By 1951, the 64 year-old Frawley had appeared in over one hundred films. The roles were soon drying up, however. When he heard that Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball were casting a new television sitcom, he jumped at the chance to play the role of penny-pinching landlord Fred Mertz. I Love Lucy, which debuted October 15, 1951 on CBS, was a huge success. The show ran for six years as half-hour episodes, later switching to hour-long specials from 1957 to 1960 titled The Lucille Ball-Desi Arnaz Show (later retitled The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour).