Lucy and Ethel Buy the Same Dress - Episode 69

I thought since with my contest going on and I am asking everyone to name their favorite episode, I would write about a few of mine here. Actually, I have more than a few, so I'm gonna talk about a dozen or so. Sorry! But I guess we are all Lucy fans so you shouldn't mind too much.
Anyway, This episode aired on October 19 1953 in the third season. Carolyn Applebee's husband gave the girls a thirty minute spot on his TV station and Ethel and Lucy decided to do the duet "friendship" to close the show, so they practice and practice and even Ricky and Fred have to admit it's a pretty cute number even if it is a little bit corny. The decide to wear formals and oddly enough, they wind up shopping for their dresses alone, Ethel went to Macy's and Lucy went to Gimbles, but they both wound up with the same dress.
After they discuss what to do, the girls decide they should both return the dresses and buy something different. On the night of the performance, however, they find out that neither one of them has returned the dress. Too late to do anything about it now, they go on stage so angry with each the other for wearing ‘her’ dress, you can almost see steam coming out of their ears! While singing their song ‘Friendship’, they can't stand it anymore and they start to take their anger out on each other by ripping parts of each other’s dress off - in time to the music!
Ricky and Fred have to stop all this by coming out on stage, and dragging the two girls off.
Would you think that the Wednesday Afternoon Fine Arts League would have learned their lesson by now? Every single show they have put on had bombed, largely because of Lucy, but still, they are a very untalented bunch of girls!

Here's a little trivia for you that goes with this episode:

Q: In what movie and with what co-star did Lucy sing "friendship" with before she ever sang it in this episode?

A: Lucille Ball had previously sung the ‘Friendship’ duet with Red Skelton in the 1942 movie, DuBarry Was A Lady

By the way, there are Barbie dolls of Lucy and Ethel made from this episode wearing these dresses.