Being the Ricardos: A Review

BEING THE RICARDOS

One week. So much can change in one week. Being the Ricardos, a biopic of Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball, looks into one tumultuous week that had everything from Communists to pregnancy. While it has some good elements, Being the Ricardos could have been more.

It is 1952. The CBS sitcom I Love Lucy is a smash television hit. The I Love Lucy cast and crew are rehearsing for that week's episode, Fred and Ethel Fight. I Love Lucy star Lucille Ball (Nicole Kidman) is constantly taking control of the set. She has barely concealed contempt for the episode's director, Donald Glass (Christopher Denham). Ball's husband and costar, Desi Arnaz (Javier Bardem), is more easygoing and casual about things. He has full faith that things will work out during the week. There are read-throughs, blocking, rehearsals to fix whatever issues arise.

What can't be fixed are things outside the studio. News is starting to leak out over Ball's private testimony to the House Un-American Activities Committee. She had, decades earlier, registered to vote as a Communist. Ball had done that in order to please her beloved Grandfather Fred, who was deeply involved in leftist politics. Both Ball and Arnaz know that the story has no real merit, and she was cleared of any Communist ties. They also know that this news could bring a screeching halt to I Love Lucy and their careers.

There is something else that could do that. Lucille is pregnant. This is an absolute scandal as far as the network is concerned. Pregnancy, and all its implications, simply cannot be seen on television. The pregnancy is not helped by reports that Arnaz has been stepping out on Ball. He insists that all he was doing was gambling on a yacht with his friends. Ball is not fully buying this alibi. 

Ball is growing more brittle with each passing day. Her other I Love Lucy costars, Vivian Vance (Nina Arianda) and William Frawley (J.K. Simmons) attempt to help her. However, they have issues of their own. Vivian is growing frustrated that she keeps getting pushed to look less glamourous than Ball. William is an alcoholic. Vivian and William also cannot stand the other, constantly making passive-aggressive comments to and at each other.

Ball is similarly displeased at some of the writing from her longtime writers Bob Carroll (Jake Lacy) and Madelyn Pugh (Alia Shawkat). Pugh in particular wants to be more progressive in how women are shown on television. Ball pushes back somewhat, insisting that she is doing a sitcom not an empowerment movement. As the week continues, Ball and Arnaz fight battles together and apart until showtime.

There are some elements in Being the Ricardos that are quite strong. Three of the film's cast received Oscar nominations for their performances. I think they were ultimately warranted. Nicole Kidman does quite well as Lucille Ball. Ball is one of the most recognized faces and voices in television history. As such, Kidman had a hard task ahead of her. She met it with great efficiency.

Kidman got Ball's speaking voice, which was lower than her "Lucy" voice. There were a few reenactments of I Love Lucy, and Kidman could perform the "Lucy" character. On a certain level, Kidman had to play two characters. There was "Lucille Ball", savvy but damaged actress. Then there was "Lucy Ricardo", wacky housewife. Kidman has several strong moments in Being the Ricardos. There is when she and Javier Bardem's Desi have to meet at the top of Mulholland Drive due to their conflicting schedules. When having a conversation with others, Kidman also does well.

She could be navigating her frenemy status with Arianda's Vance. She could be listening to advise from Simmons' Frawley. She could be slightly irritated by Shawkat's Pugh. She could be in turns dismissive and pleading with Tony Hale's Jess Oppenheimer. In almost every situation, Nicole Kidman can convince the viewer that she is Lucille Ball and not a Ball impersonator.

There was one moment where Kidman's acting was off. It is when she rushes home in a flashback to tell Arnaz that she was cast in The Big Street. This for Ball is a major coup, a chance to get top roles that would normally go to Rita Hayworth or Judy Holliday. Her scene with Bardem here felt a bit forced and theatrical. I put it down to a small misstep, for most other scenes are strong. Later in the flashback, she can barely contain her fury when told that RKO is dropping her contract. Despite The Big Street's critical success, the film is a flop. The mix of shock, anger and contempt that Ball has comes through in Kidman's perfomance.

The curious thing about Javier Bardem as Desi Arnaz is that he makes Desi likeable and casual. We do not see that driven, contradictory figure who could gamble and win until he gambled once too often both metaphorically and literally. For the most part, Bardem played Desi as an easygoing fellow, confident that things would turn out alright. 

Simmons and Arianda, who in my view was shamefully overlooked for a Supporting Actress nomination, also did well. Simmons does not look at all like William Frawley. However, he had some wonderful moments where he gives Kidman's Ball advise on how not to emasculate Arnaz in front of others. It was unintentional, but Frawley reminds Ball that even though Arnaz loves America, he is also still Cuban. Arianda has a great scene when confronting the besieged Ball about the latter's insistence on gaining weight. We see that there is a level of jealousy between them. We also do see that there is a sense of camaraderie building. 

I think at times Being the Ricardos spent a bit too much time showing the informal rivalry between Carroll and Pugh. To be fair, both Jake Lacy and Alia Shawkat did well in their roles. I just thought that in particular with Shawkat's Pugh, we were getting less witty repartee and more speeches. 

Where I think Being the Ricardos went wrong, wildly wrong, was in how it presented history. Yes, writer/director Aaron Sorkin was not making a documentary, as the saying goes. He managed to get in one of his famous "walk and talk" scenes into Being the Ricardos. However, there were some things that I did not think worked.

Being the Ricardos was presented as a faux documentary, with older versions of Carroll, Pugh and Oppenheimer speaking to the camera. Nothing against Ronny Cox, Linda Lavin and John Rubenstein as the older versions of the three mentioned figures. However, at certain points them jumping in to supposedly fill in information seemed almost jolting. 

That perhaps would not be a major issue. The historical accuracy in Being the Ricardos, however, is. Ball goes on about how she has to struggle to get good parts from someone like Judy Holliday. Holliday's first film was in 1944's Winged Victory. The Big Street was released in 1942. Holliday was barely making a ripple in New York City café society at the time. 

It makes no sense that anyone in Hollywood would know who Judy Holliday, this nightclub performer just starting out, was at the time. The idea that Ball, who at the time was known as "Queen of the B's" as in B-pictures and had been in movies for almost a decade, would be losing out roles to Judy Holliday is a curious one. It is more curious when one thinks that Holliday was seen more as a comedienne such as in her Oscar-winning role in Born Yesterday. How Ball would think that Judy Holliday was being offered roles ahead of her, especially serious dramatic roles like The Big Street, is downright bizarre. One wonders if Aaron Sorkin just pulled Judy Holliday's name out of a hat and decided she would be this great rival to Lucille Ball.

Worse is Desi Arnaz's big speech. As the I Love Lucy audience arrives to see the taping, Arnaz forgoes his usual warmup act to address the headlines of "Lucille Ball a Red". In Being the Ricardos, it takes a call from none other than J. Edgar Hoover heard by the audience to alleviate any concerns that Ball was part of a Stalinist takeover. In reality, Arnaz's speech was an eloquent defense of Ball and her actions to humor the grandfather who had raised her and her brother. He spoke about how revolution forced him out of Cuba. He even managed to make a wisecrack about the whole affair, saying that the only thing red about Ball was her hair, and that even that was not legitimate. 

It seems sad that Arnaz's work to save I Love Lucy from potential cancellation due to the Red Scare was undermined by Sorkin opting for more "drama". The real story is dramatic enough. 

Being the Ricardos is well-acted and moves well. I would quibble with how accurate the film is when it comes to this critical moment. That is a major drawback. However, the film is just good enough for people to go see. We will always Love Lucy. We just liked Being the Ricardos.

DECISION: C+