10 Insane Rules TV Shows Weren’t Allowed To Break
2. A Pregnancy Scare, Just Not In The Way You Would Expect - I Love Lucy
If you ever want a reminder of how prudish mainstream TV was (and sometimes still is), look back in time to 8 December 1952. That day saw the release of the tenth episode of the second season of I Love Lucy.
The beloved black-and-white sitcom was a mainstay in American households for the better part of the 1950s and placed its cast in era-appropriate hijinks. The aforementioned episode saw Lucy discovering that she was pregnant, and hilarity ensues from her attempts to tell her husband of the good news.
What was supposed to be a wholesome episode had the weirdest behind-the-scenes wrangles, as CBS executives balked at the idea of saying the word pregnant on air.
This led to terms such as 'with child' or 'expecting' being used in place, and while this did not detract from the episode's overall narrative, it is an amusing peek into the absurdly conservative sensibilities of studio executives back in the day.