*RIP* William Asher, Aged 90. Director of Bewitched & I Love Lucy

[launderess]

William Asher, a producer, director and screenwriter in the early days of television who directed some two dozen shows — most notably “Bewitched,” which starred his wife, Elizabeth Montgomery, and more than 100 episodes of “I Love Lucy” — died on Monday in Palm Desert, Calif. He was 90 and lived in Indian Wells, Calif.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/arts/television/william-asher-director-of-i-love-lucy-dies-at-90.html

 

[toploader55]

Wow...

Didn't realize he directed all those movies and TV shows.

 

[tomturbomatic]

As a kid, I enjoyed Our Miss Brooks when it was in syndication on afternoon TV. Eve Arden, Gale Gordon as Osgood Conklin the principal and Mr. Boynton the biology teacher, who was so sexy he should have been called Mr. Boinkin.

The son, William Asher was quite a blonde hunk as a young man.

 

[bajaespuma]

RIP Mr. Asher to you and your beautiful wife.

I loved this man's work. Oddly, for somebody who had such an influence on my life through entertainment, I knew almost nothing about him including that he was still alive. I am sorry that he and his family had to experience the trial that is Alzheimer's disease. Let us all pray that Medical science is able to vanquish this disease as soon as superhumanly possible.

 

[passatdoc]

He even directed most of the Frankie=Annette beach movies of the early to mid 1960s.

The director of I Love Lucy for the first season was Marc Daniels. He left after one season to take a job that paid more:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Daniels

probably unaware that anyone involved with the program would be going on to make history. Asher then directed three or four more seasons. James V. Kern directed most of season five and some of six, but I believe Asher was brought back to direct the last portion of season six.

FYI I Love Lucy ran 1951-1957 as a weekly show, and there are six seasons of episodes. For 1957-1960, they did three seasons of "The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour" which aired only once per month, but was an hour in length. Same characters and plot (they continued living in Westport, CT, which is where the sixth season of I Love Lucy had concluded), making heavy use of celebrity guest stars (Danny Thomas, Tallulah Bankhead, Ernie Kovacs, Bob Cummings, Harry James/Betty Grable, etc.). The weekly one hour time slot was filled with Desilu-produced dramatic anthologies on "off weeks" when there was no Lucy-Desi episode.

During the final season, 1959-1960, only three episodes were made, and Lucille Ball filed for divorce the day after filming of the last episode had concluded. Part of the novelty of the show was that a show business couple in real life portrayed a show business couple (well, a would-be show business wife married to a show business husband) on tv. Their Westinghouse contract specified that they would remain married in real life. Ball had contemplated divorce earlier, but friends and her attorney advised that they might be in breach of contract if they divorced before the Westinghouse contract expired (the final episode was broadcast after she filed for divorce, but filming was completed before she went to court).

 

[tomturbomatic]

I remember when news of the divorce appeared in the magazines. We were traveling with daddy so it was summertime, and were in a supermarket. I went to the magazine rack and found the story on the front of some publication. Reading inside, I discovered that Lucy was older than Ricky. I guess since it was 1960, she blamed his terrible temper rather than his lack of fidelity (low fidelity?) It was sad to read about them coming apart. Somewhere, I read that during the filming of the last episode and they were not speaking to each other.

Did you ever notice that after HiFi audio came out, there was nothing described as LoFi?

Westinghouse was smart to have their marriage in their contract. Phyllis Diller used to get big laughs about her husband Fang UNTIL she divorced him. Then it was not funny to audiences any more.

 

[lordkenmore]

there was nothing described as LoFi?

I am not entirely sure this is true. Yes, commercially, no one has used it. This is stating the obvious: one thing you don't do when selling something is suggest low quality. You make it sound good. Even if it cheapens the word. "Hi-fi" used to describe high quality audio systems (and it's still used in that context, although not by the public at large). But it got cheapened by being applied to any number of products that were actually "low-fi." In some cases maybe lower than low-fi.

Away from wonderful world of advertising and "let's make this product seem better than it really is!" one might possibly hear people interested in audio equipment use a term like "low-fi." I'm pretty sure I have used it; it's an accurate description of a lot of things, like the speakers built into TV sets. I have definitely heard the term "mid-fi" a lot, although the exact definition seems to vary person to person. I guess this is fitting, since audiophile types don't agree on anything, anyway. Sometimes, you hear "mid-fi" for the best mass market; other times you hear it for entry level audiophile equipment. I personally lean to the first label, but there are those with mega buck systems who will insist that anything us ordinary mortals can afford is not really "hi-fi".