Lucille Ball Was 'Like a Mother' to Arnold Schwarzenegger After Coaching Him Through First Live Audience Performance
Lucille Ball Was 'Like a Mother' to Arnold Schwarzenegger After Coaching Him Through First Live Audience Performance
Angela AndaloroWed, March 25, 2026 at 7:30 PM UTC
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Lucille Ball, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Art Carney in "Happy Anniversary and Goodbye"Credit: CBS via Getty -
Arnold Schwarzenegger was just getting started in the entertainment industry when he got a chance to appear on The Merv Griffin Show
Lucille Ball saw his performance on the show and invited him to come audition for Happy Anniversary and Goodbye
Ball supported Schwarzenegger, not only in their shared project, but in his work throughout his early career
Arnold Schwarzenegger was lucky to work with some industry titans early in his career.
During a Sirius XM interview with Andy Cohen, the actor, 78, recalled getting a call from Lucille Ball the day after his 1974 appearance on The Merv Griffin Show. Ball invited him to read for her upcoming project, Happy Anniversary and Goodbye, for the role of a masseur.
"I was shocked that she would call the gym, Gold's Gym. [She said,] 'I saw you on The Merv Griffin Show, Arnold. I saw you last night... you were so funny. I want you to be part of my special. There is a character that is a masseur, and he's going to massage me, and my husband is getting really jealous about it. Come on in and read.' "
Schwarzenegger agreed, but didn't really know what he was getting himself into. Limited in his knowledge of the English language and the entertainment industry led to some misunderstandings, but Ball made sure to protect the young actor through it.
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Schwarzenegger explained that he didn't realize "come on in and read" meant for him to act it out. Rather, he thought he was just supposed to read the lines. She got him through the moment, abandoning the script and improvising the scene for the audition.
"What she was really doing was kind of like, she wanted me so badly on the show that even though I didn't know how to read the lines, because she wanted me to act out what I read, but I did not know that's what you do, right? I was not experienced. So, anyway, she got me in there. She said, 'You're so good improvising. You're hired. We start it next week on Monday with the rehearsals.' "
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Ball then told the young actor, "Remember, you have to really project because it's done live. There's a live audience."
"Of course, I had no idea what that means. I'd been in America just a few years. So I didn't know what a live audience means and shooting means. That's filming, but they were saying 'shooting in front of a live audience.' It went right over my head," he explained.
As they rehearsed, Ball kept reminding him to "project," but he didn't figure out what that meant. The day of shooting, "The green light lights up outside the door at the stage, and I'm ringing the doorbell. She opens up, she says, 'Yeah,' and I said, 'I'm the masseur. I'm here to massage you.' And she says, 'Come on in.' "
Art Carney, Lucille Ball and Arnold Schwarzenegger in "Happy Anniversary and Goodbye," 1974Credit: CBS via Getty
He continued, "So I go in there, and I take off my jacket. And as I go to take off my jacket, I have a tank top on. Of course, this was literally a month before the Mr. Olympia competition, so I was pumped up. I was huge. I weighed 250 lbs. So the audience, now, is applauding... everybody's applauding, and I look out there, totally in shock that there were people around. So now I see this whole audience."
Schwarzenegger remembers that Ball was "very good," explaining, "She saw right away that I got stuck." Ball guided him through the rest of the scene, leading Cohen to note, "It sounds like she really took care of you."
"She was like a mother," Schwarzenegger remarked. "Every movie I did...I remember the following year, I did a movie called Stay Hungry with Jeff Bridges and Sally Fields. I won the Golden Globe for Best Acting Debut. [Ball] wrote me a long, two-page letter, handwritten, saying, 'Arnold, I'm so proud of you. You are a sweet enough guy, you deserve it. You're a great performer. You're going to have a great career,' all this kind of stuff."
"I mean, Lucille Ball," he continued. "And then, every single time, until Conan, and then she passed away... she wrote me letters and always congratulated me and told me, always, how proud she was of me."
on People
Source: “AOL Entertainment”
