WHERE ARE THEY NOW: KEITH THIBODEUX

It's been 60 years since Keith Thibodeux won America's hearts as "Little Ricky" on "I Love Lucy."

Thibodeux, now 64 and one of the last surviving cast members of the show, said he is grateful to have been a part of the cult classic.

"It was an interesting show, but it was a very special show," Thibodeux told ABC News. "It seems to be very memorable and people of any different generation can appreciate it...appreciate the humor of it, appreciate the silliness of it."

Thibodeux said he still has fond memories of his TV parents Lucille Ball, who died in 1989, and Desi Arnaz, who died in 1986.

"Lucy was naturally very motherly to me and Desi kind of made me feel at ease--that was his role," Thibodeux said. "They were very generous towards me and I was best friends with their children. Whenever I was over there, and Desi would give his kids gifts and he'd never leave me out--whether it was customized bowling balls or L.A. Rams jerseys, he'd give me the same thing.

"Lucy would give me birthday presents on the set and make a big deal of it," he added. "She gave me an Indian Tipi one time. Another time she gave me my own dressing room and a set of drums. That same set I still have today."

Thibodeaux got his start in show business on the "Horace Heidt" variety show when he was 4 years old.

"They billed me the tiniest drummer, pound for pound, the greatest drummer around," he said.

Thibodeaux said he remembers the day in 1955 when his father brought him to audition for the role of Ricky Ricardo Jr.

"I walked on the set and there was Lucy, she was standing there and she was looking at me," he said. "She said 'OK he's cute, but what does he do?' My dad said, 'Well he plays the drums' and she said, 'Oh, come on--I can't believe that.' Then, she says 'Look, we have a drum set over there, go ahead and let him play.' Eventually Desi Arnaz himself came over and started jamming with him.

Years later, the former child star said he became severely depressed.

"I do kind of look at it like a time of my life where I wasn't able to fully be a kid, but that's a problem with child stars--that dynamic is always in the mix," he said. "I was very depressed and suicidal and got to the end of my rope and became a Christian in 1974. That kind of changed my perspective on the show. After that, I was able to appreciate the show much more than I did when I was a young adult."

Thibodeaux, who still plays the drums, ditched acting and joined his wife Kathy, a professional ballet dancer, as the executive director of Ballet Magnificat! in Jackson, Miss. Thibodeaux's daughter Tara gave birth to a son a year ago. Thibodeaux calls his grandson Bryson his "little buddy."

And although he said he seldom watches "I Love Lucy," Thibodeaux continues to be proud of what it has become...

SOURCE

60TH ANNIVERSARY OF I LOVE LUCY

Somebody, somewhere, doesn't love Lucy.

But we don't want to hear from them.

Not during the 60th anniversary celebration of the Oct. 15, 1951 TV premiere of "I Love Lucy" -- the simple comedy that cemented the sitcom template, made an enduring icon of star Lucille Ball, built a Hollywood studio and changed the "business" part of show business, for better or worse, by advancing the concept of reruns.

"I Love Lucy" would run on CBS for six seasons totaling 179 half-hour episodes, then another three years adding up to 13 occasional hour specials. Then it ran on CBS network daytime, in local station syndication and around the world -- as it still does -- before becoming one of the first shows released on VHS and DVD.

The half-hour series never ranked lower than No. 3 in the Nielsen ratings, finishing No. 1 four times. Its 1953 having-a-baby outing "Lucy Goes to the Hospital" -- aided by the near simultaneous birth of Ball's real-life son, Desi Arnaz Jr. -- still ranks as Nielsen's highest-rated episode of all time.

And all CBS wanted was to move Ball from her CBS radio hit "My Favorite Husband" to the burgeoning TV medium that had already welcomed radio favorites like Jack Benny and Groucho Marx.

Ball wanted to stay close to home to start a family, and insisted on starring with her husband, Cuban-born bandleader Desi Arnaz. CBS wasn't crazy about the heavily accented Arnaz until the couple did live stage shows to prove audiences bought them as a couple. The network objected even more to the couple planning to produce the show in Hollywood. With the use of videotape still years away, TV programs then aired live from New York for the much larger audience in the country's Eastern half.

The story has become legend -- behind-the-scenes boss Arnaz turned a Hollywood soundstage into the kind of theater used by New York shows, bringing in bleachers for a live audience and playing before three film cameras, editing together the results for high-quality recordings to ship east. With "I Love Lucy" episodes preserved this way, they could be repeated -- and Arnaz was smart enough to retain ownership rights. Other shows soon wanted to tap this expertise, and Lucy and Desi's Desilu studio eventually took over the RKO lot where Ball had once made movies, churning out TV classics from Danny Thomas' "Make Room for Daddy" to "The Untouchables" to "Star Trek." (Desilu was sold to become Paramount Television in 1967.)

Sixty years later -- and 100 years after Lucille Ball's birth -- "I Love Lucy" continues to entertain audiences day after day, generation after generation. And it stands as one of TV's most influential series ever -- both on-screen and off.

SOURCE