Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse
Anthology series that launched two iconic shows.
Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse is an American television anthology series produced by Desilu Productions. The show ran on the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) between 1958 and 1960. Three of its 48 episodes served as pilots for the 1950s television series The Twilight Zone (one episode) and The Untouchables (two episodes).
Quick Facts
- Genre
- Anthology
- Creator
- Desi Arnaz
- Narrator
- Betty Furness
- Theme music
- Johnny Green
- Opening theme
- "Westinghouse Logo"
- Ending theme
- "Desilu Playhouse Closing Theme"
- Country
- United States
- Seasons
- 2
Facts from the source article.
History
Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball had already made a massive hit with I Love Lucy, which they produced and starred in from 1951 to 1957 through their company, Desilu. In early 1958, Arnaz got CBS to buy Desilu Playhouse by offering a bi-monthly Lucille Ball–Desi Arnaz Show—later rebroadcast as The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour—as part of a lineup that also included dramas, comedies, and musicals. Westinghouse Electric Company put up a then-record $12 million to sponsor the series, which pushed aside Studio One, another anthology show Westinghouse had backed. The program first aired on Monday nights from 10:00 to 11:00 pm Eastern Time on October 6, 1958, with Arnaz as host and Betty Furness staying on as the Westinghouse spokesperson. The debut episode was "Lucy Goes to Mexico," a Lucy–Desi Hour featuring Maurice Chevalier. The second week offered the dramatic "Bernadette," a biography of Saint Bernadette starring Pier Angeli. Later episodes mixed comedies, dramas, and musicals, including one-off performances where Lucille Ball played characters other than Lucy. In October 1959, the show shifted to Friday nights from 9:00 to 10:00 pm Eastern Time. It lasted only one more year, struggling to land big guest stars, facing stiff competition from the rising popularity of westerns and police shows on prime time, going up against ABC's hit 77 Sunset Strip, and ending with the Arnaz–Ball divorce in 1960. Just before their split, Ball and Arnaz, along with Vivian Vance, William Frawley, and Little Ricky, shot the final Lucille Ball–Desi Arnaz Show, "Lucy Meets The Moustache," with guests Ernie Kovacs and Edie Adams, which aired on April 1, 1960. The last Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse broadcast, "Murder is a Private Affair," ran on June 10, 1960.
Notable episodes
In the fall of 1958, "The Time Element," starring William Bendix and written by Rod Serling, aired to positive reviews. Its popularity gave Serling leverage to convince CBS to greenlight his science fiction/fantasy anthology concept, The Twilight Zone, which debuted in the fall of 1959. In April 1959, Desilu Playhouse aired a two-part drama, "The Untouchables," adapted by Paul Monash from the 1957 memoirs of treasury agent Eliot Ness, with Robert Stack playing Ness. After CBS declined to produce a weekly version, The Untouchables became a hit series on ABC, running for four seasons from 1959 to 1963. Stack was cast after Arnaz's first choice, Van Johnson, was dismissed when Johnson's agent demanded $10,000 per episode for two episodes.
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