by Ted Sherman

Created on: June 09, 2009

The 1950s represented the dawn of TV sitcoms. Most of the very earliest ones were just rewritten radio sitcom scripts, where there was much talk and little visual activity. The actors, new to TV, never seemed comfortable and moved hesitantly around poorly-designed sets. That all changed when a brilliant red-headed lady showed how a sitcom should be done.

The technical facilities of the time were crude, and episodes of most 1950s shows were either never recorded at all or saved as very blurry images on kinescope. Kinescope was an early videotaping system where the camera pointed at the TV screen and recorded the image in very poor quality. One reason the I Love Lucy show is still in reruns today is that Lucille Ball and husband Desi Arnaz had the foresight to record their programs on permanently sharp-imaged 16mm film.

I Love Lucy (1951-1960): By all critics and TV historians, the best sitcom of the 1950s was this domestic comedy. In the late 1940s, movie glamor girl Lucille Ball branched out into the then-popular weekly radio programs to costar in what was then called My Favorite Wife. Her uniquely humorous voice made the show a hit, and when all the other radio stars, including Jack Benny, Bob Hope and Red Skelton, began their TV shows, Lucille led the parade.

The Lucy show became an immediate hit, primarily because the star decided to shed her glamor-girl image for her expert physical and voice comedy. Her all-American wife role made a perfectly contrasting partnership with her real-life (at the time) and on-screen husband, Desi Arnaz, a Cuban band leader and singer. His accented English and her attempts to join his band gave Lucy many opportunities to spice up the comedy. The Mertzes, the second banana team of next-door neighbors, helped Lucy create more hair-brained schemes to exhibit with Ethel.

The Honeymooners (1955-1956): Like the Lucy show, the Honeymooners episodes will probably keep showing up on TV screens for at least another century. Not many people today realize that this show was not very successful in its first run, and in fact only lasted two seasons, and just 39 half-hour episodes survive today. Star Jackie Gleason had hosted a very successful episodic comedy variety show for five years before evolving one skit into the sitcom featuring Ralph, Alice, Norton and Trixie characters. At first, it was just one five-minute humorous bit among many others during his variety show's weekly hour.

Then, in 1955, Gleason and company made their first

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