Our Girl Lucy

 Lucille Ball is a comedy trailblazer. This weekend, TCM and Hallmark Channel were among those honoring the one hundredth anniversary of her birthday. Even more than 50 years after her show's finale, there's still no show like hers on television.
 I first watched I Love Lucy when I was about eleven or twelve in reruns. I was mesmerized. Lucy was not only funny but charismatic. They way she was on screen is unparalleled to any other woman in television before or since. Sure Carol Burnett and Mary Tyler Moore were considered icons but not in the same way.
 Carol Burnett was unique because she had a variety show and she called the shots in a way a woman hadn't before. But she didn't have one character that carried her legacy.
  Mary Tyler Moore has two iconic characters that are awesome. But looking back she was the expected type of funny that prevailed in the Hepburn-Tracy movies of the golden era. She was beautiful, educated, and had a quick-wit but the way she got laughs was ladylike. It didn't offend anyone. It didn't defy conventions. Her character was single and independent but it wasn't in a way that people could get mad at.
 Lucy is real. She's unapologetic. She's witty, but she still let her husband think he ruled the roost. I think that she wasn't afraid of comedy and how it can be used. In many ways she was a feminist comic. She didn't espouse equality, she just demanded that she have a chance to be heard, even if she couldn't sing. Lucy was bold and real. She got dirty, she got drunk on bad cough medicine, she had a baby on air when people thought it was inappropriate. She broke the rules and rewrote them.
 I think Lucy's impact is seen in a show like Saturday Night Live where the women can be just as funny or funnier than the men. Or Bridesmaids where girls can be dirty and funny in a real way. Maybe we'll never see a woman as gifted as Lucy but at least we can thank her for paving the way for women to be funny any way they want.