While many people remember the actor, comedian, producer and CEO of the studio Lucil Bal for his time playing an awkward housewife Lucy Ricardo at the classic CBS "I love Lucy", she also played a massive role in shaping the future of television. Together with her then husband, Desi Arnaz, Lucil Bal created the company for television production, Desilu, which will produce a number of plays during the 1950s and 1960s, including "I Love Lucy", "Mission", "Mission: Impossible", "Lucy Show", "Old Trek" Serving as a pilot episode of the TV classic "The Dusk Zone". Many of the shows were only developed under the guidance of Bal, as she and Arnaz divorced in 1960 and in 1962 bought it and became the only president of the company.

During her term as president of Desilu, Lucil Ball advocated "Star Trek" over and over. She reportedly helped funding reshaping the controversial pilot So the NBC may not rethink the series, and even ended up selling the company in part in order to try to secure the sequel to the series after budgets surpassed its studio's financial capabilities. Without dedication to Lucil Ball, legend of legend and innovator of TV production, Star Trek probably would never have existed.

According to stories told by writer Mark Kushman in "Fifty -year -old mission: Complete, uncensored, unauthorized oral history of Star Trek: The first 25 years,"Edited by Mark A. Altman and Edward Gross, Lucil Bal really believed in" old Trek "and he did his best to get it in the air and keep it there. He explained:

"Lucil Ball lost his studio because of Star Trek. She was gambling in the show and you can read the memorandums where her board of directors said, "Don't make this show, it will kill us." But she believed it.

While there was probably a lot of disagreement between the board of directors Surrounding Star Trek's financial feasibility, It was not the only series that losing Desillu's money, and in the 1960s, shows often had to lose money to start in order to establish themselves. What is known for sure is that Ball sold Desillu to the Gulf and Western industries in 1967 that will affect the world of television production forever. Not only will Star Trek continue to continue, but it will also be among the first plays under the new television banner.

Kushman continued to explain that while Lucil Bal wanted to continue doing "Star Trek" under Desilu, she simply could not afford to do so, saying her "instincts are right for Star Trek, that she will become one of the biggest shows in the union ever. The problem was that her pockets were not deep enough. There is only one thing: Kushman's math is off and his numbers are also. According to Desillu's financial statements at the time, Star Trek actually loses more than $ 28,000 per episode, while the Manix somehow lost a whopping $ 32,000 per episode. So it might not have been completely "Star Trek" that led to sales, but it had to contribute.

Desilu was in fact in good financial form when he decided to sell Desillu to golf and Western for $ 17 million in the company, with the most net income reported to shareholders in a decade, but it is likely that she (and the board) saw the Wallid writing about these shows on the big budgets. The newly formed Paramount TV Division will be a good home shows like "Star Trek" and "Mission: Impossible" because they were already much more Chinese From their television peers, and in the end it would have been incredibly good for almost all involved.

Regardless of the level of Lucil Ball's personal investment in Star Trek and Mission Impossible, she was Desillu's president and therefore the one with the most power to make or break the shows. When she eventually sold the company, it meant giving up the last piece of her time with her ex -husband for better or worse, which could have been a pretty big sacrifice. It is not easy to leave behind something you have built, especially if there were early fond memories to go with it.

Both "Star Trek" and "Mission: Impossible" are still part of the Paramount machine and have become massive franchises with spin-off shows and whole films, something that may have been harder to achieve under Desilu. Paramount has gone through many of its sales, mergers and corporate weak over the years and is currently trying to sell it on Skydance even At the cost of its long -lasting "late show", So, here we hope that these franchises continue to survive and progress after the change, just as they have done almost 60 years before.