Why do you think Desi started drinking and philandering in 1955? I know he had before but why did he start again? Was it his own selfish desires, stress, or what do you think?

He always was a drinker but the pressures that he had to fulfill Lucy's ambition is what made him drink that way. She was given the option to retire happily or keep on growing; that's what they did and led to that. He had that uncontrollable feeling that everything had to be taken care of and to make Lucy happy. What about if they had retire happily and lived that way; probably his drinking would'nt had gone as far as it did. No one makes you drink but that was the escape to all the pressures that the business put on him.

Couldn't have said it better myself. Just to add to that, his real love was performing -- being center stage, beating on that conga drum. In ILL he performed, but the majority of his work was the behind-the-scenes stuff which had him sitting behind a desk, constantly making huge decisions and deals. Building a television empire was fun at first and he was good at it, but in the long run it didn't make him happy. He was a performer at heart, not a businessman. The unhappiness and added pressure began to wear on him.

Another big thing that played into his drinking may have been the fact that Lucy was center stage, not him. He was raised in a culture where women were second to men, and his ego got the better of him sometimes. He was doing a huge part of the work, but Lucy got all of the glory. He was proud of her and recognized her as the great talent and the reason for the show's success, but it still must have been hard on him. As Lucie Arnaz said, he never even got the credit until he was dead. But God knows Lucy tried to open people's eyes about it. They were always giving each other the credit.

Yes, that's true, he drank and gambled and fooled around BEFORE he ever met her, and he couldn't cope with being Mr Ball, so that did not help. He certainly knew how to present her though and he was muuch better for her than her second husband in that regard. He was not a stupid man, so he had to know that when he presented her with that choice of retiring or getting bigger, she would choose to go on working, because she had the talent to be working till she dropped. He had to know that. He built the empire, but after a while the joys of running it wore off and his drinking interfered to the point where he almost lost it all. So she took over, and saved it, he retired, but eventually also tried to come back, retiring at 47 was crazy, and the money pressures intensified so he tried coming back. The accent still played a factor in his not getting certain roles, i couldn't believe it when i heard that he wanted to play Elliot Ness, and it's a shame that the Hollywood people are that narrowminded, but even on Alice, when he had that small role, they complained about his looks, and drinking and his accent, some things never change!

i couldn't believe it when i heard that he wanted to play Elliot Ness
And he finally did get to play him on SNL! :lol:

Originally posted by SPLAIN
even on Alice, when he had that small role, they complained about his looks, and drinking and his accent, some things never change!

What was wrong with his looks? Or was this later, and they felt he had drunk them away?!

Originally posted by Mickey
What was wrong with his looks? Or was this later, and they felt he had drunk them away?!

It was later. 1978. He looked like hell imo.

Didn't you ever see him hosting Saturday Night Live Mickey, his teeth were horrible, hair white, face puffy, i think good looking people pay for it later one because both Lucy and Desi were put through the ringer later in life. It's like society wants to remember them the way they used to look, even when they're older, well, not eveybody can pull a Cary Grant. In a way, i always thought someone like Marilyn Monroe or Princess Diana dying young was a good thing, they will always be remembered as great beauties.

Saturday Night Live didn't really get shown here until the eighties, and then only very late nights. It hasn't really been shown since. I haven't seen Desi any later than the Ironside episode, when he looked fine to me.

Speaking of good looking people 'paying for it later', though, that certainly doesn't apply to Dirk Benedict! He's over here at the moment for some reason, popping up all over the schedules, and he looks incredible. It pays to be macrobiotic! :)



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Yeah, but, correct me if i'm wrong, didn't he have cancer at some point, decades ago? We have some very famous people here in North America who died of cancer after preaching about their love of eating tree bark and other unappetizing things. Anybody remember Yule Gibbons, and wasn't Adele Davis another one who had to eat crow when it came out that she had cancer?

:lol: I rememer Yule Gibbons! Geez I haven't heard that name in years. :lol: Or what about Jim Fixx that runner who died of a heart attact! All that exercise and healthy living for nothing!

Dirk had cancer in 1975, not that I entirely see the relevancy! He switched to macrobiotics to fight it, 'cause conventional medicine gave him no chance. There's no tree bark in macrobiotics anyway, it's nice stuff! It's basically just the food that humans were originally designed to exist on (in a temperate environment - it'd kill you in the Arctic!), and still runs most efficiently on today. Dirk's been living his life as a sort of experiment ever since, just to see what happens. It's quite interesting actually, however it turns out.



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Sorry Mickey, i didn't mean to equate what Dirk was doing with what the others did, great for him, if they didn't give a chance and he proved them wrong by taking charge of his life, i really admire that, unfortunately i know nothing about Microbiotics having lived my entire 53 years on junk and LOVING every minute of it. Like Jackie Kennedy said on her deathbed, if she had known she would die so young, she would have had every dessert that was ever offered her! Living a life with bland mediocre food doesn't always really EXTEND life, maybe it just SEEMS that way! LOL!

Precisely. There's no point extending your life if you're not enjoying it! :)



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Well, if I found out I was going to die one of the first things I'd do is go get myself a pack of cigarettes. :mad: Maybe some cheesecake too. :D

No, not ciggies, they're horrible! Why spend your last days coughing?! A large supply of chocolate mousse, on the other hand... :lol:

I never coughed and I don't feel better since I quit. (I don't feel bad-just the same) Sometimes I think why did I even quit, and then I look at the price.:eek: Although I think I spend more on that in extra food a day now. :lol:

Maybe you didn't smoke enough to make a difference?



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Have the doctor show you a pic of your lungs BEFORE AND AFTER that's what convinced me!

Last year in one of the school's display cases, the health teachers got an actual smokers lung and a jar with the amount of tar that builds up in your lungs after smoking for a year. Yuck! :eek:

Yeah, here in Canada, they want to put that picture on the packs themselves.

They should put those photos in the stores that sell ciggies and on the billboards down the interstate that advertise them:mad:

Originally posted by SPLAIN
Yeah, here in Canada, they want to put that picture on the packs themselves. Pictures of black lungs!!:eek: What's next, a picture of a drunk on a beer bottle??

LOL!!!:lol: :lol: Well if they did I think it would reduce the population of smokers.:talk: :D

You should see the latest anti-smoking ad here in the UK! They take one of the arteries of a 32 year old man who died of a smoking related disease, and squeeze it, to show all the fatty deposits that smoking causes. Looks like cottage cheese, and there's tons of the stuff!

It never does any good though. The "It'll never happen to me" attitude always gets in the way.



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It never does any good though. The "It'll never happen to me" attitude always gets in the way.
Yeah, I think you're right about that. Teenagers who smoke usually think they're invincible or something. When I think of some of the things I did then that I don't do now, I'm surprized I made it out of my teens.:eek:

Yep, that's true, as teens and young adults, we thought we were invincible, but we find out at 40 and 50 that we have to pay for that behavior.

Originally posted by Mickey
[B]You should see the latest anti-smoking ad here in the UK! They take one of the arteries of a 32 year old man who died of a smoking related disease, and squeeze it, to show all the fatty deposits that smoking causes. Looks like cottage cheese, and there's tons of the stuff!

It never does any good though. The "It'll never happen to me" attitude always gets in the way.

Ewwwwwwwww! lol :X

Aren't they supposed to eat that on this coming week's Fear Factor?:lol:

Yep. I just saw the previews. :wave:

But they will be covered in whipped cream first though!

Originally posted by SPLAIN
But they will be covered in whipped cream first though!
Nah, that would make it too easy.