User Reviews

Desi Arnaz might today primarily be known as Lucy's husband both on screen and off, but he was a great deal more, and I'll start with his career after being one of a handful of MGM's roster of "Latin Lovers." Arnaz had the business acumen of a producer and the technical talents of a director. He had his hand in the success of I Love Lucy every step of the way. After Desi and Lucy divorced, he let Lucy buy him out of Desilu. After some years of recuperating from the hustle and bustle of acting and running a studio, he got sufficiently restless to get his feet wet again, so to speak, in 1967. He formed Desi Arnaz Productions, and enticed his old friend and employee Eve Arden to come back to series television. (Arden's Our Miss Brooks series was a Desilu production.) The threadbare theme of The Mothers-in-Law was a common one; two families with little in common and distinctly different points of view are thrown together in funny situations. One could say that the Ricardos and the Mertzes of I Love Lucy followed that pattern. Kaye Ballard, a quirky singer-comedienne almost a generation younger than Arden, fit the bill of the other mother-in-law perfectly. Herbert Rudley had been acting professionally on stage, screen and television for almost forty years before getting the role of Arden's stuffy attorney husband. Roger C. Carmel, an imposing, lumbering bear of a man and the least experienced of the parents' quartet, was a deft scene stealer as the full-of-himself television writer husband of Ballard. The premiere episode set things up for the series which would run two seasons (when seasons were long), and later, according to Arnaz, was only canceled to make room for a new Bill Cosby sitcom. The traditional Hubbards (Arden and Rudley) and the less conventional Buells (Ballard and Carmel) would alternately duke it out and make up as next door neighbors and in-laws. Deborah Walley, formerly one of filmdom's Gidgets, and Jerry Fogel, a likable but clearly awkward young actor, played the newlyweds who would be, on a very regular basis, helped, coddled, and meddled with. The piano in the swimming pool gag is typical of the 50s-style humor this series would bring into the Mod Times of 1967 and 1968. Arnaz would direct or appear in several episodes as a visiting Spanish matador, and it was always a pleasure to see him alive and well. The Mothers-in-Law seemed old-fashioned when it was broadcast, which might account for its less-than-hit status then. But it is a delightful nostalgic treat now. The cornball scripts, right from the get-go, were a problem, but the comedic sparks flying between Arden and Ballard more than make up for them. Arden's forte, like Jack Benny's, was reaction. Mostly-gentle sarcasm, withering looks and a vaudeville-sized trunk full of takes for every occasion. She possessed one of the most recognizable voices in show business, and even in 1967 was a statuesque beauty that carried off the mod print outfits of that fun-filled year. But it is more often than not that Ballard steals whatever scene she's in. Plump, energetic, always sporting Colleen Moore's famous Dutch Boy hairstyle of the silent era, we know she's going to go off like a firecracker, it is just a matter of when. The premiere episode pretty much tells us everything we need to know about them, and as every situation comedy is supposed to, it sets up our expectations. Expect a little groaning on occasion, but mostly hearty laughter. And it's a pleasure to note the absence of electronic yucks. A studio audience provides genuine laughter and, on occasion, applause.