Lucille Ball Didn’t Smoke the Brand of Cigarette’s That Sponsored ‘I Love Lucy’

I Love Lucy may be considered the most iconic television show of all time, but the road to getting the series produced was not smooth. Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz had to jump through several hurdles to get the show on the air, and finding a sponsor was especially difficult. Eventually, Philip Morris, the famed cigarette company, agreed to sponsor the show. There was one big problem, though. Ball, a heavy smoker, had a preferred brand of cigarettes, and Philip Morris wasn’t it. 

‘I Love Lucy’ didn’t have a sponsor until Philip Morris came around to the concept 

I Love Lucy quickly became a hit. The series is beloved even today, but the concept was a hard sell before production began. According to several sources, concerns over Lucy and Ricky’s relationship being “believable” scared many sponsors away. Eventually, Philip Morris took a chance on the series, but the sponsorship didn’t come easy. 

According to the Lucy Desi Museum, Ball had to go to bat to include Arnaz in the series. Eventually, Philip Morris agreed, but only after heavy product placement was worked into every episode. Eventually, more sponsors got on board, but Philip Morris was and always will be heavily linked to the series and its stars. According to the New York Post, the couple even appeared in a series of ads for the cigarette company, singing its praises and seemingly enjoying a leisurely smoke. Lucille Ball’s love of Philip Morris was fictionalized, though. 

Lucille Ball hid her preferred cigarettes inside Philip Morris packaging 

Philip Morris may have agreed to sponsor the show, but Lucille Ball wasn’t about to switch her cigarette brand to appease sponsors. According to several sources, a Philip Morris rep once caught Ball sneaking a Chesterfield cigarette on the I Love Lucy set. The agent informed Ball that not only could her character not smoke competing cigarettes, but Ball couldn’t be seen with anything but Philip Morris products herself. 

Ball wanted to keep her show on the air, so she agreed, despite appearing in Chesterfield advertisements years earlier. She was never again caught with a Chesterfield smoke, but that doesn’t mean she stopped lighting them. Instead, Ball hid her preferred brand in Philip Morris packaging. While she carried a Philip Morris tin cigarette case, she was actually smoking Chesterfield cigarettes.  

Philip Morris eventually purchased the Chesterfield brand. The merger didn’t occur until years after Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball died, though. The cigarette company was purchased by Philip Morris in 1999. Ball died in 1989. She was 77. Desi Arnaz died in 1986 from lung cancer. He was 69.