The Big Street gave Lucille Ball a dramatic role as a nightclub singer who learned to care for a man who had once used her.
The Big Street was released in 1942, directed by Irving Reis and based on a story by Damon Runyon. Lucille Ball played Gloria Lyons, a nightclub singer who was injured in a fall and left unable to walk. Henry Fonda played Little Pinks, a busboy who had loved her from a distance and who devoted himself to looking after her.
The film was a sentimental drama, with Runyon’s New York characters and dialogue, and Ball’s performance was more serious than the comic roles for which she later became famous. Gloria was proud, difficult and afraid of being dependent, and Ball played those qualities without softening them.
The Big Street showed that Ball could carry a dramatic story, and it remains a notable film in her pre-television career. It was made in the year she married Desi Arnaz, and it marked a turning point: she was no longer only a supporting player, but a leading lady in her own right.