famous before he could even draw his first breath. Daisy Arnaz Jr. was born into fame and grew up constantly surrounded by it thanks to celebrity parents Lucille Ball and Daisy Arnaz senior. You would expect that a boy born with golden spoons would be satisfied with his parents’ legacy, not Daisy Arnaz Jr.
who decided that he wanted to make his own legacy. But it wasn’t the easiest journey. The pressures of fame coupled with horrible personal choices led Desi down a tunnel of terrible consequences. Join us as we uncover the tragic story of Daisy Arnaz Jr. Daisy’s start to life was unlike any in the 1950s. He was practically the most famous baby in America at the time.
When his mother Lucille Ball appeared pregnant in the 1952 I Love Lucy episode Lucy is on Saint the world was stunned because before this episode no pregnant woman had ever appeared on a major US television network which sounds pretty weird to us in 2025 but at the time this was groundbreaking. What made it even more incredible was the fact that the pregnancy was real.
The episode was filmed while Ball was 5 months pregnant and the tears shed by both her and co-star Desi Ares Senior were real. I Love Lucy writers had written the show’s plot to accommodate Lucille’s real life pregnancy with Desi. This level of originality was something Lucille was well known for. Many who watched her launch I Love Lucy agreed that the show was very innovative for its time and praised Lucille for this success.
praise which was welld deserved given the fact that she was not only the comedian and the actress but also the producer and the studio executive. Her impact in the industry was revealed after she was recognized by time as one of the most influential women of the 20th century for her work in all four of these areas.
Her husband and co-acctor on the show was no slouch himself. The Cuban American actor was also a producer and musician. He was even heading his own band. Together with his wife, they co-founded and ran the television production company Desolu Productions, originally to market I Love Lucy to television networks.
After I Love Lucy ended, he went on to produce several other television series at first with Desolu Productions and later independently including the Anne Southern Show and The Untouchables. When Desi was born, it made headlines and Lucille estimated that 1 million people sent gifts and messages of congratulations. With his arrival so high-profile and his parents’ success, Desi got an early start in the acting business and starred in his first role when he was just 4 years old.
Around this time, his high-profile parents had had enough of each other. Their relationship had become very problematic, partly because of their busy careers, which often kept them apart. But Lucille stated that she just couldn’t deal with her husband’s infidelity and alcoholism anymore. So, she served him the divorce papers. Fortunately for young Desi, the divorce wasn’t messy.
The parents kept it mature and even chose to remain friends, which made it easier for Desi’s first TV role on his parents’ show to go as smoothly as possible. Just a couple of years later, he got another acting opportunity along with his sister on another of his mother’s shows. He then appeared in one episode of The Brady Bunch, played a small role in a couple of episodes of The Loveboat, and starred in some other show.
During this period of his early career, a 12-year-old Desi stepped into music as a drummer. He also formed a band with school friends Billy Hincha and Dean Paul Martin who was the son of the Dean Martin. Their band was aptly named Dino Desi and Billy. Surprisingly, the band was to some degree successful and they soon gained some fans. Unfortunately, this would also mark the beginning of a lifestyle that young Desi would come to regret.
a lifestyle that he should not have been exposed to in the first place. As the band got followers, some became groupies. Let’s not forget that the band was made up of 10 12 year olds. This exposure wasn’t the best thing for Desi and his friends. Yet, this was their life at the time, and they found joy in it. So much so that in the 1978 issue of People magazine, Dean Paul Martin would recall fondly that Desessie was the lover of the group and there was no shortage of groupies.
As his musical career progressed, Desi’s acting career got another boost as his mother cast him for a role on her third sitcom, Here’s Lucy. Already Desi was developing a reputation as some sort of ladies man which you would agree was incorrect as he was merely a boy at the time.
Still the reputation grew and there was some truth to it. When Desi turned 15, he got into a relationship with 15-year-old model Susan Callahan How. This relationship produced Julia, but Julia didn’t get Arnaz added to her name until years later when a paternity test proved her relationship to Desi. After moving on from Susan Callahan How, teenage Desi began a romance on the set of Here’s Lucy with actress Patty Duke, who was 23.
This relationship wasn’t amusing to Lucille, who wasn’t happy that her son was dating someone several years older than he was, and she voiced her opinion on the matter when she could, which only gave the relationship more publicity. Then it only got worse after Patty announced she was pregnant with Desi’s child.
Shortly after they had ended the relationship, it was later revealed that she was involved with three people at the same time. Desi himself, who was a teenager then, there was actor John Aston, who was 16 years older than her, and rock music promoter Michael Tel. Despite claiming Daisy was the father of her unborn child, Patty got married to Michael Tel.
Her reason was simple, so that her child could have a name. With that kind of reason, it wasn’t a surprise that the marriage lasted 13 days before ending in an anulment. Desi had believed that he was a father at 17 and for years he continued to think he was. However, DNA tests would later prove otherwise. When that happened, Patty pointed to John Aston as the actual father, and this was also discovered to be a lie after a couple of years, thanks to tests that determined that Michael Tel was the kid’s biological father. You
could almost imagine the emotional gymnastics Desi was going through when it was announced that he was going to be a father for the second time before the age of 18 and how tragic it was that after accepting the fact and playing that role for a number of years, he came to a shocking realization. Still, it didn’t stop him from finding love again.
This time, it was Liza Minnelli who was pretty successful as a multi-talented actress. She and Desi had known each other as little kids in Beverly Hills. They bumped into each other as Liza was flying to Las Vegas and they had not only caught up, but also decided to date. This decision was met with disapproval from Lucille. She felt the singer actress was too old for her son, and because of Liza’s rumored reckless lifestyle, she believed it wouldn’t be a good influence on Desi.
But since his mother’s disapproval had never stopped him before, it was almost unsurprising when Desi announced his engagement to Liza months into the relationship. They were already living together, so it wasn’t too shocking. The media loved it, and this was the news for weeks. Another person who applauded Desi’s decision was his father, who was already picking a date for the wedding.
Desi soon made the engagement official by exchanging rings in front of hundreds of photographers. But to everyone’s shock, the wedding never happened. Within months after the engagement, Liza had fallen for someone else, 47year-old Peter Sers, and they were planning to get married soon.
That relationship didn’t last long either. Desi was heartbroken over Liza, but he soon picked himself up and was dating the likes of Victoria Principal before she became famous in Dallas, Kim Darby, and Tina Sinatra, singer, actress, and the youngest daughter of entertainer Frank Sinatra. Having been called a womanizer since he was a teenager, it was almost as if Desi didn’t care anymore.
He leaned into the fame and dated openly. In fact, at just 25, he had completely bought into his reputation and even admitted during an interview that he was a playboy. You might wonder how Daisy became this person. But you don’t need to look further than his father, Arnaz Senior. Lucille was convinced that he was being unfaithful to her along with him coming home drunk several times.
Her suspicion was confirmed when Hollywood procurer of prostitutes, Scotty Bowers, claimed in his memoir, Full Service, that he had provided as many as two to three prostitutes per week for Arnaz while they were still married. Bowers added that each of these escorts was paid $200 for their services. Lucille even confronted Bowers about this and publicly slapped him in the face, yelling, “You stop pimping for my husband.
” Eventually, the solution for her was divorce. Even though Desi was young when his parents broke up, as he grew older, he understood. And unfortunately, his father still had his vices in full display. He drank, womanized, and gambled. Arna’s senior might have worked on a solution if only he hadn’t seen it as an effective means of releasing stress.
And this was the lifestyle Desi saw. Then there was the other part. Most people would agree that the Daisy Arnaz name opened doors in the entertainment industry, but few would admit that it also brought with it a level of pressure that not many are aware of. One of the challenges Daisy Arnaz Jr. faced was the weight of expectation.
According to Desi Jr. himself, it got to the point where he would pay his doctors directly for prescription drugs. So, it started initially through self-medication. He said that his friends and family, especially Lucille, tried desperately to get him to seek assistance in rehab. He said, “For one thing, I was so stubbornly sure I had all the answers, and drugs were taking over my life.
” Desi even admitted to experimenting with LSD, coke, quaudes, measculine, as well as marijuana by the time he was 23. He added that he was completely lost. Only about two years later when the doctors examined him did they reveal that he had done so many drugs that his brain scan reflected the biology of someone in their twilight years.
This was the wakeup call for Desi Jr. He sought help in the form of rehab, trying desperately to get his life and body back. Throughout these personal struggles, Desi sought peace in his passion for music and the performing arts. Thanks to his dedication to his craft, Desi was able to starve the desire.
He demonstrated a commitment to self-discovery and personal growth, ultimately emerging stronger and wiser from the trials he faced. All he had was himself. Lucille tried what she could. She was known for her perfect timing and her ability to bring joy to many. Sadly, she couldn’t replicate that joy in her own home.
Because she was committed to her career, it often led to long hours on set and frequent travel, leaving her with limited time to spend with her children. This absence, driven by her dedication to her craft and her demanding schedule, was a problem. Then Desi’s father wasn’t always much fun to be around.
According to Desi, he was really a great guy when he wasn’t drinking, but his kids, we’d definitely stay away from him when he was drunk. There was also a talk of frequent violent drunken outbursts, including a time he beat up Daisy’s tutor and another time when he fired a gun off into the air because someone was hanging out on a beach that he owned.
He also had numerous run-ins with the law. He was arrested on an intoxication charge while he was walking on Hollywood Boulevard. He was later arrested and charged with assault with a deadly weapon after an altercation with a youth parking in front of his house. Two young men were allegedly partying nearby and harassing his then 15-year-old daughter Lucy and her friend.
As a protective dad, he confronted the harassers, threatened to shoot their tires and cars, and then fired two shots that went into the ground. He spent 3 hours at the San Diego jail, and was released on bail. All of which just added to the difficulties he was facing growing up. So by his own admission, he began using drugs as a way to destroy himself because he was tired of being Desi Arnaz Jr.
After Desi checked himself into rehab, he came out much better than the man who went in. He went on to become an actor and musician himself, appearing in over 30 films and television shows. Then he married actress Linda Pearl in 1979. On January 3rd, 1980, Pearl filed for divorce, which was finalized later that year.
Then 7 years later, Desi married Amy Laura Bargiel. Amy was a dancer and trained with Christina Carson. She also studied with the late Sonia Arova and taught ballet at the University of Nevada. Vasilei Sulich, the founder of Nevada Dance Theater, also influenced her dancing. Her love for dance was clearly captured when she said this.
I give and get lots of hugs every day and wouldn’t change my profession for anything. I love children and find great pleasure in providing them this magical world where they can dance and sing and express themselves. She and Desi lived in Boulder City, Nevada with their daughter Haley. In 1997, because of his wife, Desi purchased the Boulder Theater in town and restored it when it had been on the brink of ruin.
After its conversion to a theater, the cinema became the home of the Boulder City Ballet Company. Tragically, Amy died of cancer at age 63. She was so well-loved in her community that they all mourned her loss. They paid tribute to her by placing flowers in front of the Arnaz’s Boulder Theater. Both Desi and Amy were followers of Vernon Howard and attended meetings of Howard’s New Life Foundation in Boulder City.
Desi lost his granddaughter too in 2020. Desiree S. Anselone, who was the daughter of Julia, Desi’s first child, was a photographer. She was aged 31 when she passed on. Desiree was first diagnosed with stage 2 breast cancer at the age of 25. After undergoing chemotherapy, she ultimately decided to get a double mystctomy.
Although she was in remission for a period of time, she learned two years ago that her cancer had returned as stage four and had spread to her liver, lungs, and bones. And it was just 6 years after it was first diagnosed that she lost her life. These losses were terrible and tragic for Desi, who had also borne the loss of his father in 1986 and his mother in 1989.
All that was left was himself and his sister who are on the board for the Lucy Daisy Museum in Jamestown and they manage Desolu 2 which licenses products and images of their parents. Then Desi’s two kids Haley and Nicole take care of their 79year-old dad. Desi is still a resident of Boulder City, Nevada, and takes life more simply these days.
In a recent interview, when asked about acting, he says he hasn’t ruled it out completely, but he’s content to make new memories with the theater. He adds that he feels better now. Even though he’s not all better, this is the life he has chosen for himself. Daisy’s career was always overshadowed by the fact that he was his parents’ child, and that took a toll on him.
Still, his name resonates with the golden age of Hollywood and the television era. And looking at his life, you see a man who tried to make the most of what he was given. It is just like he said, “I’m not a person who wanted to be in show business. I was born in it. I was a well-planned
