Meet the 1st TV Star to Use 'Gaslight' as a Verb
It probably isn't who you think it is, and it probably wasn't when you thought it was
January 29, 2026
No, you’re not losing your mind — I’ve written about the word “gaslighting” before. Or have I?
The origins of the word “gaslighting” have weighed heavy on my mind for years. The still trendy, if not ubiquitous, word was Merriam-Webster’s word of the year in 2022, a year after it appeared anachronistically in the 2021 film Being the Ricardos.
I noticed right away that some of the language in that film was too modern; this is something that can sour me on a period piece — when a Victorian woman says she “feels seen” or a 1960s woman replies to a profession of undying love with “same,” it takes me right out of the whole production.
Writer Roxane Gay was among those who found it jarring to hear Lucille Ball (played by Nicole Kidman) casually use “gaslighting” as a verb in Being the Ricardos, which was set in the 1950s. Her observation led to widespread mockery from people who somehow convinced themselves that the brilliant Gay was blissfully unaware that the word derived from a 1938 play and an iconic 1944 George Cukor film.
But she was not wrong.
Yes, the word is derived from the play and film, but in Cukor’s Gaslight, nobody uses that word as a verb. In fact, the film was not presenting “gaslight” as a term. Rather, its plot — about a man (Charles Boyer) attempting to drive his wife (Ingrid Bergman) crazy — led people to associate the film’s title with the concept of messing with a person’s perception of reality. One of the tactics used in the movie to convince the heroine she’s suffering from delusions involves the mysterious dimming of gaslights.
Many people on social media came forward to claim their family had used the word “gaslight” as a verb in the 1950s, but there isn’t a single instance of it in any recorded media (including extensive transcripts from TV and radio) from the creation of the play through the 1950s, so those claims are far more likely a case of people’s memories playing tricks on them.
Coming mind-blowingly close is the phrase “give the Gaslight treatment.” This related construction was used as far back as a few years after Gaslight was released, according to Snopes.
The earliest known printed use of “gaslight” as a verb, however, was in 1961, in the academic book Culture and Personality by Anthony F.C. Wallace, who describes the term in quotes as if to note it is a new and unusual term which requires some description:
“It is also popularly believed to be possible to ‘gaslight’ a perfectly healthy person into psychosis by interpreting his own behavior to him as symptomatic of serious mental illness.”
I’m much more interested in the use of “gaslighting” in the arts; for me, when a term begins popping up in movies and on TV, that is a better indication of how widespread its use is becoming.
Fascinatingly, one of the closest calls when it comes to early uses of “gaslighting” as a verb is from … Lucille Ball.
While not discrediting Gay’s observation, the fact that Ball’s TV persona flirted with the term in the ‘60s at least provides some cover for Aaron Sorkin, screenwriter of Being the Ricardos.
On an episode of The Lucy Show entitled “Lucy Gets Mooney Fired” (November 6, 1967) her character is directly inspired by the Cukor film to “give Mr. Cheaver (Roy Roberts) the Gaslight treatment” in order to trick him into re-hiring her boss, his underling, Mr. Mooney (Gale Gordon).
As tantalizing as this is, an earlier appearance of “gaslighting” as a verb in popular media arrived on Season 2, Episode 9 of Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. — and the man who said it is that show’s last surviving original main cast member.
In the middle of “The Grudge Match” — which aired November 12, 1965 — Ronnie Schell, who played Duke on 92 of the show’s 150 episodes, concocts a scheme to “gaslight” Sgt. Carter (Frank Sutton) for his own good. Carter is committed to a boxing match that is likely to end with him getting his block knocked off.
Schell’s Duke exclaims, “We’ll gaslight ‘im!” and in a later scene twice uses “gaslit” as a past tense of the verb.
It’s an interesting bit of TV and linguistic history, one I pointed out to Schell in having him sign this:
Until this week, it had been thought that Schell, 94, was the first person on TV, radio, in the movies or on the stage to utter the now-common verb “gaslight.” But don’t you believe it!
That honor goes to the late Maggie Peterson Mancuso, who said it on Season 2, Episode 5 of The Bill Dana Show. Airing on October 18, 1964, “What Elephant?” was about house detective Byron Glick (Don Adams) having to hide an elephant from his boss, Mr. Phillips (Jonathan Harris).
Peterson Mancuso (who died in 2022 at 81), playing waitress Susie on the show, hears Glick and José (Dana) chatting about how to put one over on Mr. Phillips. When José talks about how the boss recently referred to his eyes playing tricks on him, Glick observes the trick would have to be spectacular to convince him he wasn’t seeing an elephant.
She pipes up with, “Hey! You just said something,” going on to offer, “I mean, you may have the answer. We could gaslight ’im!”
Confused, José asks, “Gaslight him?” the word feeling strange in his mouth.
After that, Glick and Susie spend a few moments explaining that the word derives from the Boyer/Bergman movie.
Therefore, Maggie, better known as Charlene on The Andy Griffith Show, is the TV star who, in 1964, first uttered the word “gaslight” as a verb in entertainment media — and it was thanks to the show’s one and only writer: its star, Bill Dana. ⚡️