Lucille Ball as Princess Narah
“Oh you take yourself too seriously, after all what has he done? Stolen some sacks of grain, raided a few shabby caravans” - Princess Narah to her brother Caliph Ali regarding the Scarlet Falcon raids.
Princess Narah is the secondary antagonist in the Columbia Pictures 1951 film The Magic Carpet. She is the spoiled self centered younger sister of the usurper Caliph Ali. She was portrayed by the legendary actress the late Lucille Ball.
Biography[]
A typical femme fatale, Princess Narah is proud, vain, arrogant, outspoken, and fearless. She uses her beauty to swoon the Grand Vizier, Boreg, to be submissive to her. She is shown to be attracted to the Scarlet Falcon only by the mere rumors of him and is openly flirtatious with Ramoth when he poses as the family doctor, giving whatever excuse to see him. Her reputation for her advances towards Ramoth is well known. She is not afraid to openly express her opinions in front of her brother Caliph Ali and brush aside his ideas or concerns in spite of knowing how dangerous it is to disagree with him.
While Boreg's love for her seems genuine, this appears to be one sided. It is hinted Princess Narah merely used him to eventually become queen. After she finds out that Boreg had arranged Ramoth’s assasination (Boreg discovers that Ramoth is the Scarlet Falcon) she confronts him on the matter and he tells her Ramoth is not only the Scarlet Falcon, but also the true Caliph.
Rather than telling her brother, she plots to find out for herself if this is true and plans to blackmail Ramoth to marry her (and possibly kill her brother) so she could be queen. When this fails she turns him into the guards so he can be executed via beheading. Thanks to her chambermaid Maras (who is still loyal to the deceased caliph) sent the magic carpet to rescue Ramoth and his coheart, allowing him to carry out his final plan to avange his family and kill Caliph Ali.
All in all her plans to become queen backfired and she is last seen at the end of the film after Ramoth kills Ali and takes his rightful place as caliph. His first order as caliph was to throw Narah in the dungeon, her fate afterwards remains unknown, but it's likely she was either she may have been later released, spent the rest of her life in prison, or possibly executed. [1]
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- This was one of the rare times where Lucille Ball played a villainous character.
- Lucille Ball was pregnant with her daughter Lucy Arnez thus the producers of the film had to hide her pregnancy. [2]
- Princess Narah was Lucille Ball's last film with Colombia Pictures. Colombia allegedly gave her the role in the film so she could break her contract and they wouldnt have to pay her remaining term with them, to their suprise she accepted the role. [2]
- Ironically, while her performance in The Magic Carpet was a largely forgettable, the film was released three days after the premier of I Love Lucy in which Ball became a houshold name.