Lucy Wants New Furniture - S2-E28
Other mistake: When Ricky corners Lucy while she's holding the box of salt, the top and sides of the box have tape hiding its brand name (looks like Diamond), to prevent it from being seen on the air. (00:13:30)
Lucy Wants New Furniture - S2-E28
Continuity mistake: Lucy runs back and forth from Ricardo's and Mertz's apartment through a door in Mertz's living room that is not there in other episodes before or since.
Lucy Wants New Furniture - S2-E28
Deliberate mistake: Lucy and Ethel try and hide the new furniture in the kitchen so Ricky won't find out about it. This in turn forces Lucy to run through the Mertz's apartment to retrieve items from her own kitchen when Ricky wants them. This is supposedly done because the furniture blocks the doorway and is wedged in place thus preventing them from using the door. However it is quite clear that there is a lot of room for the furniture to be pushed into the kitchen and not block the door. They say it is wedged on the sink but there is a lot of room on the other side by the cupboards, along the back wall.
Revealing mistake: After Ricky and Lucy split up to go fishing Ricky yells that she should watch out for bears, and when Lucy stops at a tree and crouches down, the huge tree beside her jiggles when she leans on it. (00:13:40)
Continuity mistake: At the end of Ricky's song "Lady of Spain" when he sings the verse "all that my eyes are revealing, Lady of Spain", in this wideshot we see Lucy in front of the balcony doors facing forward raising her arms, then in the next side closeup Lucy's still facing forward and a flag has suddenly appeared behind her on the balcony door. (00:21:50)
Ricky and Fred Are TV Fans - S2-E31
Visible crew/equipment: When Lucy decides to use the scissors to cut the TV wire on the roof, she and Ethel walk out of the kitchen, and at the start of the next shot we can see the end of the set wall and black cables on the floor, at the right side of the screen.
Never Do Business With Friends - S2-E32
Other mistake: When Lucy and Ethel are on the back porch fighting about the washing machine and also when Mrs. Trumble walks out, Lucy's back door is open and we can see the shutters between the kitchen and living room, with the kitchen counter/sink underneath, but the sink's faucet which should be seen has vanished. (00:14:45)
Never Do Business With Friends - S2-E32
Continuity mistake: In Lucy and Ricky's apartment there are six shutters between the kitchen and living room, a set of three open to the left and three open to the right, but after the washing machine falls off the porch, when Mrs. Trumble's nephew thinks they're all crazy he runs through the back door and we see a set of four shutters on one side. Also note the round knobs are at the bottom corners, when they should be higher up at the center. (The prop shutters that we see through the doorway during the porch's "exterior" shots are identical to the seven shutters that were in apartment 4A, before the Ricardos moved downstairs). (00:22:10 - 00:24:25)
Never Do Business With Friends - S2-E32
Continuity mistake: In this episode, the Mertzes buy the Ricardo's old washing machine and say that theirs is old enough to be in the Smithsonian, yet just a few episodes earlier ("Sales Resistance") Fred tells Ethel to come and see her new Handy Dandy washing machine.
Equal Rights - S3-E3
Revealing mistake: When Lucy and Ethel go down to the jail house to see Rickey and Fred, there is a scene where Lucy says "I wonder how he (Rickey) kisses" and then she kisses him, then Ethel says the same thing about Fred and leans in for a kiss. Problem is she obviously doesn't get anywhere near his lips to touch them for a kiss, yet makes the kissing sound, turns around and says "hmmm" as if the "kiss" wasn't all that . Of course we all know those two characters did not get along on set anyways .
Continuity mistake: When Lucy and Ricky are sitting on the coffee table looking through photos of Little Ricky, just as Lucy quips, "What magazine, body beautiful?" in the closeup the baby's photo orientation is portrait, but in the wideshots when Lucy looks at it and hands it to Ricky the orientation is landscape. (00:01:50)
Continuity mistake: While Ethel's looking at the Baby Pictures we see her fingernails are short and not polished, but in the closeup of her hand holding one of the photos the fingernails are long with dark polish.
Visible crew/equipment: When Lucy and Ethel are at Caroline Appleby's apartment, a few actors' tape marks are visible on the carpet near the couch and side table, where characters will stand at different times during the scene. (00:06:00)
Continuity mistake: In season 2's episode "The Ricardos Change Apartments" their new apartment number is "3B", but in this episode when Lucy's at her audition she tells the casting agent that her apartment number is "3D" (deliberately done in order for the 3D joke to work), and it's in the next episode "The French Revue" that we see the new number "3D" on the door. (00:19:30)
Redecorating the Mertzes' Apartment - S3-E7
Visible crew/equipment: At the end, when Lucy shows Ethel the brand new furniture in the apartment, note the actor's tape mark on the carpet between the couch and coffee table, where Lucy sits down. Fun to note: just as Ethel says "Everything turned out just wonderful, everything except," we can see one of the flying feathers from the earlier scene at the Mertz's apartment. The Mertz set was located right beside the Ricardo set. (00:24:25)
Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Continuity mistake: When Fred tells Ricky there's an article in the newspaper about Carlota Romero, there's a closeup of the newspaper's back page with Carlota's photo, but later when Lucy takes the newspaper (the same NY Gazette issue) from Ethel, before she turns it over we can see that the back page photo and layout are different. (00:08:30 - 00:10:20)
Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Continuity mistake: When Fred shows Ricky the newspaper article about Carlota Romero appearing at the Opal Room, the front page of the paper reads "New York Gazette", but in the closeup of the article on the back page the newspaper is called "The Daily Record." (00:08:35)
Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Continuity mistake: In Lucy's dream, when Carlota Romero comes to their apartment, Little Ricky is sitting in a highchair with a hat on his head. Although later in the scene, you see his hat fall off, the first close-up shot of Little Ricky shows him without the hat. Then immediately, when you see a wide-shot of the scene, his hat is back on his head again.
Ricky's Old Girlfriend - S3-E11
Visible crew/equipment: In Lucy's dream, when Carlota Romero and Lucy are dancing, the camera pulls out too far and where the set carpet ends and the studio floor begins can be seen.
The Million Dollar Idea - S3-E12
Character mistake: When Ricky sits down to calculate by hand how much Lucy and Ethel have spent on supplies to make and sell their salad dressing, he adds $7.21 for the groceries, $1.20 for the jars, and 10 cents for the labels. He says his total is $8.31. He miscalculated; the correct total is $8.51. Ironically, his profit calculation is correct at 3 cents a jar. (00:15:10)
Answer: There is no reason. It's a just a silly plot device, typical of the era. Women characters were often portrayed as making uninformed assumptions or decisions.
raywest ★