Tralfaz Sunday Theatre: The Photo That Won In a Walk

Vivian Vance and Bill Frawley just couldn’t shake being Ethel and Fred.

We all know them as the Mertzes on “I Love Lucy.” But they played another Fred and Ethel. At least, we can assume they’re a different Fred and Ethel because Fred, in this case, was a newspaper editor.

The year was 1959 and this gig was for charity. The United Fund of Alleghany County hired Vance and Frawley to appear in a fund-raising short called “The Photo that Won in a Walk.”

The star of the film is actually another familiar face from TV. Eddie Albert plays a jaded newspaper photographer who, as you might expect, quite suddenly becomes an old softie at the end, thanks to a girl played by child actress Tammy Marihugh.

Vance introduces the plot as Vivian Vance. And there’s no mention of Lucy, though I suspect might have imagined she was the person Ethel was talking to on the phone.

An article in the September 14, 1959 edition of the Pittsburgh Post Gazette mentions it was a new film and was to be shown at a pre-funding raising campaign rally the following evening. The local press reveals the short was appearing in theatres and was also broadcast on WIIC Channel 11 at 2:15 p.m. on October 23rd.

The short was directed by Nick Grindé, whose career went back to the silent era at MGM. There’s no indication where it was shot, though the executive producer was a local Pittsburgh filmmaker.

You can watch it below.