title: Adam Driver

text: For his work on television, Driver has received four Primetime Emmy Award nominations. He received three nominations for his performance in "Girls" from 2013, 2014, and 2015, in the Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series category. In 2020, he also received a nomination for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series for his guest hosting role on "Saturday Night Live". For his work in film, he has been nominated twice for an Academy Award, for his performances in Spike Lee's "BlacKkKlansman" (2018), and Noah Baumbach's "Marriage Story" (2019). He also received British Academy Film Award, Golden Globe Award, and Screen Actors Guild Award (SAG) nominations for those films as well. He also received a SAG Award nomination for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture as a part of the ensemble of Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln". In 2019 he received a Tony Award nomination for Best Actor in a Play for his performance in "Burn This" at the 73rd Tony Awards.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Lucille Désirée Ball (August 6, 1911 – April 26, 1989) was an American actress, comedienne and producer. She was nominated for 13 Primetime Emmy Awards, winning five times, and was the recipient of several other accolades, such as the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award and two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. She earned many honors, including the Women in Film Crystal Award, an induction into the Television Hall of Fame, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Kennedy Center Honors, and the Governors Award from the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball's career began in 1929 when she landed work as a model. Shortly thereafter, she began her performing career on Broadway using the stage name Diane (or Dianne) Belmont. She later appeared in films in the 1930s and 1940s as a contract player for RKO Radio Pictures, being cast as a chorus girl or in similar roles, with lead roles in B-pictures and supporting roles in A-pictures. During this time, she met Cuban bandleader Desi Arnaz, and they eloped in November 1940. In the 1950s, Ball ventured into television, where she and Arnaz created the sitcom "I Love Lucy". She gave birth to their first child, Lucie, in 1951, followed by Desi Arnaz Jr. in 1953. They divorced in March 1960, and she married comedian Gary Morton in 1961.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball produced and starred in the Broadway musical "Wildcat" from 1960 to 1961. In 1962, she became the first woman to run a major television studio, Desilu Productions, which produced many popular television series, including "" and "". After "Wildcat", she reunited with "I Love Lucy" co-star Vivian Vance for "The Lucy Show", which Vance left in 1965. The show continued, with Ball's longtime friend and series regular Gale Gordon, until 1968. Ball immediately began appearing in a new series, "Here's Lucy", with Gordon, frequent show guest Mary Jane Croft, and Lucie and Desi Jr.; this program ran until 1974.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball did not retire from acting completely, and in 1985 she took on a dramatic role in the television film "Stone Pillow". The next year she starred in "Life with Lucy", which, unlike her other sitcoms, was not well-received; it was cancelled after three months. She appeared in film and television roles for the rest of her career until her death in April 1989 from an abdominal aortic aneurysm and arteriosclerotic heart disease at the age of 77.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Lucille Désirée Ball was born on August 6, 1911, at 60 Stewart Avenue in Jamestown, New York, the first child and only daughter of Henry Durrell "Had" Ball, a lineman for Bell Telephone, and Désirée Evelyn "DeDe" (née Hunt) Ball. Her family belonged to the Baptist church. Her ancestors were mostly English, but a few were Scottish, French, and Irish. Some were among the earliest settlers in the Thirteen Colonies, including Elder John Crandall of Westerly, Rhode Island, and Edmund Rice, an early emigrant from England to the Massachusetts Bay Colony.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Her father's Bell Telephone career frequently required the family to move during Lucy's early childhood. The first was to Anaconda, Montana, and later to Trenton, New Jersey. On February 28, 1915, while living in Wyandotte, Michigan, Lucy's father died of typhoid fever at age 27 when Lucy was only three. At that time, DeDe was pregnant with her second child, Fred Ball (1915–2007). Lucille recalled little from the day her father died, except a bird getting trapped in the house, which caused her lifelong ornithophobia.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball's mother returned to New York, where maternal grandparents helped raise Lucy and her brother Fred in Celoron, a summer resort village on Chautauqua Lake. Their home was at 59 West 8th Street (later renamed to 59 Lucy Lane). Ball loved Celoron Park, a popular amusement area at the time. Its boardwalk had a ramp to the lake that served as a children's slide, the Pier Ballroom, a roller-coaster, a bandstand, and a stage where vaudeville concerts and plays were presented.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Four years after Henry Ball's death, DeDe married Edward Peterson. While they looked for work in another city, Peterson's parents cared for Lucy and Fred. Ball's step-grandparents were a puritanical Swedish couple who banished all mirrors from the house except one over the bathroom sink. When Lucy was caught admiring herself in it, she was severely chastised for being vain. She later said that this period of time affected her so deeply, it lasted seven or eight years.


title: Lucille Ball

text: When Lucy was 12, her stepfather encouraged her to audition for his Shriner's organization that needed entertainers for the chorus line of its next show. While Ball was onstage, she realized performing was a great way to gain praise. In 1927, her family was forced to move to a small apartment in Jamestown after their house and furnishings were sold to settle a legal judgment.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1925, Ball, then only 14, started dating Johnny DeVita, a 21-year-old local hoodlum. Her mother was unhappy with the relationship, and hoped the romance, which she was unable to influence, would burn out. After about a year, her mother tried to separate them by exploiting Ball's desire to be in show business. Despite the family's meager finances, in 1926, she enrolled Ball in the John Murray Anderson School for the Dramatic Arts, in New York City, where Bette Davis was a fellow student. Ball later said about that time in her life, "All I learned in drama school was how to be frightened." Ball's instructors felt she would not be successful in the entertainment business, and were unafraid to directly state this to her.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In the face of this harsh criticism, Ball was determined to prove her teachers wrong and returned to New York City in 1928. That same year, she began working for Hattie Carnegie as an in-house model. Carnegie ordered Ball to bleach her brown hair blond, and she complied. Of this time in her life, Ball said, "Hattie taught me how to slouch properly in a $1,000 hand-sewn sequin dress and how to wear a $40,000 sable coat as casually as rabbit."


title: Lucille Ball

text: Her acting forays were still at an early stage when she became ill with rheumatic fever and was unable to work for two years.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1932, she moved back to New York City to resume her pursuit of an acting career, where she supported herself by again working for Carnegie and as the Chesterfield cigarette girl. Using the name Diane (sometimes spelled Dianne) Belmont, she started getting chorus work on Broadway, but it did not last. Ball was hired — but then quickly fired — by theatre impresario Earl Carroll from his "Vanities", and by Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. from a touring company of "Rio Rita".


title: Lucille Ball

text: After an uncredited stint as a Goldwyn Girl in "Roman Scandals" (1933), starring Eddie Cantor and Gloria Stuart, Ball moved permanently to Hollywood to appear in films. She had many small movie roles in the 1930s as a contract player for RKO Radio Pictures, including a two-reel comedy short with The Three Stooges ("Three Little Pigskins", 1934) and a movie with the Marx Brothers ("Room Service", 1938). Her first credited role came in "Chatterbox" in 1936. She also appeared in several Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers RKO musicals: as one of the featured models in "Roberta" (1935), as the flower shop clerk in "Top Hat" (1935), and in a brief supporting role at the beginning of "Follow the Fleet" (1936). Ball played a larger part as an aspiring actress alongside Ginger Rogers, who was a distant maternal cousin, and Katharine Hepburn in the film "Stage Door" (1937).


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1936, she landed the role she hoped would lead her to Broadway, in the Bartlett Cormack play "Hey Diddle Diddle", a comedy set in a duplex apartment in Hollywood. The play premiered in Princeton, New Jersey, on January 21, 1937, with Ball playing the part of Julie Tucker, "one of three roommates coping with neurotic directors, confused executives, and grasping stars, who interfere with the girls' ability to get ahead". The play received good reviews, but problems existed with star Conway Tearle, who was in poor health. Cormack wanted to replace him, but producer Anne Nichols said the fault lay with the character and insisted the part needed to be rewritten. Unable to agree on a solution, the play closed after one week in Washington, D.C., when Tearle became gravely ill.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1940, Ball appeared as the lead in the musical "Too Many Girls" where she met and fell in love with Desi Arnaz, who played one of her character's four bodyguards in the movie. Ball signed with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in the 1940s, but never achieved major stardom there. She was known in Hollywood circles as "Queen of the Bs" — a title previously held by Fay Wray and later more closely associated with Ida Lupino and Marie Windsor — starring in a number of B-movies like "Five Came Back" (1939).


title: Lucille Ball

text: Like many budding actresses, Ball picked up radio work to supplement her income and gain exposure. In 1937, she appeared regularly on "The Phil Baker Show". When its run ended in 1938, Ball joined the cast of "The Wonder Show" starring Jack Haley. There began her 50-year professional relationship with the show's announcer, Gale Gordon. "The Wonder Show" lasted one season, with the final episode airing on April 7, 1939.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1942 Lucy starred opposite Henry Fonda in "The Big Street". MGM producer Arthur Freed purchased the Broadway hit musical play "Du Barry Was a Lady" (1943) especially for Ann Sothern, but when she turned down the part, that role went to Ball, Sothern's real-life best friend. In 1943, Ball portrayed herself in "Best Foot Forward". In 1946, Ball starred in "Lover Come Back". In 1947, she appeared in the murder mystery "Lured" as Sandra Carpenter, a taxi dancer in London. In 1948, Ball was cast as Liz Cooper, a wacky wife in "My Favorite Husband", a radio comedy for CBS Radio. (At first, the character's name was Liz Cugat; this was changed because of confusion with real-life bandleader Xavier Cugat, who sued.)


title: Lucille Ball

text: "My Favorite Husband" was successful, and CBS asked her to develop it for television. She agreed, but insisted on working with her real-life husband, Cuban bandleader Desi Arnaz. CBS executives were reluctant, thinking the public would not accept an Anglo-American redhead and a Cuban as a couple. CBS was initially unimpressed with the pilot episode, produced by the couple's Desilu Productions company. The pair went on the road with a vaudeville act, in which Lucy played the zany housewife, wanting to get into Arnaz's show. Given the great success of the tour, CBS put "I Love Lucy" into their lineup.


title: Lucille Ball

text: "I Love Lucy" was not only a star vehicle for Lucille Ball, but also a potential means for her to salvage her marriage to Arnaz. Their relationship had become badly strained, in part because of their hectic performing schedules, which often kept them apart, but mostly due to Desi's attraction to other women.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Along the way, Ball created a television dynasty and achieved several firsts. She was the first woman to head a TV production company, Desilu, which she had formed with Arnaz. After their divorce in 1960, she bought out his share and became a very actively engaged studio head. Desilu and "I Love Lucy" pioneered a number of methods still in use in TV production today, such as filming before a live studio audience with more than one camera, and distinct sets, adjacent to each other. During this time, Ball taught a 32-week comedy workshop at the Brandeis-Bardin Institute. She was quoted as saying, "You cannot teach someone comedy; either they have it or they don't."


title: Lucille Ball

text: During the run of "I Love Lucy", Ball and Arnaz wanted to remain in their Los Angeles home, but time-zone logistics made that difficult. Since prime time in Los Angeles was too late to air a major network series live on the East Coast, filming in California would have meant giving most of the TV audience an inferior kinescope picture, delayed by at least a day.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Sponsor Philip Morris pressured the couple into relocating, not wanting day-old kinescopes airing in major East Coast markets, nor did they want to pay the extra cost that filming, processing, and editing would require. Instead, the couple offered to take a pay cut to finance filming, which Arnaz did on better-quality 35 mm film and on the condition that Desilu would retain the rights of each episode once it aired. CBS agreed to relinquish the post-first-broadcast rights to Desilu, not realizing they were giving up a valuable and enduring asset. In 1957, CBS bought back the rights for $1,000,000 ($ in today's terms), giving Ball and Arnaz's down payment for the purchase of the former RKO Pictures studios, which they turned into Desilu Studios.


title: Lucille Ball

text: "I Love Lucy" dominated U.S. ratings for most of its run. An attempt was made to adapt the show for radio using the "Breaking the Lease" episode (in which the Ricardos and Mertzes argue, and the Ricardos threaten to move, but find themselves stuck in a firm lease) as the pilot. The resulting radio audition disc has survived, but never aired.


title: Lucille Ball

text: A scene in which Lucy and Ricky practice the tango, in the episode "Lucy Does The Tango", evoked the longest recorded studio audience laugh in the history of the show — so long that the sound editor had to cut that section of the soundtrack in half. During the show's production breaks, Lucy and Desi starred together in two feature films: "The Long, Long Trailer" (1954) and "Forever, Darling" (1956). After "I Love Lucy" ended its run in 1957, the main cast continued to appear in occasional hour-long specials under the title "The Lucy–Desi Comedy Hour" until 1960.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Desilu produced several other popular shows, such as "The Untouchables", "", and "". Lucy sold her shares of the studio to Gulf+Western in 1967 for $17,000,000 ($ in today's dollars) and it was renamed Paramount Television.


title: Lucille Ball

text: The 1960 Broadway musical "Wildcat" ended its run early when producer and star Ball could not recover from a virus and continue the show after several weeks of returned ticket sales. The show was the source of the song she made famous, "Hey, Look Me Over", which she performed with Paula Stewart on "The Ed Sullivan Show". Ball hosted a CBS Radio talk show entitled "Let's Talk to Lucy" in 1964–65. She also made a few more movies including "Yours, Mine, and Ours" (1968), and the musical "Mame" (1974), and two more successful long-running sitcoms for CBS: "The Lucy Show" (1962–68), which costarred Vivian Vance and Gale Gordon, and "Here's Lucy" (1968–74), which also featured Gordon, as well as Lucy's real-life children, Lucie Arnaz and Desi Arnaz, Jr. She appeared on the Dick Cavett show in 1974 and discussed her work on "I Love Lucy", and reminisced about her family history, the friends she missed from show business, and how she learned to be happy while married. She also told a story about how she helped discover an underground Japanese radio signal after accidentally picking up the signal on the fillings in her teeth.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball's close friends in the business included perennial co-star Vivian Vance and film stars Judy Garland, Ann Sothern, and Ginger Rogers, and comedic television performers Jack Benny, Barbara Pepper, Ethel Merman, Mary Wickes, and Mary Jane Croft; all except Garland appeared at least once on her various series. Former Broadway co-stars Keith Andes and Paula Stewart also appeared at least once on her later sitcoms, as did Joan Blondell, Rich Little, and Ann-Margret. Ball mentored actress and singer Carole Cook, and befriended Barbara Eden, when Eden appeared on an episode of "I Love Lucy". Ball was originally considered by Frank Sinatra for the role of Mrs. Iselin in the Cold War thriller "The Manchurian Candidate". Director/producer John Frankenheimer, however, had worked with Angela Lansbury in a mother role in "All Fall Down", and insisted on having her for the part.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball was the lead actress in a number of comedy television specials to about 1980, including "Lucy Calls the President", which featured Vivian Vance, Gale Gordon, and Mary Jane Croft, and "Lucy Moves to NBC", a special depicting a fictionalization of her move to the NBC television network. In 1959, Ball became a friend and mentor to Carol Burnett. She guested on Burnett's highly successful CBS-TV special "Carol + 2" and the younger performer reciprocated by appearing on "The Lucy Show". Ball was rumored to have offered Burnett a chance to star on her own sitcom, but in truth, Burnett was offered (and declined) "Here's Agnes" by CBS executives. She instead chose to create her own variety show due to a stipulation that was on an existing contract she had with CBS. The two women remained close friends until Ball's death in 1989. Ball sent flowers every year on Burnett's birthday.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Aside from her acting career, she became an assistant professor at California State University, Northridge in 1979.


title: Lucille Ball

text: During the 1980s, Ball attempted to resurrect her television career. In 1982, she hosted a two-part "Three's Company" retrospective, showing clips from the show's first five seasons, summarizing memorable plotlines, and commenting on her love of the show.


title: Lucille Ball

text: After she and Desi Arnaz died in 1986 and 1989, respectively, Morton didn't know what to do with The Lucy Show. In 1983, both Lucille Ball and Gary Morton had partnered to set up a film and television production house at 20th Century Fox, that encompasses all film and television productions, and has plans to produce plays.


title: Lucille Ball

text: A 1985 dramatic made-for-TV film about an elderly homeless woman, "Stone Pillow", received mixed reviews, but had strong viewership. Her 1986 sitcom comeback "Life with Lucy", costarring her longtime foil Gale Gordon and co-produced by Ball, Gary Morton, and prolific producer Aaron Spelling, was cancelled less than two months into its run by ABC. In February 1988, Ball was named the Hasty Pudding Woman of the Year.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In May 1988, Ball was hospitalized after suffering a mild heart attack. Her last public appearance, just one month before her death, was at the 1989 Academy Awards telecast, in which fellow presenter Bob Hope and she were given a standing ovation.


title: Lucille Ball

text: When Ball registered to vote in 1936, she listed her party affiliation as Communist, as did her brother and mother.


title: Lucille Ball

text: To sponsor the Communist Party's 1936 candidate for the California State Assembly's 57th District, Ball signed a certificate stating, "I am registered as affiliated with the Communist Party." The same year, the Communist Party of California appointed her to the state's Central Committee, according to records of the Secretary of State of California. In 1937, Hollywood writer Rena Vale, a self-identified Communist, attended a class at an address identified to her as Ball's home according to her testimony given before the United States House of Representatives' Special House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), on July 22, 1940. Two years later, Vale affirmed this testimony in a sworn deposition:


title: Lucille Ball

text: In a 1944 Pathé News newsreel titled "Fund Raising for Roosevelt", Ball was featured prominently among several stage and film stars at events in support of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's fundraising campaign for the March of Dimes. She stated that in the 1952 United States presidential election, she voted for Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On September 4, 1953, Ball met voluntarily with HUAC investigator William A. Wheeler in Hollywood and gave him sealed testimony. She stated that she had registered to vote as a Communist "or intended to vote the Communist Party ticket" in 1936 at her socialist grandfather's insistence. She stated she "at no time intended to vote as a Communist". Her testimony was forwarded to J. Edgar Hoover in an FBI memorandum:


title: Lucille Ball

text: Immediately before the filming of episode 68 ("The Girls Go Into Business") of "I Love Lucy", Desi Arnaz, instead of his usual audience warm-up, told the audience about Lucy and her grandfather. Reusing the line he had first given to Hedda Hopper in an interview, he quipped:


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1940, Ball met Cuban-born bandleader Desi Arnaz while filming the Rodgers and Hart stage hit "Too Many Girls". They connected immediately, and eloped on November 30, 1940, two months after the film opened. Although Arnaz was drafted into the Army in 1942, he was classified for limited service due to a knee injury. He stayed in Los Angeles, organizing and performing USO shows for wounded G.I.s brought back from the Pacific.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball filed for divorce in 1944, obtaining an interlocutory decree; however, she and Arnaz reconciled, precluding the entry of a final decree.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On July 17, 1951, less than three weeks prior to her 40th birthday, Ball gave birth to daughter Lucie Désirée Arnaz. A year and a half later, she gave birth to Desiderio Alberto Arnaz IV, known as Desi Arnaz, Jr. Before he was born, "I Love Lucy" was a solid ratings hit, and Ball and Arnaz wrote the pregnancy into the show. Ball's necessary and planned caesarean section in real life was scheduled for the same date that her television character gave birth.


title: Lucille Ball

text: CBS insisted that a pregnant woman could not be shown on television, nor could the word "pregnant" be spoken on-air. After approval from several religious figures, the network allowed the pregnancy storyline, but insisted that the word "expecting" be used instead of "pregnant". (Arnaz garnered laughs when he deliberately mispronounced it as "spectin.) The episode's official title is "Lucy Is Enceinte", borrowing the French word for pregnant; however, episode titles never appeared on-screen.


title: Lucille Ball

text: The episode aired on the evening of January 19, 1953, with 44 million viewers watching Lucy Ricardo welcome little Ricky, while in real life Ball delivered her second child, Desi Jr., that same day in Los Angeles. The birth made the cover of the first issue of "TV Guide" for the week of April 3–9, 1953.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In October 1956, Ball, Arnaz, Vance, and William Frawley all appeared on a Bob Hope special on NBC, including a spoof of "I Love Lucy", the only time all four stars were together on a color telecast. By the end of the 1950s, Desilu had become a large company, causing a good deal of stress for both Ball and Arnaz.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On March 3, 1960, a day after Desi's 43rd birthday (and one day after filming the final episode of "The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour"), Ball filed papers in Santa Monica Superior Court, claiming married life with Desi was "a nightmare" and nothing at all as it appeared on "I Love Lucy". On May 4, 1960, they divorced; however, until his death in 1986, Arnaz and Ball remained friends and often spoke fondly of each other. Her real-life divorce indirectly found its way into her later television series, as she was always cast as an unmarried woman, each time a widow.


title: Lucille Ball

text: The following year, Ball starred in the Broadway musical "Wildcat", co-starring Keith Andes and Paula Stewart. It marked the beginning of a 30-year friendship with Stewart, who introduced Ball to second husband Gary Morton, a Borscht Belt comic 13 years her junior. Morton and Ball married on November 19, 1961. According to Ball, Morton claimed he had never seen an episode of "I Love Lucy" due to his hectic work schedule. She immediately installed Morton in her production company, teaching him the television business and eventually promoting him to producer; he also played occasional bit parts on her various series. They had homes in Beverly Hills and Palm Springs, California, and in Snowmass Village, Colorado.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball was outspokenly against the relationship her son had with actress Patty Duke. Later, commenting on when her son dated Liza Minnelli, she said, "I miss Liza, but you cannot domesticate Liza."


title: Lucille Ball

text: On April 18, 1989, Ball was admitted to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles after experiencing chest pains. She was diagnosed with a dissecting aortic aneurysm and underwent surgery to repair her aorta and a successful seven-hour aortic valve replacement.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Shortly after dawn on April 26, Ball awoke with severe back pain, then lost consciousness; she died at 5:47 a.m. PDT at the age of 77. Doctors determined that Ball had succumbed to a ruptured abdominal aortic aneurysm not directly related to her surgery. A greater incidence of aortic aneurysms is seen in cigarette smokers and Ball had been a heavy smoker most of her life.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Three memorial services were held for Ball. She was cremated and the ashes were initially interred in Forest Lawn – Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles, where her mother was also buried. In 2002, Ball's and her mother's remains were re-interred at the Hunt family plot at Lake View Cemetery in Jamestown, NY, in accordance with Ball's wishes to be buried near her mother. Her brother's remains were also interred there in 2007.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball received many tributes, honors, and awards throughout her career and posthumously. On February 8, 1960, she was given two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame: at 6436 Hollywood Boulevard, for contributions to motion pictures; and at 6100 Hollywood Boulevard, for her contribution to the arts and sciences of television. In 1964, Ball and her second husband Morton attended "Lucy Day", a celebration in her honor held by the New York World's Fair.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Acting on advice given to her by Norman Vincent Peale in the early 1960s, Ball collaborated with Betty Hannah Hoffman on an autobiography that covered her life until 1964. Her former attorney found the manuscript, postmarked 1966, while going through old files. He sent it and the tapes of interviews, conducted by Hoffman and used to write the manuscript, to Lucie Jr. and Desi Jr, who had been put in charge of Ball's estate. It was subsequently published by Berkley Publishing Group in 1997. The book was released on audio through Audible on July 9, 2018, read by her daughter.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 1976, CBS paid tribute to Ball with the two-hour special "CBS Salutes Lucy: The First 25 Years." Both Ball and Arnaz appeared on the screen for the special, which is the first time they appeared together in 16 years since their divorce.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On December 7, 1986, Ball was recognized as a Kennedy Center Honors recipient. The part of the event focused on Ball was particularly poignant, as Desi Arnaz, who was to introduce Lucy at the event, had died from cancer just five days earlier. Friend and former Desilu star Robert Stack delivered the emotional introduction in Arnaz's place.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Posthumously, Ball received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George H. W. Bush on July 6, 1989, and The Women's International Center's Living Legacy Award.


title: Lucille Ball

text: The Lucille Ball Desi Arnaz Museum & Center for Comedy is in Ball's hometown of Jamestown, New York. The Little Theatre was renamed the Lucille Ball Little Theatre in her honor. The street she was born on was renamed Lucy Street.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On June 7, 1990, Universal Studios Florida opened a walk-through attraction dedicated to Ball, "Lucy – A Tribute." It featured clips of shows, facts about her life, displays of items she owned or that were associated with her, and an interactive quiz. It remained open until August 17, 2015.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On August 6, 2001, the United States Postal Service honored what would have been Ball's 90th birthday with a commemorative stamp as part of its Legends of Hollywood series.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball appeared on 39 covers of "TV Guide," more than any other person, including its first cover in 1953 with her baby son, Desi Arnaz Jr. "TV Guide" voted her the "Greatest TV Star of All Time", and later commemorated the 50th anniversary of "I Love Lucy" with eight covers celebrating memorable scenes from the show. In 2008, it named "I Love Lucy" the second-best television program in American history, after "Seinfeld".


title: Lucille Ball

text: For her contributions to the Women's Movement, Ball was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in 2001.


title: Lucille Ball

text: The Friars Club named a room in its New York clubhouse the Lucille Ball Room. She was posthumously awarded the Legacy of Laughter Award at the fifth Annual TV Land Awards in 2007. In November 2007, she was chosen as number two on a list of the 50 Greatest TV Icons; however, a public poll chose her as number one.


title: Lucille Ball

text: On August 6, 2011, Google's homepage showed an interactive doodle of six classic moments from "I Love Lucy" to commemorate what would have been Ball's 100th birthday. On the same day, 915 Ball look-alikes converged on Jamestown to celebrate the birthday and set a new world record for such a gathering.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Since 2009, a statue of Ball has been on display in Celoron, New York, that residents deemed "scary" and not accurate, earning it the nickname "Scary Lucy". On August 1, 2016, it was announced that a new statue of Ball would replace it on August 6. However, the old statue had become a local tourist attraction after receiving media attention, and it was placed from its original location so visitors could view both statues.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Rachel York and Madeline Zima portrayed Ball in a biographical television film titled "Lucy" which was directed by Glenn Jordan and originally broadcast on CBS on May 4, 2003.


title: Lucille Ball

text: In 2015, it was announced that Ball would be played by Cate Blanchett in an untitled biographical film, to be written and directed by Aaron Sorkin. Subsequently, Nicole Kidman was hired to portray Ball when Sorkin's film entitled "Being the Ricardos" was produced in 2021. On February 8, 2022, Nicole Kidman received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of Ball. Kidman also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama for her performance.


title: Lucille Ball

text: A 2017 episode of "Will & Grace" paid homage to Ball by replicating the 1963 shower scene from the episode “Lucy and Viv Put in a Shower" from "The Lucy Show". Three years later, an entire episode was dedicated to her by recreating four scenes from "I Love Lucy".


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball's character Lucy Ricardo was portrayed by Gillian Anderson in the "American Gods" episode "The Secret of Spoons" (2017).


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball was portrayed by Sarah Drew in the play "I Love Lucy: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Sitcom", a comedy about how Ball and her husband battled to get their sitcom on the air. It premiered in Los Angeles on July 12, 2018, co-starring Oscar Nuñez as Desi Arnaz, and Seamus Dever as "I Love Lucy" producer-head writer Jess Oppenheimer. The play was written by Oppenheimer's son, Gregg Oppenheimer. BBC Radio 4 broadcast a serialized version of the play in the UK in August 2020, as "LUCY LOVES DESI: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Sitcom," starring Anne Heche as Ball.


title: Lucille Ball

text: Ball was a well-known gay-rights supporter, stating in a 1980 interview with "People": "It's perfectly all right with me. Some of the most gifted people I've ever met or read about are homosexual. How can you knock it?"


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha Ruth Prabhu (formerly: Samantha Akkineni; born 28 April 1987) is an Indian actress who mainly works in Telugu and Tamil film industries. She is a recipient of several awards, including four South Filmfare Awards, six South Indian International Movie Awards and two Andhra Pradesh State Nandi Awards. She has established herself as one of the leading actresses in Telugu and Tamil cinema.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha worked part-time on modeling assignments while pursuing a degree in commerce. She soon received offers for film roles and made her acting debut in Gautham Vasudev Menon's critically acclaimed Telugu romance film, "Ye Maaya Chesave" (2010), which fetched her the Filmfare Award for Best Debut Actress and a Nandi Award. Samantha then became the second actress ever to win both the Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Tamil and the Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Telugu in the same year, for her performances in the films "Neethaane En Ponvasantham" (2012) and "Eega" (2012). Since then, she has primarily opted to appear in the leading female role in hero-centric Telugu and Tamil films, earning box office success with films including "Dookudu" (2011), the family dramas "Seethamma Vakitlo Sirimalle Chettu" (2012) and "Attarintiki Daredi" (2013) and AR Murugadoss's Tamil action film, "Kaththi" (2014). Her work in the film "A Aa" (2016) also won positive reviews and won Samantha her fourth Filmfare Award, while her next films "Theri" (2016), "24" (2016), "Mersal" (2017), "Rangasthalam" (2018), and "Mahanati" (2018) also were commercially successful. She won further critical acclaim for her roles in 2019 releases, "Super Deluxe", "Majili", "Oh! Baby" and for her only 2020 film, "Jaanu".


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: She is the founder of Pratyusha Support and Saaki World. Samantha married actor Naga Chaitanya in 2017, who announced their separation in October 2021.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha was born on 28 April 1987 to a Telugu father, Joseph Prabhu and a Malayali mother, Ninette Prabhu from Alappuzha, Kerala. She was brought up in Pallavaram in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, as the youngest child of the family, with two elder brothers Jonathan and David, whilst becoming fluent in the Tamil language. Despite her mixed background, she has cited herself as a Tamilian. As a part of her education, Samantha was schooled at Holy Angels Anglo Indian Higher Secondary School and then completed a degree in commerce at Stella Maris College, Chennai. Towards the end of her undergraduate degree she became involved in modelling, notably working with Naidu Hall, through which she was first spotted by filmmaker Ravi Varman.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha began her professional film career with Gautham Vasudev Menon's Telugu film, "Ye Maaya Chesave" (2010). The film, simultaneously made in Tamil as "Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa" (2010), created much anticipation prior to release, due primarily to the first-time-collaboration between Gautham Menon and composer A. R. Rahman. The actress successfully auditioned and was signed up for the project in mid August 2009 and worked on the film in India and the United States, while the film was released on 26 February 2010. Post-release, she revealed that Menon played a "crucial part in moulding her as an actress", teaching her how to remain natural and comfortable in front of the screen, even if she had no dialogues in a scene. In the film, Samantha played the lead character "Jessie", a Malayali Saint Thomas Christian girl living in Hyderabad, with whom the male protagonist, played by Naga Chaitanya, falls in love. Upon release of the film, Samantha received very positive reviews for her portrayal, with the film itself garnering much critical acclaim. Critics at Sify praised Samantha as a "scene-stealer" and her beauty as "alluring", adding, "she was the girl to watch out for." Jeevi from Idlebrain.com, wrote that "Samantha's debut is one of the best heroine debuts in Telugu cinema" and noted that the "minute expressions she gave spoke volumes about her", whilst labelling the film as a "classic". "Ye Maaya Chesave" fetched her the Filmfare Award for Best Debut Actress and a Nandi Award. Samantha appeared in a cameo role in the Tamil version of the film, portraying an assistant director who becomes an actress. Both the Telugu and the Tamil versions of the films proved to be grand successes, propelling Samantha to sign on for bigger projects. She followed up her collaborations with Gautham Menon and A. R. Rahman by appearing in the music video for the World Classical Tamil Conference 2010 promotional song, "Semmozhiyaana Thamizh Mozhiyaam", which Menon directed and Rahman composed.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha's next release was the romantic drama, "Baana Kaathadi" (2010), opposite Adharvaa. The film was actually the third Tamil project signed by the actress, but its release preceded the first two that she was contracted for due to delays in their completion. Samantha portrayed a student of the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT), the first such role in Tamil cinema. Her next release was Ravi Varman's "Moscowin Kavery" (2010), originally the first film she began work on. The shooting for the film began in August 2007, with Samantha, then briefly credited with the screen name Yasodha, joining the team later in the year. In an interview held in 2008, Ravi Varman mentioned that he had decided that Samantha would be the lead actress for his film within three minutes after viewing one of her commercial assignments. He went on to describe her as an actress with "intelligence" and "potential", whilst drawing comparisons with the noted actress, Revathi. However, due to Ravi Varman's prior commitments as cinematographer in other projects, the film languished in development hell, eventually releasing in August 2010. The film earned poor reviews from critics, though Samantha's performance was credited as one of the sole highlights that the film offered. In August 2008, while still completing her last three projects, Samantha also signed up to play the lead role of a modern girl in the Narain starrer, "Pookada Ravi", which was later shelved. Samantha then went on to feature in Vamsi Paidipally's Telugu film "Brindaavanam" (2010) in which she had a supporting role alongside NTR Jr and Kajal Aggarwal. Her performance as Indu was well received despite the role having a shorter screen time than the ones she had played in her previous films, and the film became her second successful venture in Telugu.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha featured in the big budget Telugu film, "Dookudu" (2012) alongside Mahesh Babu, which became one of the most successful Telugu films of all time. The film won positive reviews, while a critic from "The Times of India" said "Samantha looks beautiful and has done a great job, though her role as Prashanthi isn't too lengthy." She also subsequently made guest appearances in two of Gautham Vasudev Menon's films, first in the psychological thriller film, "Nadunisi Naaygal" (2011) as a mental asylum inmate and then repeated her role from "Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa" in the Hindi version of the film, "Ekk Deewana Tha" (2012). Her popularity in Telugu films meant that "Nadunisi Naaygal" was dubbed and released in Telugu as "Eera Gulabeelu", with Samantha featured prominently on the film's posters, despite only having a guest appearance. During the period, Samantha had also been signed on two feature in two big budget projects in Tamil, Mani Ratnam's "Kadal" (2013) and Shankar's "I" (2015) but was forced to opt out from both films, since she was suffering from a skin disease and could not work for two months during mid 2012.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha next featured in S. S. Rajamouli's live action Telugu-Tamil bilingual project "Eega" (2012) alongside Nani and Sudeep, portraying a micro artist who runs a NGO and takes revenge for the murder of her lover. As the film featured a CGI-created housefly as the main character, Samantha noted that she had to use her imagination and act accordingly. She also revealed that many heavy lights were used for the shoot of the film and she subsequently suffered skin burns, calling the process "very stressful" but "satisfying". Titled "Naan Ee" (2012) in Tamil, the film opened to highly positive reviews and Samantha also won acclaim for her performance. A critic from "The Hindu" noted "Samantha blooms in the role given to her," while Jeevi of Idlebrain.com wrote her "run of success continues as she did extremely well as a bereaved lover". Sify.com also praised her performance in the film, citing her "subtle expressions of love, fear and anxiety work well for the film" and that she "looks beautiful and has done her role with consummate ease". The film went on to become a large commercial success, grossing more than 1.25 billion, and went on to be dubbed in several foreign and Indian languages.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha then worked on Gautham Vasudev Menon's a trilingual romantic drama film and played the leading female role of Nithya in the Tamil, Telugu, and Hindi versions of the film, shooting scenes simultaneously back-to-back with three different actors. The Tamil version, "Neethaane En Ponvasantham" (2012) featured her alongside Jiiva, while "Yeto Vellipoyindhi Manasu" (2012) paired her opposite Nani. A further Hindi version titled "Assi Nabbe Poorey Sau" with Aditya Roy Kapoor was simultaneously shot with the other two films and was "sixty percent" completed, before Menon shelved the venture after his other Hindi film, "Ekk Deewana Tha", had failed at the box office. The film spanned three periods in the life of a couple, focusing on their romantic relationship at school, college and in their late twenties. Samantha revealed that she knew Gautham would want to work with her again and immediately accepted the opportunity to portray the roles when she was offered the film. She felt that she "could relate to the attributes and the circumstances the character goes through" and described Nithya's character as "close to her." To make her performance as authentic as possible, Samantha chose to dub for herself in the Tamil version of the film. The Tamil and Telugu versions of the film opened in December 2012, earning differing reactions. "Neethane En Ponvasantham" earned mixed reviews and performed averagely at the box office, though Samantha received highly positive acclaim for her portrayal. The critic from "The Hindu" noted she "comes up with possibly the best performance by a female lead in Tamil cinema this year" and "her transformation from a gawky teenager to an adult, unable to overcome her ego, is outstanding". Meanwhile, IBN stated "Samantha's transformation from a school kid to an adult is a treat to watch," while Rediff.com noted she is "pretty, graceful, and does an excellent job of conveying the emotions of a girl in love, especially during the school sequence, while concluding she carries the film on her slender shoulders." The Telugu version, "Yeto Vellipoyindhi Manasu", won positive reviews and did well commercially, while Samantha's performance was equally well appreciated. "The Hindu" wrote she "goes a step further from her famous portrayal of Jessy ("Ye Maaya Chesaave") and brings out the intricacy of her character well", while "The Times of India" wrote "Samantha has the author backed role and she creams it." At the Filmfare Awards ceremony celebrating South Indian films of 2012, the actress subsequently won the Best Actress awards for both the Tamil and Telugu film industries for her performances in "Neethane En Ponvasantham" and "Eega". Samantha became the second-ever actress to achieve the feat after Revathi had secured both awards in 1992. 2012 became her most prolific award-winning year and she secured further recognition for Best Actress at the Vijay Awards, Santosham Film Awards and the CineMAA Awards.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Although Samantha often portrayed strong character roles in her early films, post-2012, she has appeared increasingly in big-budget, hero-oriented films, which have comparatively smaller scope for actresses. Samantha next appeared in the Telugu multi-starrer film, "Seethamma Vakitlo Sirimalle Chettu" (2013) alongside Venkatesh and Mahesh Babu, which won positive reviews and was commercially successful. Though her role was comparatively minuscule to her co-stars, "IBN Live" noted it was "good to see Samantha shed her glamorous side and welcome performance-oriented roles, which she only handles with deftness and ease". The romantic comedy "Jabardasth" (2013) alongside Siddharth, in which she portrayed a wedding planner, became a commercial failure, though critics noted Samantha is "getting better by the day and it's a delight to watch her on screen". Samantha then starred alongside Pawan Kalyan in the family drama, "Attarintiki Daredi" (2013), which emerged as the highest-grossing Telugu film upon release. A critic from Rediff.com noted Samantha "exudes confidence even though she has limited screen time and nothing much to do", and her performance saw her win Best Actress recognition at the SIIMA Awards and the Santosham Film Awards. Her final release of 2013 was in the unsuccessful Telugu masala film "Ramayya Vasthavayya", where she had a small role, with a critic noting "we have seen Samantha in better roles and better films."


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: The year 2014 saw Samantha appear in six films and make a return to the Tamil film industry. Her first release saw Samantha portray a dual role in the family drama film "Manam" (2014), where she featured alongside several members of the Akkineni film family. Featuring as a young mother and a college student in two different time eras, Samantha received positive reviews for her work, with the critic from Sify saying "she excels" and "The Hindu"s reviewer noting that she "emotes well and easily shifts between the roles." Her performance fetched Samantha a nomination for Best Actress from the Filmfare Awards, while she won Critics' Best Actress at the SIIMA Awards. Samantha subsequently featured alongside Naga Chaitanya again in the long-delayed "Autonagar Surya" (2014), before playing different minuscule roles in the Telugu action masala films "Alludu Seenu" (2014) and "Rabhasa" (2014). Critics lamented that she "signed up to be a glam doll" for the ventures. She has "previously shown us she is capable of doing much more, but of late, seems to be stuck with doing similar roles that require her to be an attractive prop." Samantha later revealed that she solely worked on "Alludu Seenu" as a favor to producer Bellamkonda Suresh, who had helped her delay the making of "Jabardasth" during her health problems.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha worked simultaneously on two big budget Tamil films during early 2014, working with industry-leading actors and directors. N. Lingusamy's gangster masala film "Anjaan" (2014) opposite Suriya, received negative reviews and performed poorly at the box office. Portraying a small role, critics panned her character in the film, stating Samantha "gamely performs the requisite crazy girl duties". Her other release, AR Murugadoss's action drama "Kaththi" (2014) opposite Vijay won predominantly positive reviews and became the most profitable Tamil film of 2014. Again, reviewers criticised her character stating "all she had to do in the film is smile and look pretty," while "The Hindu" remarked she played "an emoticon" and "that covers her contribution to the proceedings". She subsequently featured in the Telugu film "S/O Satyamurthy" with Allu Arjun, as a part of another hero-orientated film, though critics noted she "enacts her part with grace" and that she "plays her role well".


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: She then featured in her second dual role as a part of Vijay Milton's road film, "10 Endrathukulla" (2015), where she appeared alongside Vikram. Like "Anjaan" and "Kaththi", critics lamented her role as a clumsy girl, with Sify.com stating "beyond a point Samantha's character is plainly annoying". She sported a different rural look for a particular role and her performance won mixed reviews, with a critic noting "Samantha doesn't make much of an impact in the film except towards the end." Samantha subsequently won positive reviews for her role and performance in Velraj's "Thanga Magan", where she featured opposite Dhanush. Portraying a homely role of a wife for the first time in Tamil films, the actress noted it would be the first of many such performance-orientated roles, as she looked to move away from being typecast in charming characters. A critic from Sify.com labelled her performance as "impressive", while DNA.com stated Samantha "has given a very subdued and mature performance sans drama". Likewise, a reviewer from Silverscreen, suggested that she "delivers a performance that stands head and shoulders above her work in previous films".


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha's first release of 2016 was in the Tamil romantic drama film "Bangalore Naatkal", where she made a guest appearance and reprised Nithya Menen's small role from the film's Malayalam original. She then portrayed the lead female role in Atlee's "Theri", and featured alongside Vijay for the second time in her career. Her performance received positive reviews, with a critic from DNA India stating "Samantha looks pretty as always" and that "she has done an incredible job in dubbing with a range of emotions in her numerous shades – doctor, lover, mother – and she shines". Likewise, Behindwoods.com stated that "Theri" "could be one of Samantha's best roles; she plays a doctor and has given out a soulful performance". The film went on to become of the most profitable Tamil films of all time, upon release, and ended a barren spell for the actress in Tamil cinema, by becoming her first commercially successful film in Tamil cinema since "Kaththi" (2014). Samantha then worked for a second time with director Vikram Kumar and Suriya in the critically acclaimed, fantasy film "24". Featuring as the love interest of the film's lead character, Samantha won praise from critics for her small role in the film, with Sify.com stating that the actress "does well in the comedy scenes." The film also performed well at the box office, with The Hindu stating she was "at the top of the film industry," following her back-to-back commercial successes.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha also featured in three high-profile Telugu films during 2016; Although Srikanth Addala's family drama "Brahmotsavam" opposite Mahesh Babu was a box office failure, her role in Trivikram Srinivas's romantic comedy, "A Aa" alongside Nithiin, won her critical and commercial acclaim. Portraying Anasuya Ramalingam, a naive girl trying to escape from her mother's controlling behavior, Samantha received positive reviews for her character portrayal. A critic from The New Indian Express noted ""A Aa" undoubtedly is Samantha's film" and that "right from her first frame till the last, she delivers a stellar performance and shows what she can do if given ample screen time", adding that she was "a joy to watch". Likewise, a reviewer from The Hindu noted "Samantha, after a long time, gets enough screen time and scope to shine", stating "she's vulnerable as a 23-year-old reeling in her mother's shadow and can also play the high maintenance, stubborn girl with ease", while concluding "this is a role she can be proud of". Similarly Bollywoodlife.com noted her "earnest performance was the life and soul of the romantic comedy", while DNA India's critic cited that "Samantha and Nithiin's performances in this movie will be what people would rave about for days to come". The film also performed well at the box office, doing excellent business for a Telugu film released in the United States. Her performance fetched her several awards, including the Filmfare Award for Best Actress – Telugu at the Filmfare Awards, her fourth such recognition. She then featured in the commercially successful action film "Janatha Garage" directed by Koratala Siva, with a critic noting despite "a limited role, she gives a nice performance". She then portrayed the lead female role in Atlee's "Mersal", and featured alongside Vijay for the third time in her career and her performance received positive reviews and the movie became one of the highest grossing Tamil films of 2017 and was a blockbuster. "Mersal" went on to join the 200 crore club.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: In 2018, she had a successful venture with "Rangasthalam" which went on to be the all-time Telugu Blockbuster only behind "" and "". The Tamil film "Irumbu Thirai" in which she starred opposite Vishal and the Telugu film "Mahanati" were successful at the box-office and each had a run of 100 days at the box office. Her performances in Rangasthalam and Mahanati were highly praised. Mridula R from "The News Minute" noted her critically acclaimed film "U Turn" as a curiosity generating script that provides her the ultimate screen presence since the story begins with her and she finds it ends, rather that not being shaking a leg in "Anjaan", "Brindavanam", "Kaththi", "Attarintiki Daredi" or being glam doll or having out of scope performances overshadowed in "Dookudu", "S/O Satyamurthy", "Brahmotsavam", "Theri" and "Mersal".


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: After acting in her first women-centric film "U Turn", she is next starred in another women-centric film "Oh! Baby" released on 5 July 2019. The film is the remake of the 2014 South Korean film "Miss Granny". It collected a gross collection of ₹40 crores. A critic cited her performance as the career best. Manoj Kumar R of "The Indian Express" felt that Samantha's thrives in the role that reflects the possibilities of youth, the burden of old age, and the society's indifference to the desires and complaints of old people." She is next seen in another successful film "Majili". This marks Chaitanya and Samantha's fourth collaboration after "Ye Maaya Chesave", "Manam", and "Autonagar Surya" and their first collaboration after their marriage. Her character was quoted as one of the strong ones of 2019 films. She received awards for her performance in the two films. Samantha next played the character Janaki Devi in the 2020 film "Jaanu", which is a remake of 2018 Tamil film "'96". The film received decent reviews with her performance too receiving good response. In 2021, she performed her first dance number in the film, "" alongside Allu Arjun in the song "Oo Antava Oo Oo Antava". Her first release of 2022 "Kaathuvaakula Rendu Kaadhal" received mixed reviews. Directed by Vignesh Shivan, she played the role Khatija alongside Nayanthara and Vijay Sethupathi.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha has a signed a mythological film in 2020 titled "Shaakuntalam", directed by Gunasekhar, where she will be seen as Shakuntala. In November 2021, she was cast in "Chennai Story" directed by Philip John and produced by Guru Films, marking her international debut. She signed a film with debutant director, Shantaruban, produced by Dream Warrior Pictures. She also has a pan-India film, "Yashoda", produced by Sridevi Movies, which started filming on 6 December 2021. On 21 April 2022, she announced her film with Vijay Deverakonda and with director Shiva Nirvana, "Kushi", marking her second collaboration with both of them. The film was launched in Hyderabad and is set in a Kashmir backdrop.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha made her television debut in 2020 by hosting an episode Telugu-language reality television series "Bigg Boss 4" as part of a special episode. She received praise for her work in the series. Later, in the same year she once again hosted a talk show "Sam Jam" that streamed on Aha.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: In 2021, Samantha starred in the second season of Amazon Prime Video's Hindi spy thriller streaming television series "The Family Man", marking her debut in the digital content medium. She played the role of the main antagonist Raji, a rebel leader from the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha suffered from an extended period of illness in 2012, which saw her having to opt out of big film projects and take a two-month break from acting. She suffered from an immunity disorder and then had a further setback after her body did not respond well to antibiotics. She began dating actor Naga Chaitanya in 2010 after appearing in the film "Ye Maaya Chesave". The pair were engaged in a ceremony in Hyderabad on 29 January 2017. She got married in Goa as per traditional Hindu customs on 6 October 2017 and then by Christian customs on 7 October 2017, and became a member of the Akkineni family. She then started using her married name, Samantha Akkineni. On 31 July 2021, she removed her surname "Akkineni" from her social media handles which led to speculations of her separation with Naga Chaitanya. Later, on 2 October 2021, they announced their separation and eventual divorce.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: After June 2022, Samantha was suddenly inactive on social media which sparked several rumours about her health and there were rumours of her suffering from a relapse of a rare skin disorder. However, her team dismissed all rumours. On 29 October 2022, she announced that she was diagnosed with the autoimmune disease Myositis.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha has actively been involved in philanthropic activities and donates her earnings from endorsements, product launches, and inauguration events to her charitable trust, Pratyusha Support, registered in 2012. She chose to begin the non-governmental organisation after being bed-ridden for 15 days during her documented illness in 2012, and wanted to give back to society. Samantha subsequently started the Pratyusha Support foundation to provide medical support for women and children with the help of three doctor friends. She provided full financial support for the program. She held a fundraiser in August 2013 to raise awareness of her foundation, auctioning several of her items and memorabilia from films. A further initiative in 2014 saw the launch of a program to fulfill the wishes of children with life-threatening diseases; Samantha financed trips for children to fly on an airplane and travel to the Taj Mahal, and organized opportunities for children to meet their favorite film actors. Samantha has also been involved in spreading awareness of haemophilia, regularly taking part in events creating awareness of the disease.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha agreed in January 2015 to pay a third of the hospital bills of one infant per week who required intensive care support at Andhra Hospitals through her charitable trust. Under the arrangement, Samantha agreed to contribute towards a third of the bills, while Andhra Hospitals would also pay a third of the bill, and the parents would pay the remaining third. In November 2015, Samantha entered into a further agreement with Andhra Hospitals to sponsor vaccination of all infants below six months for rotaviral infections free of cost. Later in the month, the actress took part in an organ donation pledge at Madhapur. During the 2015 Chennai floods, Samantha was situated in Hyderabad for the shoot of a film and helped mobilize the Mana Madras Kosam initiative organized by the Telugu film industry. Through the initiative, she participated in gathering relief materials at Ramanaidu Studios. She appealed to the Telugu-speaking public to help gather resources to send to Chennai. She later donated 30 lakh rupees for flood relief activities to take place in Pallavaram, the suburb in which the actress grew up. Samantha stood up for the cause of Handloom people of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh states by wearing them and making photoshoots for handloom made sarees and other items. Samantha also launched a business venture 'Tweave' in partnership with the Telangana Government, which was a program to promote the handloom sector in Telangana.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: The success of "Ye Maaya Chesave" (2010) and subsequent back-to-back successes prompted Rediff.com to label her "the most sought after actress in the Telugu film industry" during 2014. Her initial choice of films depicted her as an actress who actively selects to feature in strong female roles, with Times of India noting that "scripts are written around the characters she portrays" and that she held a place in the "wishlist of every top actor, director and producer". Her inclusion in Telugu film projects were also initially considered a "lucky charm" by producers, though Samantha acknowledged that though "destiny" played a role in her career, and that there were "many women out there who are more beautiful and more talented" than she was and that she hoped her name would instead be "synonymous with hard work". Samantha also stated that she was willing to forgo her salary demands to appear in good films, revealing that she worked on Gautham Vasudev Menon's films for lower rates and that she had rejected more lucrative offers to feature in S. S. Rajamouli's "Eega" (2012).


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: After portraying strong characters in her first few films, Samantha featured in increasingly hero-centric films in the mid-2010s. When questioned on her decision not to take up more heroine-orientated roles, Samantha lamented the lack of chances that the South Indian film industry presents for established female characters and described it as "simply male-dominated". She added that the market meant she was not going to "get roles similar to her characters in "Ye Maaya Chesave" or "Eega" every time" and accepted stories if it had "the potential to engage viewers". Talking about her glamorous role in her comeback Tamil film, "Anjaan" (2014), Samantha stated that she made a "thoughtful call" as "it was important to do these kind of films to get exposure into the market," and that regrettably "mass films" were "where the main audience" was in South Indian cinema. She also added that she did not want to be "typecast as the girl-next-door" and was keen to prove critics wrong, who said that she could not fit into glamorous roles. In an interview in 2015, Samantha suggested that she was unhappy with her work during the previous year and would no longer do any more films where she would be "required to do five songs and the scenes leading up to the songs" and made a promise to herself that "if she were not going to get good roles," she would quit acting.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Being able to speak both Tamil and Telugu, Samantha has often been cast in bilingual films and has juggled her commitments between the Tamil and Telugu film industries. Even though she had a brief foray into Hindi cinema with the shelved "Assi Nabbe Poorey Sau", Samantha has distanced herself from working on Hindi language films, stating that she has no incentive to move to Bollywood unlike actresses of North Indian origin and that audiences from South India would relate to her appearance more. Her popularity has led to the actress representing several brands on a pan-Indian scale. She has often been cast opposite the same actors more than once, featuring in two or more films with Vijay, Suriya, Naga Chaitanya, Nani, Mahesh Babu and N. T. Rama Rao Jr., a feat Samantha revealed she takes "pride in". The actress has also regularly appreciated work by her contemporaries, and has in particular praised performances by Anushka Shetty, Nithya Menen and Sai Pallavi.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha has got involved in a few controversies due to voicing her opinions through Twitter. Following the release of a promotional poster for the Telugu film, "" (2014) in December 2013, Samantha criticized the depiction of actress Kriti Sanon crawling behind actor Mahesh Babu on the beach, who looks back at Kriti disapprovingly. Samantha tweeted that the poster was "deeply regressive" and stated that the makers were offensive to depict women like animals. The tweet received an adversely storming response from Mahesh Babu's fans, who launched a scathing attack on her online and targeted abuse at the actress. Her opinions were later backed by actor Siddharth and directors Sekhar Kammula and Nandini Reddy, who also resultantly faced similar abuse, before Mahesh Babu apologised. Through her tweets, she was also criticised for revealing actor Akhil's presence in "Manam" (2014) and retweeting a pirated image from her film "10 Endrathukulla" (2015). Her family home in Chennai was raided in late September 2015 by income tax officials, in a planned operation targeting film actors, though the actress and her father denied making any wrongful payments. In 2017, she was appointed as the ambassador for Telangana Handlooms by the government of Telangana and currently works to promote handloom textiles in the state of Telangana.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: She had a ranking of 17th and 34th in The Times Most Desirable Women in 2019 and 2020 respectively. In March 2022, according to a report by "The Times of India", Samantha became the second highest-paid South Indian actress after Nayanthara.


title: Samantha Ruth Prabhu

text: Samantha is the recipient of several awards, including four Filmfare Awards South, one Filmfare OTT Award, two Andhra Pradesh State Nandi Awards, four South Indian International Movie Awards, and three CineMAA Awards.


title: Venezuela

text: Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in the Caribbean Sea. It has a territorial extension of , and its population was estimated at 29 million in 2022. The capital and largest urban agglomeration is the city of Caracas.


title: Venezuela

text: The continental territory is bordered on the north by the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Colombia, Brazil on the south, Trinidad and Tobago to the north-east and on the east by Guyana. The Venezuelan government maintains a claim against Guyana to Guayana Esequiba. Venezuela is a federal presidential republic consisting of 23 states, the Capital District and federal dependencies covering Venezuela's offshore islands. Venezuela is among the most urbanized countries in Latin America; the vast majority of Venezuelans live in the cities of the north and in the capital.


title: Venezuela

text: The territory of Venezuela was colonized by Spain in 1522 amid resistance from indigenous peoples. In 1811, it became one of the first Spanish-American territories to declare independence from the Spanish and to form part, as a department, of the first federal Republic of Colombia (historiographically known as Gran Colombia). It separated as a full sovereign country in 1830. During the 19th century, Venezuela suffered political turmoil and autocracy, remaining dominated by regional military dictators until the mid-20th century. Since 1958, the country has had a series of democratic governments, as an exception where most of the region was ruled by military dictatorships, and the period was characterized by economic prosperity. Economic shocks in the 1980s and 1990s led to major political crises and widespread social unrest, including the deadly Caracazo riots of 1989, two attempted coups in 1992, and the impeachment of a President for embezzlement of public funds charges in 1993. The collapse in confidence in the existing parties saw the 1998 Venezuelan presidential election, the catalyst for the Bolivarian Revolution, which began with a 1999 Constituent Assembly, where a new Constitution of Venezuela was imposed. The government's populist social welfare policies were bolstered by soaring oil prices, temporarily increasing social spending, and reducing economic inequality and poverty in the early years of the regime. However, poverty began to increase in the 2010s. The 2013 Venezuelan presidential election was widely disputed leading to widespread protest, which triggered another nationwide crisis that continues to this day. Venezuela has experienced democratic backsliding, shifting into an authoritarian state. It ranks low in international measurements of freedom of the press and civil liberties and has high levels of perceived corruption.


title: Venezuela

text: Venezuela is a developing country and ranks 113th on the Human Development Index. It has the world's largest known oil reserves and has been one of the world's leading exporters of oil. Previously, the country was an underdeveloped exporter of agricultural commodities such as coffee and cocoa, but oil quickly came to dominate exports and government revenues. The excesses and poor policies of the incumbent government led to the collapse of Venezuela's entire economy. The country struggles with record hyperinflation, shortages of basic goods, unemployment, poverty, disease, high child mortality, malnutrition, severe crime and corruption. These factors have precipitated the Venezuelan migrant crisis where more than three million people have fled the country. By 2017, Venezuela was declared to be in default regarding debt payments by credit rating agencies. The crisis in Venezuela has contributed to a rapidly deteriorating human rights situation, including increased abuses such as torture, arbitrary imprisonment, extrajudicial killings and attacks on human rights advocates. Venezuela is a charter member of the UN, Organization of American States (OAS), Union of South American Nations (UNASUR), ALBA, Mercosur, Latin American Integration Association (LAIA) and Organization of Ibero-American States (OEI).


title: Venezuela

text: According to the most popular and accepted version, in 1499, an expedition led by Alonso de Ojeda visited the Venezuelan coast. The stilt houses in the area of Lake Maracaibo reminded the Italian navigator, Amerigo Vespucci, of the city of Venice, Italy, so he named the region "Veneziola", or "Little Venice". The Spanish version of "Veneziola" is "Venezuela".


title: Venezuela

text: Martín Fernández de Enciso, a member of the Vespucci and Ojeda crew, gave a different account. In his work "Summa de geografía", he states that the crew found indigenous people who called themselves the "Veneciuela." Thus, the name "Venezuela" may have evolved from the native word.


title: Venezuela

text: Previously, the official name was "Estado de Venezuela" (1830–1856), "República de Venezuela" (1856–1864), "Estados Unidos de Venezuela" (1864–1953), and again "República de Venezuela" (1953–1999).


title: Venezuela

text: Evidence exists of human habitation in the area now known as Venezuela from about 15,000 years ago. Leaf-shaped tools from this period, together with chopping and plano-convex scraping implements, have been found exposed on the high riverine terraces of the Rio Pedregal in western Venezuela. Late Pleistocene hunting artifacts, including spear tips, have been found at a similar series of sites in northwestern Venezuela known as "El Jobo"; according to radiocarbon dating, these date from 13,000 to 7,000 BC.


title: Venezuela

text: It is not known how many people lived in Venezuela before the Spanish conquest; it has been estimated at around one million. In addition to indigenous peoples known today, the population included historical groups such as the Kalina (Caribs), Auaké, Caquetio, Mariche, and Timoto–Cuicas. The Timoto–Cuica culture was the most complex society in Pre-Columbian Venezuela, with pre-planned permanent villages, surrounded by irrigated, terraced fields. They also stored water in tanks. Their houses were made primarily of stone and wood with thatched roofs. They were peaceful, for the most part, and depended on growing crops. Regional crops included potatoes and ullucos. They left behind works of art, particularly anthropomorphic ceramics, but no major monuments. They spun vegetable fibers to weave into textiles and mats for housing. They are credited with having invented the arepa, a staple in Venezuelan cuisine.


title: Venezuela

text: After the conquest, the population dropped markedly, mainly through the spread of new infectious diseases from Europe. Two main north–south axes of pre-Columbian population were present, who cultivated maize in the west and manioc in the east. Large parts of the "llanos" were cultivated through a combination of slash and burn and permanent settled agriculture.


title: Venezuela

text: In 1498, during his third voyage to the Americas, Christopher Columbus sailed near the Orinoco Delta and landed in the Gulf of Paria. Amazed by the great offshore current of freshwater which deflected his course eastward, Columbus expressed in a letter to Isabella and Ferdinand that he must have reached Heaven on Earth (terrestrial paradise):


title: Venezuela

text: Spain's colonization of mainland Venezuela started in 1522, establishing its first permanent South American settlement in the city of Cumaná.


title: Venezuela

text: In the 16th century, the king of Spain granted a concession in Venezuela to the Welser family of German bankers and merchants. Klein-Venedig became the most extensive initiative in the German colonization of the Americas, from 1528 to 1546. The Welser family of Augsburg and Nuremberg were bankers to the Habsburgs and financiers of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, who was also King of Spain and had borrowed heavily from them to pay bribes for his Imperial election.


title: Venezuela

text: In 1528, Charles V granted the Welsers the right to explore, rule and colonize the territory, as well as to seek the mythical golden town of El Dorado. The first expedition was led by Ambrosius Ehinger, who established Maracaibo in 1529. After the deaths of first Ehinger (1533), then Nikolaus Federmann, and Georg von Speyer (1540), Philipp von Hutten persisted in exploring of the interior. In absence of von Hutten from the capital of the province, the crown of Spain claimed the right to appoint a governor. On Hutten's return to the capital, Santa Ana de Coro, in 1546, the Spanish governor Juan de Carvajal had Hutten and Bartholomeus VI. Welser executed. Subsequently, Charles V revoked Welser's concession. The Welsers transported German miners to the colony, in addition to 4,000 African slaves as hard work to paintings sugar cane plantations. Many of the German colonists died from tropical diseases, to which they had no immunity, or through frequent wars with the indigenous inhabitants.


title: Venezuela

text: Native "caciques" (leaders) such as Guaicaipuro () and Tamanaco (died 1573) attempted to resist Spanish incursions, but the newcomers ultimately subdued them; Tamanaco was put to death by order of Caracas' founder, Diego de Losada.


title: Venezuela

text: In the 16th century, during the Spanish colonization, indigenous peoples such as many of the Mariches, themselves descendants of the Kalina, were converted to Roman Catholicism. Some of the resisting tribes or leaders are commemorated in place names, including Caracas, Chacao and Los Teques. The early colonial settlements focused on the northern coast, but in the mid-18th century, the Spanish pushed farther inland along the Orinoco River. Here, the Ye'kuana (then known as the Makiritare) organized serious resistance in 1775 and 1776.


title: Venezuela

text: Spain's eastern Venezuelan settlements were incorporated into New Andalusia Province. Administered by the Royal Audiencia of Santo Domingo from the early 16th century, most of Venezuela became part of the Viceroyalty of New Granada in the early 18th century, and was then reorganized as an autonomous Captaincy General starting in 1777. The town of Caracas, founded in the central coastal region in 1567, was well-placed to become a key location, being near the coastal port of La Guaira whilst itself being located in a valley in a mountain range, providing defensive strength against pirates and a more fertile and healthy climate.


title: Venezuela

text: After a series of unsuccessful uprisings, Venezuela, under the leadership of Francisco de Miranda, a Venezuelan marshal who had fought in the American Revolution and the French Revolution, declared independence as the First Republic of Venezuela on 5 July 1811. This began the Venezuelan War of Independence. A devastating earthquake that struck Caracas in 1812, together with the rebellion of the Venezuelan "llaneros", helped bring down the republic. Simón Bolívar, new leader of the independentist forces, launched his Admirable Campaign in 1813 from New Granada, retaking most of the territory and being proclaimed as "El Libertador" ("The Liberator"). A second Venezuelan republic was proclaimed on 7 August 1813, but lasted only a few months before being crushed at the hands of royalist caudillo José Tomás Boves and his personal army of "llaneros".


title: Venezuela

text: The end of the French invasion of homeland Spain in 1814 allowed the preparation of a large expeditionary force to the American provinces under general Pablo Morillo, with the goal to regain the lost territory in Venezuela and New Granada. As the war reached a stalemate on 1817, Bolívar reestablished the Third Republic of Venezuela on the territory still controlled by the patriots, mainly in the Guayana and Llanos regions. This republic was short-lived as only two years later, during the Congress of Angostura of 1819, the union of Venezuela with New Granada was decreed to form the Republic of Colombia (historiographically Republic of Gran Colombia). The war continued for some years, until full victory and sovereignty was attained after Bolívar, aided by José Antonio Páez and Antonio José de Sucre, won the Battle of Carabobo on 24 June 1821. On 24 July 1823, José Prudencio Padilla and Rafael Urdaneta helped seal Venezuelan independence with their victory in the Battle of Lake Maracaibo. New Granada's congress gave Bolívar control of the Granadian army; leading it, he liberated several countries and founded the Republic of Colombia (Gran Colombia).


title: Venezuela

text: Sucre, who won many battles for Bolívar, went on to liberate Ecuador and later become the second president of Bolivia. Venezuela remained part of Gran Colombia until 1830, when a rebellion led by Páez allowed the proclamation of a newly independent Venezuela, on 22 September; Páez became the first president of the new State of Venezuela. Between one-quarter and one-third of Venezuela's population was lost during these two decades of warfare (including perhaps one-half of the Venezuelans of European descent), which by 1830, was estimated at 800,000.


title: Venezuela

text: The colors of the Venezuelan flag are yellow, blue, and red: the yellow stands for land wealth, the blue for the sea that separates Venezuela from Spain, and the red for the blood shed by the heroes of independence.


title: Venezuela

text: Slavery in Venezuela was abolished in 1854. Much of Venezuela's 19th-century history was characterized by political turmoil and dictatorial rule, including the Independence leader José Antonio Páez, who gained the presidency three times and served a total of 11 years between 1830 and 1863. This culminated in the Federal War (1859–1863), a civil war in which hundreds of thousands died in a country with a population of not much more than a million people. In the latter half of the century, Antonio Guzmán Blanco, another "caudillo", served a total of 13 years between 1870 and 1887, with three other presidents interspersed.


title: Venezuela

text: In 1895, a longstanding dispute with Great Britain about the territory of Guayana Esequiba, which Britain claimed as part of British Guiana and Venezuela saw as Venezuelan territory, erupted into the Venezuela Crisis of 1895. The dispute became a diplomatic crisis when Venezuela's lobbyist, William L. Scruggs, sought to argue that British behavior over the issue violated the United States' Monroe Doctrine of 1823, and used his influence in Washington, D.C., to pursue the matter. Then, U.S. president Grover Cleveland adopted a broad interpretation of the doctrine that did not just simply forbid new European colonies, but declared an American interest in any matter within the hemisphere. Britain ultimately accepted arbitration, but in negotiations over its terms was able to persuade the U.S. on many of the details. A tribunal convened in Paris in 1898 to decide the issue and in 1899 awarded the bulk of the disputed territory to British Guiana.


title: Venezuela

text: In 1899, Cipriano Castro, assisted by his friend Juan Vicente Gómez, seized power in Caracas, marching an army from his base in the Andean state of Táchira. Castro defaulted on Venezuela's considerable foreign debts and declined to pay compensation to foreigners caught up in Venezuela's civil wars. This led to the Venezuela Crisis of 1902–1903, in which Britain, Germany and Italy imposed a naval blockade of several months before international arbitration at the new Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague was agreed. In 1908, another dispute broke out with the Netherlands, which was resolved when Castro left for medical treatment in Germany and was promptly overthrown by Juan Vicente Gómez (1908–1935).


title: Venezuela

text: The discovery of massive oil deposits in Lake Maracaibo during World War I proved to be pivotal for Venezuela and transformed the basis of its economy from a heavy dependence on agricultural exports. It prompted an economic boom that lasted into the 1980s; by 1935, Venezuela's per capita gross domestic product was Latin America's highest. Gómez benefited handsomely from this, as corruption thrived, but at the same time, the new source of income helped him centralize the Venezuelan state and develop its authority.


title: Venezuela

text: He remained the most powerful man in Venezuela until his death in 1935, although at times he ceded the presidency to others. The "gomecista" dictatorship (1935–1945) system largely continued under Eleazar López Contreras, but from 1941, under Isaías Medina Angarita, was relaxed. Angarita granted a range of reforms, including the legalization of all political parties. After World War II, immigration from Southern Europe (mainly from Spain, Italy, Portugal, and France) and poorer Latin American countries markedly diversified Venezuelan society.


title: Venezuela

text: In 1945, a civilian-military coup overthrew Medina Angarita and ushered in a three-year period of democratic rule (1945–1948) under the mass membership party Democratic Action, initially under Rómulo Betancourt, until Rómulo Gallegos won the 1947 Venezuelan presidential election (generally believed to be the first free and fair elections in Venezuela). Gallegos governed until overthrown by a military junta led by the triumvirate , Marcos Pérez Jiménez, and Gallegos' Defense Minister, Carlos Delgado Chalbaud, in the 1948 Venezuelan "coup d'état".


title: Venezuela

text: The most powerful man in the military "junta" (1948–1958) was Pérez Jiménez (though Chalbaud was its titular president) and was suspected of being behind the death in office of Chalbaud, who died in a bungled kidnapping in 1950. When the junta unexpectedly lost the election it held in 1952, it ignored the results and Pérez Jiménez was installed as president, where he remained until 1958.


title: Venezuela

text: The military dictator Pérez Jiménez was forced out on 23 January 1958. In an effort to consolidate a young democracy, the three major political parties (Acción Democrática (AD), COPEI and Unión Republicana Democrática (URD), with the notable exception of the Communist Party of Venezuela), signed the Puntofijo Pact power-sharing agreement. The two first parties would dominate the political landscape for four decades.


title: Venezuela

text: During the presidencies of Rómulo Betancourt (1959–1964, his second term) and Raúl Leoni (1964–1969) in the 1960s, substantial guerilla movements occurred, including the Armed Forces of National Liberation and the Revolutionary Left Movement, which had split from AD in 1960. Most of these movements laid down their arms under Rafael Caldera's first presidency (1969–1974); Caldera had won the 1968 election for COPEI, being the first time a party other than Democratic Action took the presidency through a democratic election. The new democratic order had its antagonists. Betancourt suffered an attack planned by the Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo in 1960, and the leftists excluded from the Pact initiated an armed insurgency by organizing themselves in the Armed Forces of National Liberation, sponsored by the Communist Party and Fidel Castro. In 1962 they tried to destabilize the military corps, with failed revolts in Carúpano and Puerto Cabello. At the same time, Betancourt promoted a foreign policy, the Betancourt Doctrine, in which he only recognized elected governments by popular vote.


title: Venezuela

text: The election in 1973 of Carlos Andrés Pérez coincided with an oil crisis, in which Venezuela's income exploded as oil prices soared; oil industries were nationalized in 1976. This led to massive increases in public spending, but also increases in external debts, which continued into the 1980s when the collapse of oil prices during the 1980s crippled the Venezuelan economy. As the government started to devalue the currency in February 1983 to face its financial obligations, Venezuelans' real standards of living fell dramatically. A number of failed economic policies and increasing corruption in government led to rising poverty and crime, worsening social indicators, and increased political instability.


title: Venezuela

text: In the 1980s, the Presidential Commission for State Reform (COPRE) emerged as a mechanism of political innovation. Venezuela was preparing for the decentralization of its political system and the diversification of its economy, reducing the large size of the State. The COPRE operated as an innovation mechanism, also by incorporating issues into the political agenda that were generally excluded from public deliberation by the main actors of the Venezuelan democratic system. The most discussed topics were incorporated into the public agenda: decentralization, political participation, municipalization, judicial order reforms and the role of the State in a new economic strategy. The social reality of the country made the changes difficult to apply.


title: Venezuela

text: Economic crises in the 1980s and 1990s led to a political crisis. Hundreds of people were killed by Venezuelan security forces and the military in the "Caracazo" riots of 1989 during the presidency of Carlos Andrés Pérez (1989–1993, his second term) and after the implementation of economic austerity measures. Hugo Chávez, who in 1982 had promised to depose the bipartisanship governments, used the growing anger at economic austerity measures to justify a coup d'état attempt in February 1992; a second coup d'état attempt occurred in November. President Carlos Andrés Pérez (re-elected in 1988) was impeached under embezzlement charges in 1993, leading to the interim presidency of Ramón José Velásquez (1993–1994). Coup leader Chávez was pardoned in March 1994 for by president Rafael Caldera (1994–1999, his second term), with a clean slate and his political rights reinstated, allowing Chávez to win and maintain the presidency continuously from 1999 until his death in 2013. Chávez won the elections of 1998, 2000, 2006 and 2012 and the presidential referendum of 2004. The only gaps in his presidency occurred during the two-day de facto government of Pedro Carmona Estanga in 2002 and when Diosdado Cabello Rondón acted as interim president for a few hours.


title: Venezuela

text: The Bolivarian Revolution refers to a left-wing populism social movement and political process in Venezuela led by Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez, who founded the Fifth Republic Movement in 1997 and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela in 2007. The "Bolivarian Revolution" is named after Simón Bolívar, an early 19th-century Venezuelan and Latin American revolutionary leader, prominent in the Spanish American wars of independence in achieving the independence of most of northern South America from Spanish rule. According to Chávez and other supporters, the "Bolivarian Revolution" seeks to build a mass movement to implement Bolivarianism—popular democracy, economic independence, equitable distribution of revenues, and an end to political corruption—in Venezuela. They interpret Bolívar's ideas from a populist perspective, using socialist rhetoric.


title: Venezuela

text: A collapse in confidence in the existing parties led to Chávez being elected president in 1998 and the subsequent launch of a "Bolivarian Revolution", beginning with a 1999 constituent assembly to write a new Constitution of Venezuela. Chávez also initiated Bolivarian missions, programs aimed at helping the poor.


title: Venezuela

text: In April 2002, Chávez was briefly ousted from power in the 2002 Venezuelan coup d'état attempt following popular demonstrations by his opponents, but Chavez returned to power after two days as a result of demonstrations by poor Chávez supporters in Caracas and actions by the military.


title: Venezuela

text: Chávez also remained in power after an all-out national strike that lasted from December 2002 to February 2003, including a strike/lockout in the state oil company PDVSA. Capital flight before and during the strike led to the reimposition of currency controls (which had been abolished in 1989), managed by the CADIVI agency. In the subsequent decade, the government was forced into several currency devaluations. These devaluations have done little to improve the situation of the Venezuelan people who rely on imported products or locally produced products that depend on imported inputs while dollar-denominated oil sales account for the vast majority of Venezuela's exports. According to Sebastian Boyd writing at Bloomberg News, the profits of the oil industry have been lost to "social engineering" and corruption, instead of investments needed to maintain oil production.


title: Venezuela

text: Chávez survived several further political tests, including an August 2004 recall referendum. He was elected for another term in December 2006 and re-elected for a third term in October 2012. However, he was never sworn in for his third period, due to medical complications. Chávez died on 5 March 2013 after a nearly two-year fight with cancer. The presidential election that took place on Sunday, 14 April 2013, was the first since Chávez took office in 1999 in which his name did not appear on the ballot.


title: Venezuela

text: Poverty and inflation began to increase into the 2010s. Nicolás Maduro was elected in 2013 after the death of Chavez. Chavez picked Maduro as his successor and appointed him vice president in 2013. Maduro was elected president in a shortened election in 2013 following Chavez's death.


title: Venezuela

text: Nicolás Maduro has been the president of Venezuela since 14 April 2013, when he won the second presidential election after Chávez's death, with 50.61% of the votes against the opposition's candidate Henrique Capriles Radonski, who had 49.12% of the votes. The Democratic Unity Roundtable contested his election as fraud and as a violation of the constitution. An audit of 56% of the vote showed no discrepancies, and the Supreme Court of Venezuela ruled that under Venezuela's Constitution, Nicolás Maduro was the legitimate president and was invested as such by the Venezuelan National Assembly (Asamblea Nacional). Opposition leaders and some international media consider the government of Maduro to be a dictatorship. Since February 2014, hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans have protested over high levels of criminal violence, corruption, hyperinflation, and chronic scarcity of basic goods due to policies of the federal government. Demonstrations and riots have resulted in over 40 fatalities in the unrest between Chavistas and opposition protesters and opposition leaders, including Leopoldo López and Antonio Ledezma were arrested. Human rights groups condemned the arrest of Leopoldo López. In the 2015 Venezuelan parliamentary election, the opposition gained a majority.


title: Venezuela

text: Venezuela devalued its currency in February 2013 due to rising shortages in the country, which included those of milk, flour, and other necessities. This led to an increase in malnutrition, especially among children. Venezuela's economy had become strongly dependent on the exportation of oil, with crude accounting for 86% of exports, and a high price per barrel to support social programs. Beginning in 2014 the price of oil plummeted from over $100/bbl to $40/bbl a year and a half later. This placed pressure on the Venezuelan economy, which was no longer able to afford vast social programs. To counter the decrease in oil prices, the Venezuelan Government began taking more money from PDVSA, the state oil company, to meet budgets, resulting in a lack of reinvestment in fields and employees. Venezuela's oil production decreased from its height of nearly per day. In 2014, Venezuela entered an economic recession. In 2015, Venezuela had the world's highest inflation rate with the rate surpassing 100%, which was the highest in the country's history. In 2017, Donald Trump's administration imposed more economic sanctions against Venezuela's state-owned oil company PDVSA and Venezuelan officials. Economic problems, as well as crime and corruption, were some of the main causes of the 2014–present Venezuelan protests. Since 2014, roughly 5.6 million people have fled Venezuela.


title: Venezuela

text: In January 2016, President Maduro decreed an "economic emergency", revealing the extent of the crisis and expanding his powers. In July 2016, Colombian border crossings were temporarily opened to allow Venezuelans to purchase food and basic household and health items in Colombia. In September 2016, a study published in the Spanish-language "Diario Las Américas" indicated that 15% of Venezuelans are eating "food waste discarded by commercial establishments".


title: Venezuela

text: Close to 200 riots had occurred in Venezuelan prisons by October 2016, according to Una Ventana a la Libertad, an advocacy group for better prison conditions. The father of an inmate at Táchira Detention Center in Caracas alleged that his son was cannibalized by other inmates during a month-long riot, a claim corroborated by an anonymous police source but denied by the Minister of Correctional Affairs.


title: Venezuela

text: In 2017, Venezuela experienced a constitutional crisis in the country. In March 2017, opposition leaders branded President Maduro a dictator after the Maduro-aligned Supreme Tribunal, which had been overturning most National Assembly decisions since the opposition took control of the body, took over the functions of the assembly, pushing a lengthy political standoff to new heights. The Supreme Court backed down and reversed its decision on 1 April 2017. A month later, President Maduro announced the 2017 Venezuelan Constituent Assembly election and on 30 August 2017, the 2017 Constituent National Assembly was elected into office and quickly stripped the National Assembly of its powers.


title: Venezuela

text: In December 2017, President Maduro declared that leading opposition parties would be barred from taking part in the following year's presidential vote after they boycotted mayoral polls.


title: Venezuela

text: Maduro won the 2018 election with 67.8% of the vote. The result was challenged by countries including Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Brazil, Canada, Germany, France and the United States who deemed it fraudulent and moved to recognize Juan Guaidó as president. Other countries including Cuba, China, Russia, Turkey, and Iran continued to recognize Maduro as president, although China, facing financial pressure over its position, reportedly began hedging its position by decreasing loans given, cancelling joint ventures, and signaling willingness to work with all parties. A Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman denied the reports, describing them as "false information".


title: Venezuela

text: In January 2019 the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS) approved a resolution "to not recognize the legitimacy of Nicolas Maduro's new term as of the 10th of January of 2019".


title: Venezuela

text: In August 2019, United States President Donald Trump signed an executive order to impose a total economic embargo against Venezuela. In March 2020, the Trump administration indicted Maduro and several Venezuelan officials, including the Chief Justice of the Supreme Tribunal, on charges of drug trafficking, narcoterrorism, and corruption.


title: Venezuela

text: In June 2020, a report by the US organisation Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights documented enforced disappearances in Venezuela that occurred in the years 2018 and 2019. During the period, 724 enforced disappearances of political detainees were reported. The report stated that Venezuelan security forces subjected victims, who had been disappeared, to illegal interrogation processes accompanied by torture and cruel or inhuman treatment. The report stated that the Venezuelan government strategically used enforced disappearances to silence political opponents and other critical voices it deemed a threat.


title: Venezuela

text: Venezuela is located in the north of South America; geologically, its mainland rests on the South American Plate. It has a total area of and a land area of , making Venezuela the 33rd largest country in the world. The territory it controls lies between latitudes 0° and 16°N and longitudes 59° and 74°W.