Desi Arnaz News

Diversionary has announced their 2020 D-Tours production of WELCOME TO LA MISA, BABY which will tour the San Diego Unified School District as part of the Arts Education and Outreach programming.

Nevada's largest film festival The 16th Annual Dam Short Film Festival returns to take movie lovers and film buffs around the globe. The festival will screen 146 short films submitted from 16 countries of origin in the historic Boulder City Theatre Feb. 13-16.

In celebration of what would be legendary film and television icon Ricardo Montalbán's 100th birthday in 2020, the historic Hollywood theatre, The Montalbán, whose moniker is “where entertainment begins,” is unveiling new plans to fulfill Ricardo Montalbán's dream of diversity and inclusion. This year, the owners of The Montalbán, Ricardo's son in law and President of The Montalbán Company, LLC, Gilbert Smith, and daughter Anita, have plans to expand the theatre's musical performances, beginning with The Company Men on February 21 and 22; and The Soul of Broadway Starring Terron Brooks on February 28 and 29.

Tommy Tune's anticipated performance scheduled for this year at Old School Square's Crest Theatre has been canceled due to unforeseen circumstances. André De Shields will proudly be presented in his place.

It was reported today that acclaimed playwright William Luce has passed away at age 88.

I LOVE LUCY CHRISTMAS SPECIAL, a new one-hour special featuring two back-to-back colorized episodes of the classic series, will be broadcast Friday, Dec. 20 (8:00-9:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

In July, we introduced LA music duo NOMAD & LOLA when they released their remake of the Nancy Sinatra classic 'Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)'.

ACT a?' A Contemporary Theatre, under the direction of Artistic Director John Langs, officially announces its 55th seasona?'a celebration of five contemporary plays including ACT's 50th Mainstage world premiere. The 2020 mainstage season will open with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Sweat by Lynn Nottage, followed by The Effect, a scintillating, pill-popping love story by Lucy Prebble. Summer 2020 will feature a co-production with the Denver Center for the Performing Arts with the soaring coming-of-age musical-drama Choir Boy by the Academy Award-winning screenwriter of Moonlight, Tarell Alvin McCraney. Fall at ACT will feature the world premiere of The Laugh Track by Wendy MacLeod, inspired by the true story of the first female Hollywood writer on the I Love Lucy Show. Closing the season, will be the weirdly wonderful and witty Witch by Jen Silverman, an updated version of The Witch of Edmonton, where the Devil comes to bargain for souls and things go awry when he meets up with the town outcast.

The White Plains Performing Arts Center (WPPAC) is proud to announce an exciting fall season featuring AIDA, NEWSIES, Lainie Kazan, and more!

A moving and memorable portrait of America's favorite sidekick. Vivian Vance.

Provincetown will see yet another return visitor when Lucie Arnaz returns to The Crown and Anchor for a one night only concert of her latest act ' I Got The Job: Songs From My Musical Past.' After selling out this same concert last year, producer Rick Murray asked Ms. Arnaz to return with the same show that had audiences cheering. Along with her musical director Ron Abel, the show will play Monday July 22,2019 at 8pm. Arnaz and Abel will bring this show to a many more venues over the next year, including New York's fabled 54 BELOW CLUB this fall .

A grant from the National Endowment for the Arts will enable the Great American Songbook Foundation to digitize historic radio recordings featuring The Music Man creator Meredith Willson and make them available online for scholars worldwide.

Actress Fay McKenzie Waldman passed away peacefully in her sleep on the morning of April 16th at the age of 101. She was born February 19, 1918 into a show business family where she was the youngest of two sisters and an actress cousin, and made her screen debut at only ten weeks old in "Station Content" (1918) in which she was carried in the arms of Gloria Swanson. Her parents, Eva & Bob "Pops" McKenzie were already veteran performers and apparently wanted their daughter to get an early start in films. She nearly stole the show from Oliver Hardy as "the baby" in the Alice Howell short "Distilled Love" (filmed in 1918 but released two years later). By the time she was six, Fay was considered an old hand, having played diverse parts in her father's stock company. Among her early films was the 1924 Photoplay Medal Winner, "The Dramatic Life of Abraham Lincoln." 

I LOVE LUCY FUNNY MONEY SPECIAL, a new one-hour special featuring two back-to-back colorized episodes of the classic series, will be broadcast Friday, April 19 (8:00-9:01 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

The National Comedy Center, the country's official cultural institution dedicated to comedy, announced today that it has added a second show for John Mulaney after his initial show - as well as Sebastian Maniscalco's first show - broke all festival records by selling out in the first day on sale to the public for the 2019 Lucille Ball Comedy Festival.

The National Comedy Center and legendary producer, director, and writer Carl Reiner announced today, on Carl Reiner's 97th birthday, an initiative to digitally preserve Reiner's extensive personal collection of production-used scripts from "The Dick Van Dyke Show" - one of the most iconic, innovative, and beloved comedy series in television history.

The National Comedy Center was formally designated as the nation's official cultural institution dedicated to the art form of comedy on Tuesday, March 12. In a tremendous bi-partisan show of support, both the Senate and House of Representatives passed this bill in February, and the president signed it into law on Tuesday, recognizing the Center as the "Official National Comedy Center of the United States."

I LOVE LUCY FUNNY MONEY SPECIAL, a new one-hour special featuring two back-to-back colorized episodes of the classic series, will be broadcast Friday, April 19 (8:00-9:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

Audiences are in for a rare treat when theatrical legend Charles Busch and playwright/performer Lee Tannen team up for a special two-performance concert staging of Tannen's I LOVED LUCY on Friday March 22 and Saturday March 23 as a benefit for Catskill's Bridge Street Theatre. This delightful stage adaptation of Tannen's own 2001 memoir, directed by Carl Andress, stars the fabulous Charles Busch as Lucille Ball, Lee Tannen as … Lee Tannen, and also features the multitudinous talents of actor/pianist Tom Judson.

There is an historic house in Key West, La Terraza De Marti, which was the home of cigar manufacturer Teodoro Perez who was a symbol of Key West's strong ties to Cuba. On May 3, 1883 Perez welcomed Jose Marti, the man who was the symbol of Cuba's bid for independence from Spain to speak from his 2nd story balcony to thousands of Cuban sympathizers. Marti was an integral factor in freeing Cuba from Spanish rule.