Simon Luckinbill: Everything to Know About Laurence Luckinbill’s Son

Simon Luckinbill comes from one of the most famous families in American television, yet he chose one of the quietest careers in it. He is the son of actor Laurence Luckinbill and actress and singer Lucie Arnaz, and the grandson of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, the creators and stars of I Love Lucy. Instead of acting for a living, Simon became a visual artist.

That choice is the key to his story. He grew up surrounded by stage and screen talent across three generations, and he turned that inheritance toward painting rather than performance. This article explains his family background, the little that is firmly documented about his art, and why so much of his personal life remains private by design.

Quick Facts

A Family Built on Television History

To understand Simon, you first have to understand the family he was born into. His grandmother, Lucille Ball, was one of the greatest comic performers of the twentieth century. With her husband Desi Arnaz, she starred in I Love Lucy, which began in 1951 and changed television forever. The couple also built Desilu Productions, the company behind major shows of that era, and they helped set technical standards for sitcom filming that are still used in spirit today.

Lucy and Desi had two children, Lucie Arnaz, born in 1951, and Desi Arnaz Jr., born in 1953. Lucie, Simon’s mother, built her own long career on stage and screen. She performed in musical theatre, appeared in films such as The Jazz Singer in 1980, and worked steadily in television. She did all of this while carrying a famous name that invited constant comparison with her mother, and she earned respect in her own right.

Simon’s father, Laurence Luckinbill, was born on November 21, 1934, in Fort Smith, Arkansas. He trained seriously for the stage, earned a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Catholic University of America, and built a career across theatre, film, and television from 1961 onward. He became especially known for one man stage shows in which he played Theodore Roosevelt, Lyndon B. Johnson, Ernest Hemingway, and Clarence Darrow, and for playing Sybok, the half-brother of Spock, in the film Star Trek V: The Final Frontier in 1989.

Laurence and Lucie married in 1980 and have toured together in stage productions, including They’re Playing Our Song. Simon is the eldest of their three children together. That means his family tree holds Broadway, classic Hollywood, Cuban music history through his grandfather Desi, and one of the most watched television shows ever made.

Early Life and Growing Up

Simon was born in December 1980, in the first year of his parents’ marriage. Artist profiles commonly give his birthplace as Los Angeles and say he was raised largely on the East Coast, including New York, where his parents’ theatre work was based. Those early life details come from biography and gallery style profiles rather than from major news records, so they should be read as widely reported rather than officially documented.

What is clear is the shape of his childhood. He grew up as the child of two working performers, in a home where scripts, rehearsals, touring, and opening nights were normal life. His younger brother Joseph became a musician, and his younger sister Katharine acted for a period, including work connected to her famous family name. On his father’s side, Simon also has two older half-brothers, Nicholas and Benjamin, from Laurence Luckinbill’s first marriage to actress Robin Strasser, which lasted from 1965 to 1976.

Growing up as Lucille Ball’s grandson brought a particular kind of attention. Lucy died in 1989, when Simon was eight years old, and Desi Arnaz had died in 1986. So Simon knew his famous grandparents only in early childhood, yet he has lived his whole life in the long shadow of their fame. Strangers who never met Lucy still feel they know her, and that feeling often extends, fairly or not, to her grandchildren.

Choosing Art Over Acting

Simon took a different path from his parents, his grandparents, his aunt and uncle’s generation, and even his own sister. He became a painter. Artist profiles describe his work as acrylic painting on canvas, often bright in color and emotional in tone, drawing on music, nature, and faith among its themes. He has not published a large official catalogue that can be checked easily, so detailed claims about individual works should be treated with care.

One event is reported again and again in profiles of him, a 2016 exhibition titled in those reports as The Show, Flea On a Hot Rock, at Gallery 500 in Palm Springs, California. The reports say the show was a success and that many of the paintings sold quickly on the opening occasion. An earlier show at a Palm Springs area gallery in 2014 is also mentioned in some profiles. These reports come from art and biography websites rather than from major newspaper reviews, but they agree with each other on the broad point that Simon exhibited and sold work in Palm Springs in the middle of the 2010s.

That Palm Springs link also fits his family history. The Arnaz and Ball family had deep and long ties to the California desert communities, and Lucie Arnaz has lived and worked in that world for years. For an artist grandson, showing work there was both a professional step and a family homecoming of a quiet kind.

Choosing painting also changed the terms of public attention for Simon. An actor’s face is his product. A painter can let the canvas stand in front of him instead. Simon’s career choice gave him a real way to be creative in public and private at the same time, and by all available accounts, that is exactly how he has used it.

His Parents and Their Influence

Both of Simon’s parents modeled a serious, workmanlike approach to art. Laurence Luckinbill did not chase celebrity in the modern sense. He built one man shows that depended on research, writing, memory, and stamina, performing as presidents and writers for audiences across America. Lucie Arnaz likewise built a stage career that depended on craft night after night, far from the quick fame of a single hit show.

It is easy to see that example in Simon’s path, even though the form is different. Painting is solitary where theatre is social, but the discipline is similar. Finish the work. Show the work. Begin the next piece. Family profiles often note the support of his mother in his art career, and Lucie has spoken over the years with pride about all three of her children finding their own forms of creative work, music for Joseph, acting for Katharine, and art for Simon.

His father’s family also holds another notable branch. Laurence Luckinbill is the uncle of filmmakers Lana and Lilly Wachowski, the children of his sister Lynne. That makes the Wachowskis Simon’s cousins, one more branch of creative work in an already remarkable family tree, though the cousins work in entirely different fields and keep separate public lives.

A Private Life in a Famous Family

Almost nothing reliable is published about Simon Luckinbill’s personal relationships, home life, or day to day routine, and this article will not fill that gap with guesses. Artist profiles sometimes list a marital status or a net worth figure, but those claims have no visible source and differ between sites, so they are not repeated here as facts.

What can be said is that Simon has kept a low public profile for an adult whose grandmother remains one of the most beloved figures in television history. He does not trade on the Ball name in public campaigns. He has not sought reality television, memoir deals, or celebrity interviews. His public identity rests on his paintings and on the exhibitions reported in the 2010s, and on family appearances connected with honoring his grandparents’ legacy.

That legacy remains very much alive. I Love Lucy still runs around the world. The Lucy Desi Museum in Jamestown, New York, Lucille Ball’s hometown, draws visitors every year. Documentaries and books about Lucy and Desi continue to appear. As a grandson, Simon is a living link to that story, and his choice to answer fame with quiet work may be the most Arnaz like decision of all. Desi and Lucy built their empire by working. Their grandson works too, just with a brush instead of a camera.

FAQs

Who are Simon Luckinbill’s parents?

His father is actor, playwright, and director Laurence Luckinbill, known for his one man shows and for Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. His mother is actress and singer Lucie Arnaz, the daughter of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz.

Is Simon Luckinbill really Lucille Ball’s grandson?

Yes. His mother Lucie Arnaz is the daughter of Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, which makes Simon their grandson and Desi Arnaz Jr. his uncle.

What does Simon Luckinbill do for a living?

He is a visual artist and painter. Profiles describe acrylic work on canvas and report exhibitions in Palm Springs, including a well received show in 2016. He did not follow his parents into acting as a career.

Who are Simon Luckinbill’s siblings?

His full siblings are Joseph Luckinbill, a musician, and Katharine Luckinbill. His half-brothers Nicholas and Benjamin Luckinbill are his father’s sons from his father’s first marriage to Robin Strasser.

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Final Thoughts

Simon Luckinbill could have spent his life trading on two of the most famous names in television. Instead, he picked up a brush. He is Laurence Luckinbill’s son and Lucie Arnaz’s son, and Lucille Ball’s grandson, and all of that is true at once alongside the simpler fact that he is a painter who shows his work and lives privately. Details about his personal life are scarce because he wants them scarce, and the honest record respects that. His story is proof that a family legacy does not have to be copied to be honored. It can be carried forward quietly, in a different art, at a different pace.

Featured photo: Lucie Arnaz – photo by Alan Light, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons