a job babysitting in order to pay for it. The trouble is, she didn't know that she would be winding up babysitting a pair of rambunctious, spoiled twins. The twins do almost everything to Lucy besides burning her at the stake. The twins' mother eventually calls, and says that if Lucy performs at a variety show with the twins, she can keep the prize money $100.

Miss Lewis, the Ricardos' elderly neighbor, requests Lucy's assistance in getting the attention of Mr. Ritter, the elderly grocery man whom she is sweet on. Lucy readily agrees to give Mr. Ritter a dinner invitation for Miss Lewis. The first complication arises when Lucy shares the news with Ricky, who spanks Lucy for interfering and makes her promise to give the note back to Miss Lewis. But, when Lucy proceeds to give Mr. Ritter the note anyway, he misunderstands and thinks the invitation is

After all this time, Lucy has finally found what she believes to be the perfect solution for getting into show business. After Ethel gives her a book about diseases, Lucy decides that she will pretend that she is suffering from numerous psychological ailments so that Ricky will feel sorry for her and let her go into show business. To convince Ricky that she is really ""ill,"" Lucy pretends that she doesn't know who she is, and at one point ""thinks"" that she is Tallulah Bankhead! When Ricky

Lucy is busily writing the script for the play that her women's club is going to put on, a little something called ""A Tree Grows in Havana,"" and she needs Ricky to appear in it. When Ricky sees the script, he immediately declines. So Lucy is then left with no alternative but to get Fred to agree to do the role. Deciding that Fred wouldn't be very good for portraying a Cuban character, Lucy decides to rewrite the play so that it is set in England. Later, however, Ricky decides that he wants to

The show opens with the Ricardos and the Mertzes sitting around the Ricardos' piano, singing songs together. After the Mertzes leave, Lucy and Ricky wind up in an argument: Lucy wants to leave the bedroom window open, while Ricky wants it closed. The Mertzes, who are trying to get some sleep, are most irritated by the noise. They angrily phone the Ricardos and demand that they cut down on the racket. This, as you can imagine, leads to a big quarrel between the Ricardos and the Mertzes. Lucy and

Even after all this time, Lucy still longs to get into one of Ricky's shows. When she learns that there is an opening in one of Ricky's acts for a ballet dancer,as well as a burlesque comedienne, Lucy decides to take a ballet class-which leads to some pretty disastrous results. Fed up, Lucy then hires a teacher to teach her the art of burlesque comedy. It is then that Lucy learns that Ricky still has one spot available in his act. Falsely assuming that it is the burlesque comedienne, not the

A shy young teenager named Peggy has a major crush on Ricky. Ricky, however, is tired of all this ""attention"" that this girl is giving him, so asks Lucy to have a talk with her. During their conversation, Lucy asks Peggy to think of some other boys her own age that she might like to go out with instead. Peggy, it seems, also likes a boy named Arthur Morton. Unfortunately, Arthur is painfully shy and cannot dance, so Lucy volunteers to give him a dance lesson. But it is then that Arthur becomes

Lucy becomes afraid that one of her new neighbors is threatening to kill her and convinces the others that the neighbors are trying to kill them...which gets them into big trouble.

Fred and Ethel have been going at each others' throats for the past few days now, and aren't talking to each other any more. (Fred: She called my mother a weasel!)To get them back together, Lucy comes up with a plan: She will invite Ethel to dinner, while Ricky will invite Fred. Neither Mertz will know that the other is coming, Lucy hopes that she can bring the Mertzes together so they can talk out their issues. Lucy commences with her plan, but during dinner, she and Ricky start to bicker. By

Lucy dislikes Ricky's new moustache. In order to take revenge, she glues a moustache and beard on to her face. Then, Ricky agrees to shave his moustache off, as long as Lucy gets rid of hers. Lucy tries to get the facial hair off, and is unsuccessful. They try to get a special substance to take the glue off, to find out that it is not made anymore.

Ricky is disgusted by Lucy's obsession with gossiping about other people. According to Ricky, Lucy acts as if it is her ""life's blood."" Fred, too, is disturbed by Ethel's love of gossiping. The two girls then point out that both Ricky and Fred have been known to gossip, also. The boys then challenge the girls to a bet: They will see who can go without gossiping the longest, and the winners will receive breakfast in bed for a month. The bet commences, and everything is going fine until Ricky

Having been bet by their husbands that they can't do without modern conveniences, Lucy and Ethel churn butter and bake bread from scratch-an eighteen foot loaf! But then Lucy demands that Ricky live as if it's the turn of the century for him, too.