Lucy Special: "Lucy Calls the President" coming to DVD

Fans of Lucille Ball, know that she created a number of TV specials. Although she had appeared on game shows and commercials during the running of I Love Lucy, it was in the 1960s and 70s that the networks created one-hour TV specials featuring Lucille Ball with a well-known guest star.

One of these great TV specials aired on CBS in November, 1977, "Lucy Calls the President". Lucille Ball plays, Lucy Whittaker, who decides to call President Jimmy Carter during his weekly radio show and bring up a topic of local Indiana civic importance. He tells her he will be in her area, and will visit her to discuss the matter. Later, the plan is changed to a dinner with the President at Lucy's house, and everyone she has ever known demands to be invited. Lucy finds herself in many situations from chaos in the kitchen to cases of mistaken identity.

This special was more or less, a bittersweet Lucy Show reunion as it featured most of the regulars from that show. This was also the final appearance of Lucille Ball with Vivian Vance. Vivian had already been diagnosed with Breast Cancer and was receiving chemotherapy treatments and had suffered a stroke, which left her face partially paralyzed, just a few months prior to filming this special. This was also the last time Lucille worked with Mary Jane Croft and Mary Wickes. Lucy had also just lost her mother, DeDe, in July 1977, four months prior to the shows airing, and was visibly distraught at her mother's absence in the audience.

MPI Home Video now brings this Lucy Special to DVD, coming to retail on April 6th.  Bonus features include previously unseen Dress Rehearsal footage with Lucy along with the cast as well as a featurette with guest actor James E. Brodhead and other rare Lucy footage.

Last year, MPI brought us a double-feature of Lucy Specials, "Lucy Gets Lucky" and "Three for Two", which was previously featured here on the Everything Lucy blog.  In these specials, Lucy stars with one of her favorites, Dean Martin and Jackie Gleason.

This special was released last year in June 2009.

I'm sure we can look forward to seeing more of the Lucy Specials being released and becoming part of our complete Lucy collections.

You can purchase both of these DVD's from Amazon through the links provided in this article, or visit the Everything Lucy Store to purchase these DVDs and many more great Lucille Ball DVDs and collectables.