12:35 PST 2/9/2021
by
Borys Kit
Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem are already in talks to join Aaron Sorkin’s drama, which focuses on television icons Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.
JK Simmons and Nina Arianda are in negotiations to join Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem in Aaron Sorkin’s drama starring television icons Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz of I love Lucy fame.
The project, entitled To be the Ricardos, was introduced as a feature at Amazon Studios. Kidman and Bardem are in negotiations to portray Ball and Arnaz, the first television family to create and interpret the influential comedy presented in the 1950s. Sorkin wrote and directed the screenplay.
In the program, the couple Ball and Arnaz played the married New York couple Lucy and Desi Ricardo, a housewife and orchestra leader, respectively. Their best friends are another couple, Ethel and Fred Mertz, who are regularly caught up in Lucy’s complicated plans to join her husband in the show business.
In Sorkin’s drama, the story is told during one production week of I love Lucy, in which Ball and Arnaz face challenges on two fronts, one crisis that could end their careers and another that could end their marriage.
Simmons would play William Frawley, the actor who played Fred Mertz who later starred in the film with him My three sons. Arianda would play Vivian Vance, played by Ethel Mertz. The Emmy-winning actress would also join Ball in her striking 1960s sitcom, The Lucy Show.
Escape artists Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal and Steve Tisch are producing the project, which kicks off in Los Angeles in April.
Jenna Block, David Bloomfield, Stuart Besser, Lucie Arnaz, Desi Arnaz Jr., and Lauren Lohman are produced.
Simmons, last year by Gersh, has a key role opposite Andy Samberg in the award-winning Palm springs and will star alongside Chris Pratt in Skydance’s big-budget sci-fi film, Die More War.
Arianda won a Tony for her breakout performance in Venus in fur and earned another nomination for Born Yesterday. She also played the love interest for Damien Lewis in Showtime’s Billions and starred with Billy Bob Thornton in the Amazon drama, Goliath. She also appears in Clint Eastwood’s 2019 drama, Richard Jewell. The actress is fascinated by ICM Partners and Schreck Rose.