Red Studios Hollywood, formerly Desilu-Cahuenga Studios and Ren-Mar Studios, is a rental studio located at 846 N. Cahuenga Blvd. in Hollywood, Los Angeles on premises that were formerly the home of Desilu Productions. Originally it was the site of Metro Pictures Back Lot #3 in 1920. In 1947 it was rebuilt as a 9-stage studio called Equity Pictures and became Motion Picture Center Studios a year later. It has been used for a wide variety of film and television production, and the studio has been known by many different names.
In 1953, after filming the first two seasons of the I Love Lucy TV series at General Service Studios, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz were looking for a larger studio. They looked at the lot (known at the time as Motion Picture Center) and signed a ten-year lease on the property. [1] In 1955 Desilu bought the studio, and in 1959, after Desilu bought other studios in Hollywood and Culver City, the name was changed to Desilu-Cahuenga Studios [2] to avoid confusion with the other Desilu Studios. [3] Beginning in 1974, the studio was independently owned and operated for use by producers and became Ren-Mar Studios in 1984.
The Abbott and Costello Show (season 2, 1953-54), I Love Lucy (seasons 3–6, 1953–1957), The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour (1957–1960), The Lucy Show (1962-1968), The Dick Van Dyke Show (1961–1966), [4] My World and Welcome to It , Make Room for Daddy , Hogan's Heroes , The Andy Griffith Show , Barney & Friends (2002-09), The Jack Benny Program , That Girl , Seinfeld , The Golden Girls , The Golden Palace , Empty Nest , NewsRadio , Ally McBeal , Beauty and the Beast , It’s a Living , MADtv , and Lizzie McGuire are among the television series that have been filmed entirely or partially at Ren-Mar. In addition, music videos are often filmed at the studio, including those of Madonna, INXS, Michael Jackson, Ozzy Osbourne, Hilary Duff, and Britney Spears. The front (Cahuenga Boulevard) gate of Ren-Mar was used to represent the "Maroon Cartoon Studio" for the film Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). In 1991, the Richard Simmons exercise tape, "Sweatin' to the Oldies 3" was taped at Ren-Mar.
Shows produced at Ren-Mar were FNMTV , Monk , and Weeds .
In January 2010, Ren-Mar Studios was bought by Red Digital Cinema Camera Company. The complex was renamed "Red Studios Hollywood". [5]
Desiderio Alberto Arnaz y de Acha III, known as Desi Arnaz, was a Cuban-American actor, musician, producer, and bandleader. He played Ricky Ricardo on the American television sitcom I Love Lucy, in which he co-starred with his wife Lucille Ball. Arnaz and Ball are credited as the innovators of the syndicated rerun, which they pioneered with the I Love Lucy series.
I Love Lucy is an American television sitcom that originally aired on CBS from October 15, 1951, to May 6, 1957, with a total of 180 half-hour episodes spanning six seasons. The series starred Lucille Ball and her husband Desi Arnaz, along with Vivian Vance and William Frawley, and follows the life of Lucy Ricardo (Ball), a young, middle-class housewife living in New York City, who often concocts plans with her best friends and landlords, Ethel and Fred Mertz, to appear alongside her bandleader husband, Ricky Ricardo (Arnaz), in his nightclub. Lucy is depicted trying numerous schemes to mingle with and be a part of show business. After the series ended in 1957, a modified version of the show continued for three more seasons, with 13 one-hour specials, which ran from 1957 to 1960. It was first known as The Lucille Ball–Desi Arnaz Show, and later, in reruns, as The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour.
William Clement Frawley was an American Vaudevillian and actor best known for playing landlord Fred Mertz in the sitcom I Love Lucy. Frawley also played "Bub" O'Casey during the first five seasons of the sitcom My Three Sons and the political advisor to the Hon. Henry X. Harper in the film Miracle on 34th Street.
Desilu Productions, Inc. was an American television production company founded and co-owned by husband and wife Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball. The company is best known for shows such as I Love Lucy, The Lucy Show, Mannix, The Untouchables, Mission: Impossible and Star Trek. Until 1962, Desilu was the second-largest independent television production company in the United States, behind MCA's Revue Studios, until MCA bought Universal Pictures and Desilu became and remained the number-one independent production company, until Ball sold it to Gulf and Western Industries in 1968.
Vivian Vance was an American actress best known for playing Ethel Mertz on the sitcom I Love Lucy (1951–1957), for which she won the 1953 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress, among other accolades. She also starred alongside Lucille Ball in The Lucy Show from 1962 until she left the series at the end of its third season in 1965. In 1991, she posthumously received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She is most commonly identified as Lucille Ball’s longtime comedic foil from 1951 until her death in 1979.
The Lucy Show is an American sitcom that aired on CBS from 1962 to 1968. It was Lucille Ball's follow-up to I Love Lucy. A significant change in cast and premise for the fourth season (1965–1966) divides the program into two distinct eras; aside from Ball, only Gale Gordon, who joined the program for its second season, remained. For the first three seasons, Vivian Vance was the co-star.
Here's Lucy is an American sitcom starring Lucille Ball. The series co-starred her long-time comedy partner Gale Gordon and her real-life children Lucie Arnaz and Desi Arnaz Jr. It was broadcast on CBS from 1968 to 1974. It was Ball's third network sitcom, following I Love Lucy (1951–57) and The Lucy Show (1962–68).
Desiderio Alberto Arnaz IV, better known as Desi Arnaz Jr., is an American retired actor and musician. He is the son of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.
Metro Pictures Corporation was a motion picture production company founded in early 1915 in Jacksonville, Florida. It was a forerunner of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The company produced its films in New York, Los Angeles, and sometimes at leased facilities in Fort Lee, New Jersey. It was purchased in 1919.
Sunset Las Palmas Studios, formerly General Service Studios and Hollywood Center Studios, is an American independent entertainment production lot located at 1040 North Las Palmas Avenue in the Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles. It has stage facilities and provides filmmaking services to clients in the film, television and advertising industries. Founded in 1919, it is one of the oldest production facilities in Hollywood and has been the host of many notable motion picture productions for over a century.
My Favorite Husband is the name of an American radio program and network television show. The original radio show, starring Lucille Ball, evolved into the groundbreaking television sitcom I Love Lucy. The series was based on the novels Mr. and Mrs. Cugat, the Record of a Happy Marriage (1940) and Outside Eden (1945) written by Isabel Scott Rorick, the earlier of which had previously been adapted into the Paramount Pictures feature film Are Husbands Necessary? (1942), co-starring Ray Milland and Betty Field.
The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour is a collection of thirteen black-and-white one-hour specials airing occasionally from 1957 to 1960. The first five were shown as specials during the 1957–58 television season. The remaining eight were originally shown as part of Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse. Its original network title was The Ford Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Show for the first season, and Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse Presents The Lucille Ball–Desi Arnaz Show for the following seasons. The successor to the classic comedy, I Love Lucy, the programs featured the same cast members: Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, Vivian Vance, William Frawley, and Little Ricky. The production schedule avoided the grind of a regular weekly series.
I Love Lucy is a 1953 American comedy film that is a spin-off of the sitcom I Love Lucy. Except for one test screening in Bakersfield, California, the film was never theatrically released and was shelved.
The Lucille Ball Desi Arnaz Museum,, formally The Lucille Ball Desi Arnaz Museum & Center for Comedy and commonly known as the Lucy Desi Museum, is a museum at 2 West 3rd Street, Jamestown, New York that is affiliated with the nearby National Comedy Center with which it shares executive director Journey Gunderson. The museum is dedicated to the lives and careers of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. Jamestown was Ball's birthplace.
Forever, Darling is a 1956 American fantasy romantic comedy film directed by Alexander Hall, written by Helen Deutsch, and starring Lucille Ball, Desi Arnaz, and James Mason. In the film, Ball stars as a wife who tries to save her struggling marriage to a chemical engineer (Arnaz) with the help of her guardian angel (Mason). Louis Calhern and Natalie Schafer co-star in supporting roles.
Lucy is a 2003 television film directed by Glenn Jordan. It is based on the life and career of actress and comedian Lucille Ball. The film premiered on May 4, 2003, on CBS.
Daniel Richard "Dann" Cahn was an American film editor who received the Career Achievement Award from the American Cinema Editors (ACE). Cahn was best known as the head editor of the TV series, I Love Lucy and for his work as the head of post-production of Desilu Playhouse. Cahn would also go on to edit several more movies and TV series such as The Beverly Hillbillies. Cahn worked with Orson Welles, Russ Meyer and others.
Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse is an American television anthology series produced by Desilu Productions. The show ran on the Columbia Broadcasting System between 1958 and 1960. Three of its 48 episodes served as pilots for the 1950s television series The Twilight Zone and The Untouchables.
Lucille Désirée Ball was an American actress, comedian, producer, and studio executive. She was recognized by Time in 2020 as one of the most influential women of the 20th century for her work in all four of these areas. She was nominated for 13 Primetime Emmy Awards, winning 5, and was the recipient of several other accolades, such as the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award and two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She earned many honors, including the Women in Film Crystal Award, an induction into the Television Hall of Fame, a Kennedy Center Honor, and the Governors Award from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.
Being the Ricardos is a 2021 American biographical drama film written and directed by Aaron Sorkin, about the relationship between I Love Lucy stars Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem star as Ball and Arnaz, while J. K. Simmons, Nina Arianda, Tony Hale, Alia Shawkat, Jake Lacy, and Clark Gregg are featured in supporting roles.