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Plot[]
Ricky has a gig playing at a summer resort in Maine, and while they're gone, the Ricardos decide to sublet their $125-a-month apartment for $300 a month. This starts a feud between the Ricardos and the Mertzes. When they finally agree to split the $300 down the middle, they settle on subletting the apartment to Mr. Beecher, a nervous wreck of a man who needs time to relax after being a witness on a murder trial.
Once Mr. Beecher is moved in, Ricky finds out that the gig in Maine has been canceled. Where will they live now? The Mertzes offer to let the Ricardos stay with them, but the crowded conditions just cause friction between the two couples. Lucy tries her best to find an apartment for the summer, but she's not having good luck. If only she could get rid of Mr. Beecher!
Lucy and Ethel decide to pretend to stage a murder scene hoping to scare off Mr. Beecher. Ethel storms in the Ricardos' apartment with a toy gun, accusing Lucy of having an affair with Fred. They put on a good fake performance, and Mr. Beecher runs out, wailing.
Lucy and Ethel proudly return to the Mertzes' apartment, to tell everyone the good news. But the good news quickly becomes bad news. Fred just got home from finding the Ricardos a summer apartment, and he's already put down a deposit for the next two months! And what's worse, the Ricardos won't even need ONE apartment, let alone two, because Ricky's just been offered another summer job, this time in Del Mar, California!
Trivia[]
- This is one of those episodes that has a really great, surprising ending, but we as viewers unfortunately don't get to find out how the characters fixed the problem posed at the end of the episode. Did the Ricardos end up going to Del Mar? Did Fred get his money back for the apartment deposit? Did the Ricardos move back in to their apartment, or did they sublease it to somebody else after Mr. Beecher left? This is the season finale, too, so the next episode can't possibly tell us what's going on.
- Del Mar was Desi Arnaz's favorite vacation spot in real-life. He loved going fishing there. He retired to Del Mar and lived there with his second wife, Edie, until his death in 1986. After this episode was filmed, Lucy and Desi and their children really did go and spend the summer of 1954 in Del Mar.
- The seventh episode of the Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour totally stole the main plot of this episode. In episode #7 of the Comedy Hour, the Ricardos are heading to Hollywood so Ricky can do a movie, and they rent their house to Danny Thomas and his family while they're away. Right after the Thomases move in, Ricky gets a call telling him that the movie is canceled. So, the Ricardos move into the Mertzes' guest house, and Lucy tries her best to get the Thomases to leave so she can have her house back. Of course, "The Sublease" was a very interesting and unique episode because of its clever plot. The Comedy Hour episode was neither interesting NOR unique, which was the general story for that subpar spin-off.
- While it is totally understandable that Mr. Beecher doesn't want to have to be a witness to another murder, it is a very poor decision on his part that he completely abandons the scene of what he thinks is a crime. What if Ethel really did kill Lucy? Mr. Beecher should have gone to the police and said what he saw, regardless of how badly his nerves were shot. It is very selfish of him to think somebody was murdered and not go for help!
- Luckily, one of Little Ricky's balloons was left under the couch. Otherwise, Lucy wouldn't have been able to simulate the gunshot when Ethel's cap gun didn't fire. Lucy ended up popping the balloon with a safety pin she had on her shirt.
- Look closely when Lucy is "comforting" Little Ricky in the crib after Ricky bangs into the crib and wakes up his son. Lucy is just fiddling with blankets in an empty crib. The part of the scene where Little Ricky is present were shot after filming.
- Little Ricky is fussy in this episode because he is teething.
- The Mertzes and the Ricardos get more annoyed living together in this episode than in episode #168, even though they are a lot more crowded (by moving boxes) in "Lucy Hates to Leave"!
- Lucy has such a hard time finding an apartment, because all of the landlords will accept pets but no children.
- The Ricardos and Mertzes have supposedly been friends for 12 years, and Lucy was supposedly 22 when she got married. Both of these numbers are contradicted in the series, the first in "The Fur Coat" and the second in "The Passports."
- Mr. Beecher was played by Jay Novello, he also played Mario the Gondala operator on their trip through Europe and he played Mr. Merriwhether in the episode 'The Seance', trying to talk to Tilly, who everyone thought was his wife, but was actually his Cocker Spaniel.
- This is the last episode in which Ricky wears his wedding ring regularly. The only episode after this in which he wears it is in "The Hollywood Anniversary."
- What would've been nice is for the Del Mar revelation at the end of season 3 to continue into season 4, showing them already there, as it was supposed to be a two-month gig for the summer, ending up in Hollywood; they were already in California, and most of season 4 will take place there. All they would need is to bring the Mertzes to Hollywood!!
Quotes[]
- Ethel: Oh, I don't know what I'll do with you gone for two months!
Fred: Well, at least the kitchen door and your tongue will get a little rest.
- Ricky: As long as you get $125 a month, it's fair.
Fred: Well, it might be fair, but it's lousy!
- Ricky: (reading copy of lease) "The lessee has the right to sublet the apartment in question." "The lessee"- that's us. And THIS is "the apartment in question."
Lucy: Ha, ha!
Fred: Read on, read on.
Ricky: "The lessee has the right to sublet the apartment in question, with the approval of the lessor."
Fred: And that's us, Mr. and Mrs. Fred Lessor.
Ethel: Well, what do you say to that, Minnie Ha-Ha?
- Lucy: Why bother [bringing another potential renter here]? The Mertzes wouldn't even approve Ike and Mamie.
- Fred: (pretending to be sublease customers) Do you approve of me, Ethel?
Ethel: Yes! Do you approve of ME?
Ricky: What's going on here?!
Mrs. Hammond: Well, I think the Mertzes plan to sublease your apartment, and then sub-sublet it to somebody else...
- Ricky: Oh! They're trying to make us look at this thin' through a sweater!
Lucy: Oh, you mean they're trying to pull the wool over our eyes!
- Ethel: Sometimes, it's so quiet I think everyone else in the apartment house is dead.
Lucy: What she means, Mr. Beecher, is that this place is always quiet as a tomb.
- Lucy: The only [apartments] that look decent will take pets but no children.
Fred: Too bad.
Lucy: I'm so desperate, I'm thinking of tying feathers on Little Ricky and telling them he's a parrot.
- Lucy: How was the baby, honey?
Ethel: Oh, he was alright, except for a couple of things, like crying all afternoon and spilling his food on the bedroom rug again...
- Lucy: Gee, I never thought when we came here that we'd be here a whole week.
Fred: Has it only been a week?
- Ethel: She and Ricky are probably just as sick of us as we are of them.
- Fred: Lucy, will you try and keep that baby quiet? His crying is gettin' on my nerves!
Lucy: Well, why didn't you say so, Fred? Little Ricky's only crying because he thought you LIKED it!
- Fred: [Lucy]'s been in [the bathtub] long enough to bathe an elephant!
- Ethel: Is the baby going to cry ALL night again tonight?
Lucy: He wouldn't be crying if Fred hadn't come out here and kicked the crib!
- Ethel: There's one skillet out there that hasn't been cold for a week.
Lucy: Well, I guess there's just one thing to do.
Ethel: Yeah, but you can't find an apartment.
Lucy: I meant use paper plates!
- Mr. Beecher: Look here, please- if you've got to kill her, take her out in the hall and do it!
Ethel: Oh, no, I'm gonna do it right here and now! I'm gonna count to three, and then I'm gonna let you have it! 1... 2... 3...
(Ethel pulls cap gun's trigger, but it doesn't go off)
Lucy: Ah-ha! You're afraid to let me have it, huh?
Ethel: Oh, no, I'm not! I just wanna watch you squirm!
- Lucy: First, we have no apartment. Now, we've got TWO! Ricky, your news? Don't tell me we've got THREE!
Ricky: We don't even need ONE!