I Hate Sorkin (Part 2): An ONTD Original Deep Dive into Being the Ricardos
Welcome to Part Two of my ONTD Original, a deep dive into everything I loathed and despised about Aaron Sorkin's terrible new film, Being the Ricardos!
In Part One, we explored the general timeline inaccuracies, as well as some episode-specific errors.
Today, we'll discuss the cast and characterizations of these iconic Hollywood figures, Sorkin's disrespect for the legacy of Lucy's writers, compare set design, costumes, and bad wigs, shudder at hauntingly cursed photoshops, and explore things I just plain didn't like about this embarrassment of a film!
Disclaimer: This deep dive will contain MANY spoilers about Being the Ricardos.
Join me on this excruciating journey below:
The Cast and Characterizations
Much has already been said about Sorkin's casting choices, but guess what? I have MORE to say. Let's look at the ages, acting choices, and characterizations of the Being the Ricardos cast.
Ages: Characters Vs. Actor
I want to devote a few precious moments of my life to complaining about the ages of everyone in this cast. Remember when the Harry Potter series aged up all the adult characters from their 30s into middle-age just so they could have Alan Rickman (of "'twas I fam" fame) as Snape? Nicole Kidman brought the Snape Effect to this film, and boy, does it make shit weird!
Lucille Ball: 40 at the start of I Love Lucy.
Nicole Kidman: 54.
It's rare to see a woman in Hollywood get to play YOUNGER than her actual age, so I hate to criticize this on principle. But Nicole Kidman is 14 years older than Lucille Ball was when I Love Lucy began, and that makes the flashbacks to Lucille's younger years even more uncanny and uncomfortable.
Desi Arnaz: 34 at the start of I Love Lucy.
Javier Bardem: 52.
This age difference is absolutely whack. Javier is actually old enough to be Desi's father. Desi Arnaz was a charming, fairly young man at the start of I Love Lucy - not to mention significantly younger than Lucille!
Sorkin has aged him up by nearly 20 years, dramatically altering one of the key dynamics of I Love Lucy - the Mertzes are meant to be an older married couple, serving as foils to the younger Ricardos.
Clearly Sorkin went for an older actor here to balance out Nicole Kidman already being way too old to play Lucille. But this middle-aged guy bears no resemblance to the Desi Arnaz of the I Love Lucy era, and it's absolutely comical to see him in flashbacks when Arnaz would've been fresh-faced in his early 20s.
Vivian Vance: 42
Nina Arianda: 37
What happened in this movie is absolutely not Nina Arianda's fault. She's a good actress, she's technically about the right age for this role, she looks right for the part, and if we're ignoring the other weird age dynamics happening here, I enjoyed her as Vivian Vance. But Nicole Kidman has completely skewed the ages here, and it really throws off the dynamics.
In real life, Vivian Vance was only two years older than Lucille Ball, but was made to play Ethel as significantly older than Lucy Ricardo, while Lucille played significantly younger than herself (Lucy Ricardo is in her early thirties, while Ethel is in her 40s).
In this movie, Nina absolutely does NOT read as older than Nicole Kidman. If I had no idea who these people were playing and you showed me a clip out of context, I'd assume Nina was playing the younger actress here - and that's because she is VISIBLY the younger actress here, despite Nicole Kidman's best efforts to thwart the passage of time.
Think of it this way: if Nicole Kidman were playing Vivian Vance instead, she'd STILL be too old for the part. Imagining Nicole Kidman's version of Lucille passing for a 33 year old alongside Nina Arianda's age-appropriate Vivian Vance is fucking laughable.
William Frawley: 64
JK Simmons: 66
This is the best casting choice, age-wise, and - bad writing aside - JK Simmons knocked it out of the park as William Frawley.
But, as with Nicole and Nina, Javier Bardem being way too fucking old throws William Frawley's age out of whack too. He's supposed to be the Old Man of the cast, and the real William Frawley was nearly twice Desi's age.
But Javier and JK Simmons (despite the 14 year age gap between them) don't read as dramatically different ages - they both look solidly middle-aged. Not to mention that seeing an appropriately-aged William Frawley next to Nina Arianda's Vivian Vance just emphasizes how young Nina looks compared to Nicole Kidman. Every problem here comes back to Nicole Kidman.
Aaron Sorkin: 60
Retirement age.
The Acting Choices
Nicole Kidman's Acting:
Look, the woman's face doesn't move. Even when she's trying her best to emulate Lucy's facial expressions, her smooth, rubbery face just doesn't allow for anything to come through other than a haunting, Halloween mask-esque imitation. Every I Love Lucy scene recreation felt incredibly creepy, like something from a pyschological thriller, and Nicole Kidman had a lot to do with that. (Sorkin's weird, claustrophobic cuts to the laughing audience also didn't help, but that's a separate issue.)
And her VOICE when she's playing Lucy Ricardo? Truly bone-chilling.
In the dramatic scenes, she's.... fine. Nicole Kidman knows how to act. And if she weren't playing Lucille Ball, if she were just playing a generic Old Hollywood actress, it might be a pretty good performance. But she IS playing Lucille Ball, and there was no moment in this film where I was able to suspend my disbelief and forget that I was watching Nicole Kidman's Acting.
I get that Sorkin wanted a "prestige" actress for his "prestige" drama. But even though the film doesn't heavily focus on the actual comedy of I Love Lucy, it's still painfully obvious during those scenes that Nicole Kidman doesn't have the comedic range needed to make those moments believable. If Sorkin is trying to emphasize the two sides of Lucille - her serious perfectionist side and her natural comedic intuition - it falls flat, because Nicole Kidman's natural comedic intuition just isn't there behind her Halloween mask of a face.
Javier Bardem's Acting:
Besides being far too old to play Desi, Javier doesn't bring enough charm to Desi Arnaz to make him likable. And he NEEDS to be likable when so much of the plot revolves around Desi's scandals. He comes off as a creepy, manipulative, aggressive, egotistical dude through most of the film - though a lot of these issues also boil down to Sorkin's shitty writing and characterization.
Javier and Nicole also lack the natural chemistry that Lucille and Desi shared, and that flat, dry energy between them really doesn't help you shake the feeling that you're watching a dull, tired middle-aged couple instead of fairly young, passionately in love couple at the height of their fame.
Beyond that, Javier Bardem's version of Desi Arnaz's accent sounds like it belongs in an SNL sketch. It's incredibly distracting, and Javier sometimes sounds like he's speaking with a mouth full of mashed potatoes. It's like watching someone counting steps while dancing - you can practically see Bardem doing the calculations in his head about how to pronounce the next "'splainin,'" and you start to wish he'd stuck with his own accent instead.
Nina Arianda's and JK Simmons' Acting and Characterization:
Even Sorkin's terrible, repetitive writing wasn't enough to bring these two down! I'm giving gold stars to Nina and JK!
Nina was a great choice to play Vivian Vance - in certain scenes, she really nailed the look, and I also appreciated that she didn't put on a weird, distracting voice during the I Love Lucy scenes.
JK Simmons? I have no notes for you. Perfection. Maybe the only thing I truly loved in this movie. If Being the Ricardos was two minutes long and only featured JK Simmons' lines, it'd be the top comedy of the year. Sorkin did give him some clunky jokes (ex: "Are you drunk?" "It's 10 AM, so... yeah, of course"), but also gave him some lines that felt authentically Fred Mertz-y, like when Frawley barks that he's trying to take his afternoon nap. JK Simmons was a shining star in a dumpster full of trash, and I thank him for giving me one thing to love in this dumb movie.
However, Sorkin contradicted himself by having Frawley constantly mention being drunk onset, and then including the true anecdote that Frawley had promised to never show up to work drunk. When Frawley was hired, Desi made him agree to never be drunk onset, and the result is visible - in many I Love Lucy scenes, William Frawley's hands are shaking or hidden in his pockets because he hasn't had a drink.
And by the way, Vivian's plot about being forced to maintain her weight and look heavier than Lucille? True! It's also true that Vivian couldn't wear clothes onscreen that were as nice as Lucy's. In one particularly nasty story, Vivian had to change dresses during a Season 4 taping ("The Dancing Star," when Lucy dances with Van Johnson) because Lucille thought Vivian's outfit would upstage her own dance costume.
And the feud between Vivian Vance and William Frawley? Also VERY true! The feud began when Frawley overheard her complaining about her character being married to someone old and unattractive, and carried on throughout their professional lives, with Vivian Vance ultimately deciding against a Mertzes spinoff series because she disliked him so much. Rumor has it that upon learning of William Frawley's death, Vivian Vance bought a round of drinks for everyone.
Characterization of the Writers
Aaron Sorkin really, really wants you to know that Hollywood is SERIOUS BUSINESS, and no one on this comedy set is having a MOMENT of fun.
I'll be honest, I don't know every details about the dynamics between all the writers. It’s true that Lucille’s perfectionism did sometimes cause tension on set, and it’s true that sometimes the writers would argue over jokes or the logic of certain gags - but that’s true of any writer’s room.
And it’s also true that Desi’s desire to be credited as a producer caused tension, and that Lucille wanted Desi to be given more credit in order to keep him happy and involved. But did the writing team spend day in and day out trading nasty quips with each other and the cast? No.
Based on what I’ve read about I Love Lucy (which is more than Aaron Sorkin, I can promise you that), I believe that the writers respected each other’s talent in real life. Why else would Madelyn Pugh and Bob Carroll Jr. have remained writing partners throughout their long careers in radio AND television? Jess Oppenheimer even states in his book that the writing team got along great as people, even if Madelyn and Bob didn’t always love the changes he made to their scripts.
You won’t find any of that respect or friendship in Sorkin’s retelling - in fact, he seems to imply that the writers not only hate each other, but also resent and dislike the show they worked so hard on.
Jess Oppenheimer
Did Jess Oppenheimer run over Aaron Sorkin's dog or something?? Because holy shit, Sorkin HATED this man. Lucille Ball called Oppenheimer "the brains" behind I Love Lucy, but you wouldn't know that from watching Being the Ricardos.
Sorkin's screenplay reduces one of the driving forces of I Love Lucy's success - and Desi and Lucille's careers - into an irritating, unsupportive, ineffectual dork who is barely capable of doing his job. He takes nearly every one of Oppenheimer's successes, including convincing the network and sponsors - alongside Desi - to allow the Pregnancy Plotline on the air, and gives that victory to Desi instead. As I stated in Part One, every scene between Oppenheimer and Desi feels like a dick-measuring contest, and that dynamic has no basis in reality. Yet over and over, the movie puts everyone at Oppenheimer's throat and uses him as a point of friction, especially for Desi.
Jess Oppenheimer was also famously a perfectionist about the show's scripts, especially when it came to the logic behind jokes and gags. So it's odd that Sorkin paints him as being dismissive and constantly frustrated by Lucille's attention to detail and perfectionism, when he himself probably would've been the person asking why Lucy Ricardo doesn't hear the door open.
Sorkin also makes him say "Here's what you have to understand" what feels like 500 times. Great writing, really top notch.
Madelyn Pugh
Madelyn, honey, I'm so sorry.
Aaron Sorkin seems to think the audience will only respect Madelyn Pugh's contribution to comedy if she's the most combative, quippy, unpleasant character in every scene. Her entire characterization in this film boils down to a whole lot of bickering over who came up with what plotline first and asserting herself as the "girl" in the room. Not to mention that Sorkin himself seems to believe the comedy of I Love Lucy is stupid to begin with - so with that disdain for her show coloring this characterization, does the casual viewer even CARE that this woman came up with some gag or episode that Sorkin sees as cliche?
While it's true that Pugh did want the comedy of I Love Lucy to represent real women and wanted to make sure Lucy was a smart character, Sorkin does Pugh a huge disservice with his snappy "cool girl" speech about Lucy's "infantilization." On its own, maybe this speech wouldn't be so bad - but when set inside a film that gives us no real reason to give a shit about I Love Lucy as a groundbreaking work of comedy, this speech comes off as another strike against the show, another instance of Sorkin implying that I Love Lucy was a silly little comedy that wasted the talent of those involved rather than something with its own outstanding merit. Between the lines, the speech is saying, "I'm the only woman in this writer's room and it was hard work to get here - but I COULD be doing so much MORE than writing slapstick." It's an entirely joyless, mirthless, "strong female character" interpretation of a trailblazing comedy writer, and one that feels both exhausting and dated in 2021.
And for all the emphasis on what a genius Lucille was when it came to physical comedy, there's not one mention of the fact that Madelyn herself would often test out the physical comedy stunts while writing episodes and meticulously choreograph them for Lucille.
Audiences unfamiliar with Madelyn Pugh will leave this movie thinking she was a bitter hack fighting her way into a writer's room to bicker over some disappointing jokes that not even Pugh herself gives that much of a fuck about, and that's about it. Thanks, Sorkin.
Bob Carroll Jr.
This poor guy was seemingly only included in Being the Ricardos to provide a sounding board for Madelyn's inane quips. The character of Bob didn't have one intelligent thing to say throughout the movie, and somehow comes off as an even bigger loser than poor Jess.
In real life, Bob was Madelyn's writing partner of 50 years, with the two collaborating on 900 radio and television episodes together. As a team, the pair were absolutely instrumental in creating I Love Lucy from start to finish. Prior to I Love Lucy, they had also written for Lucille's radio show My Favorite Husband together, and created the Desi-Lucy vaudeville sketches that because I Love Lucy's pilot.
Bob and Madelyn also dated at some point in their partnership, though they married other people.
Unfortunately, instead of showing how in-tune Bob and Madelyn were with each other's comedic writing and how their combined intuition created something outstanding, Sorkin puts these two in constant competition, fighting to snatch jokes and credit from each other at every turn. It's completely idiotic, and it spoils the legacy of one of comedy's greatest duos.
Styling and Set Design
Let's look at the best and worst of the hair, makeup, wardrobe, and set design choices in Being the Ricardos.
Wardrobe:
The I Love Lucy costume recreations are a rare standout in this film, and Costume Designer Susan Lyall gets a gold star from me for her attention to detail. I was especially impressed that Lucy Ricardo's floral shirt from "Fred and Ethel Fight" was recreated with the subtle sequin detailing that barely shows up in the original black-and-white footage.
Hair and Makeup:
Despite her face being entirely too still, Nicole Kidman's makeup seems fairly accurate, and her lipstick was a close match to Besame Cosmetics' recreation of Lucille Ball's usual Max Factor lipstick. (Yes, I did compare the lipstick worn onscreen against my own tube of Besame's "Love That Redhead.")
Nina Arianda also looks great in character as Ethel, and she also got to have permed, period-accurate hair while playing regular Vivian Vance.
Nicole Kidman's hair, on the other hand? Jesus Christ. I don't feel good about anything that's happening with these wigs. Aaron Sorkin's wig stylists commit the common Hollywood sin of replacing period-accurate hairdos with styles that are more appealing to modern audiences. It seems like Vivian Vance was allowed to keep her permed hairdo in Being the Ricardos because she's not meant to look as glamorous in the first place - but Lucille's hair is another story.
Throughout the rehearsal scenes, Nicole Kidman is in a wig that resembles a modern-day "lob" with some slight curling around the ends. While Lucille did sometimes wear her hair partially down, her hair still would've been curly. Instead, Sorkin's got her rockin' some flat-iron waves for half the film.
In flashback scenes, Lucille's curly hair is much more accurate - but the color is often wrong.
Lucille first went red after joining MGM Studios (a huge career move for her and something that Sorkin mostly skips over, choosing instead to make it seem like Lucille went straight from RKO into radio as a last resort. MGM is briefly mentioned, but her blossoming film career with them is not.).
In any flashbacks taking place pre-MGM, Lucille would've been blonde, including when she met Desi.
And in character as Lucy Ricardo, Nicole Kidman's wig is ALMOST perfect - save for the decision to give it some weirdly flat little bangs at the front. Again, it seems like Sorkin and the hair styling team can't fully commit to a permed look.
The Set:
The overall attention to detail here is pretty impressive - the china on the table is correct (the Ricardos used Franciscan Ivy dinnerware), the paintings on the walls are correct, the figurines above the fireplace are correct, and the layout is correct.
There's just one major problem: It's the WRONG apartment for this episode.
The Ricardos don't switch apartments until late in Season Two following the birth of Little Ricky. While I understand that Sorkin likely wanted to use the more recognizable of the two Ricardo apartment sets, it makes no sense in this timeline for the Ricardos to already be in the second apartment, when the move happening at all is entirely dependent on the Ricardos having a baby.
If Aaron Sorkin had taken my advice and centered the movie around the season three episode, "The Girls Go Into Business," he could've avoiding me complaining about this until the day I die. But he didnt, so I will.
Oh, and the flower bowl has been replaced by a flower vase for the sake of Sorkin's stupid flower metaphor, and the table's the wrong shape. The Ricardo's small card table that they bring out when company comes over has been replaced with a large, round dining table, and I have no idea where Lucy Ricardo is storing that thing in their apartment. And that tiny gripe brings us to...
Things I Just Didn't Like
I mean, this category covers most of the movie, but we're already like 20 pages into this shit, so here are a few select bullet points:
The Quippy Dialogue and Jokes:
Yeah, I know going into an Aaron Sorkin movie and complaining about all the quips is like going into a Quizno's and complaining that I don't like sandwiches, but good god, this man really needs to broaden his horizons. Nobody really talks like these characters, and if people DID really talk like these characters, everyone would find them unbearable.
Read my full review below for more on why Sorkin's bad attempts at wit reminded me of a Bojack Horseman parody.
The Framing Structure:
I truly hated the "interview footage" of older versions of the writers. Sorkin clearly only included this as a way to explain his jumbled timeline quickly (instead of, you know, writing a coherent story in the first place), and to comment on his own brilliant ideas like The Flower Bit.
The Whole Flower Thing:
Jesus christ, Sorkin, we get it - it's a fucking metaphor or some shit. There was so much time devoted to this made-up scene, and whatever the FUCK the metaphor was had SO little payoff that honestly, it made me want to throw my laptop. All I could see in my mind's eye was Sorkin writing the final scene with the flowers, looking like that gif of Antonio Banderas looking so pleased with himself in front of his laptop.
And if I had to hear someone say "we're cutting the flowers. Cutting for time, not actually cutting the flowers" one more FUCKING TIME, I was going to personally sue Aaron Sorkin and Amazon Studios for emotional suffering. It wasn't funny the first time and it didn't get any funnier with repetition!
The Story Goes in Circles:
Aaron Sorkin crammed as many overlapping plots in here as possible, yet somehow, this script goes absolutely nowhere for the majority of its runtime. It's incredibly slow and repetitive, repeating the same emotional beats, the same jokes, the same arguments and conflicts too many times. If anyone wants to sit through this movie and count how many times Desi and Oppenheimer have the exact same debate about whether or not the network will allow the pregnancy plot, be my guest, but please do so with caution and take a pre-emptive Tylenol for your incoming headache.
And in the end, the movie feels like it ends up nowhere too, probably because Sorkin doesn't care about I Love Lucy and therefore can't make his audience emotionally invested in whether or not the show carries on.
Aaron Sorkin's Incompetence:
The man admittedly knew nothing about I Love Lucy or its stars before making this movie, and it shows. In an interview, he stated that it was difficult to find books that explored the true drama behind-the-scenes of the show, suggesting that fans prefer some sugarcoated truth.
I don't know what books Aaron Sorkin was reading, but I've managed to find several excellent books that cover the real-life drama in great detail. So either he's just lazy, or he's illiterate. See this post's sources for several book recommendations.
This Hauntingly Cursed Photoshopped Portrait in the Background:
Things I Loved
Thank you, JK Simmons, for easing my suffering during this movie.
My Overall Review
Well folks, we've made it to the end of my lecture. So how would I summarize my overall feelings about Being the Ricardos?
My expectations for this movie went below rock bottom. And now I truly feel I've played the fool, proven wrong by Aaron Sorkin: my expectations should've been fucking subterranean.
I hated this movie. Loathed this movie. Felt disgust and revulsion in every fiber of my being every time a new plot point was introduced, any time an Important Point was hamfistedly made, and by the end, any time a character so much as opened their mouth to make another goddamn quip.
But lest you think I'm simply biased by the fact that I'm a huge I Love Lucy fanatic, let me put aside my petty quibbles over factual inaccuracies - why would anyone give a shit about THOSE in a biopic? Let's pretend for a second that I'm going into this movie knowing NOTHING about I Love Lucy - much like Aaron Sorkin and his cast!
Even without any previous knowledge or interest in I Love Lucy, it's a bad movie. The script is somehow bloated, melodramatic, and cluttered while also maintaining a constant atmosphere of intense boredom and emptiness. You leave the movie feeling like you've seen too little of too many plots. The movie throws a lot at you, but none of it lands with any significance, and you won't care enough to strain your arms trying to catch the plots as they whizz by on their way to being run into the fucking ground by Sorkin's repetitive writing.
Yet somehow, for a movie without enough time or skill to do even one plotline justice, the movie DOES have PLENTY of time for Sorkin to repeat the same idiotic jokes, the same corny dramatic metaphors and overblown speeches, the same "witty comedy 101" beats over and over and over and FUCKING OVER. It's like the man never learned how to backspace and delete things that don’t move the story forward. Do we NEED multiple cuts back to Vivian Vance and William Frawley having the exact same argument over the span of five minutes? No. Would one well-written, 30 second block of dialogue have accomplished the exact same thing? Yes. Does Sorkin give a shit? No, and fuck you, here's another quip.
But what's worse is that Sorkin has written an intentionally non-comedy movie about comedy, but that still tries desperately to remind you that Sorkin considers himself something of a Wit. For a man who insisted that I Love Lucy doesn't feel fresh to today's audiences, Sorkin sure managed to drop a cliche and predictable mess.
There were moments in this film that felt more like satirical jokes out of a Bojack Horseman parody of I Love Lucy: William Frawley responding to "Are you drunk?" with "It's 10 AM, so... yeah, of course," a dimwitted writer's assistant frantically writing notes about not writing everything down when she's told "You don't have to write everything down," William Frawley cracking almost exactly the SAME 10 AM joke again later in the script, the maddening refrain of "we're cutting the flowers - cutting for time, not literally cutting the flowers," William Frawley cracking ANOTHER DRUNK JOKE oh my GOD we GET IT he's DRUNK shut the FUCK UP ABOUT IT and find a new joke!!
Then there's Sorkin's insistence on adding his own spin to I Love Lucy's comedy, a bizarre choice for a film that wants to assert that Lucille Ball was a genius who was too good for comedy. The scene where perfectionist Lucille calls William Frawley and Vivian Vance to the set to rehearse the dinner scene's physical comedy struck a deep, furious nerve with me. Sorkin wants to show that Lucille is RIGHT, that she understands what's funny and what works better than anyone else on this set, that in spite of her flaws and perfectionism, she at least knows her shit.
And how does Sorkin get this point across? First by having Lucille brilliantly suggesting that the actors face the camera. And then by having Lucille direct Frawley and Vance, beat by beat, to fall off a bench at the same time - something that apparently fixes the scene and even earns Frawley's praise later on when he confesses that the dinner scene is much better now.
But that's not how the scene happens in I Love Lucy. Only Ethel falls off the bench in the real episode, "Fred and Ethel Fight." So why the change? Why make this "better" gag - one that never happens on the real show - into the CLIMAX of Lucille's plot of trying to fix the episode and assert her comedy genius?
In short: Sorkin doesn't find I Love Lucy funny, but he sure finds himself funny. This scene, and the movie as a whole, are Sorkin's love letter not to Lucy, but to himself and his own writerly, important, groundbreaking WIT. He's not writing about Lucille's genius; he's writing about his OWN, showcasing just how witty he can be within the elevated, important, superior genre of DRAMA. He thinks he's wittier than Lucille Ball, than Madelyn Pugh, than the whole damn cast and crew of the show that he's deemed to not be very “fresh.” So yeah, he's gonna make Fred and Ethel BOTH fall off the bench, and hell, if Lucille was such a genius, why didn't SHE think of that in the first place? I mean, Aaron Sorkin managed!
Aaron Sorkin's justification for squeezing so many dramatic events from across the entire run of the I Love Lucy series into one week was that it created a stronger story with more friction and more dramatic beats. So it's strange that the final movie ends up feeling so deeply empty of any story at all. The movie has friction, all right, but so does a trainwreck, which is all we’re left with as Sorkin smashes all his contradictory plot points together without providing any other tracks to move the story along.
Even the characters don't seem that invested in any particular plotline beyond bickering with each other about them. From the get-go, the communist story seems like it'll be the driving center of the plot. But all in all, the characters spend half their time waiting for that plot to kick in, and once it does, it doesn't result in any character growth or real emotional impact. In fact, the plot isn’t even resolved not by Lucille or Desi themselves, but by a fictional, heroic cameo from J Edgar Hoover in a jarring deux ex machina that misses the entire fucking point:
Audiences didn't embrace Lucy after the communist scandal (or during the pregnancy controversy, or after all the marital troubles) just because someone else told them to.
They did it because they genuinely loved Lucy.
It's too bad Aaron Sorkin doesn't.
Thank you for attending parts One and Two of my lecture. Your homework is to watch episodes of I Love Lucy until you forget the pain Aaron Sorkin has caused us all.
While Aaron Sorkin has made innumerable mistakes in this film - as numerous as the stars in the sky or the comments on an ONTD secrets post - I have been unable to cover each and every one in detail. Please use the comments to share your personal grievances against Aaron Sorkin and list any facts I have not included.
Disclaimer: If I got anything factually wrong in this novel, leave me alone, I still did 400% more research than Aaron Sorkin did and I deserve an Oscar, an Emmy, four Golden Globes, and probably a Tony.
Happy holidays, ONTD!
Sources: Lucy & Desi: The Legendary Love Story of Television's Most Famous Couple
Desilu: The Story of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz
Meet the Mertzes: The Life Stories of I Love Lucy's Other Couple
Laughs, Luck...and Lucy: How I Came to Create the Most Popular Sitcom of All Time
Papermoon Loves Lucy