Jerry Lewis on teaming up with Dean Martin - EMMYTVLEGENDS.ORG

Dean and I met uh I was at the Belmont Plaza glass hat appearing in the glass hat then it's so funny Frank Sinatra's mother adored me she loved what I did in my act and adored me and she just told me every night she was there four nights a week having dinner in the glass hat and watching my show she said I'm going to bring my son and he's going to love you not know her son is and Frank hadn't really hit yet I'm talking about 43 42 I think yeah I was 16 at the glass hat and I meet Dean who was on WMCA sustaining 15 minutes every day five days a week and he was staying at the Belmont Plaza because the station owned the hotel or the hotel owned the station and he was able to stay there for nothing he wasn't paid so therefore they would got to get him an accommodation where he didn't have to pay and he was doing fine and I met him in the coffee shop of the Belmont Plaza Hotel one day and I was sitting at the counter having a very loose egg salad sandwich and I bite the sandwich and most of the egg salad is now on my shirt and tie and I look around and there's this handsome guy sitting there hysterical and I left because he left and I looked down he said lick it so I lifted the tie I licked it what else do you want I fixed for spit and we met that way and I knew the moment I looked at him that I found that big brother I found a friend I found someone that that read me apparently and I was in need of someone in my life I was alone pretty much at the time my folks were still on the road I hadn't I wasn't married yet so for two years Dean and I are running into one mother because they pick up my contract at the glass hat I went in for two weeks in stage 66 oh and I was able to put my money away and I was making a lot of money there 100 and a half a week net with a room and I was in heaven and we we got to know one another pretty well and we got into discussions about show business and he was talking about having his nose fixed and I try to talk him out of it I said you're a handsome man you look a little like Danny Thomas but you're a handsome man and he really had a he had a very nice beak he could have been an eagle okay with this beak and I'm trying to talk him out of it and he says I know what you're getting at you don't want me for competition because you're a good-looking kid I said but you're a nice-looking man he said I'm an eagle and we'll fix it he had the nose job done well for the next three or four months I had the most fun with him he's got they they did what'd you do with the nose okay remember we're talking about a lot of years ago when it was still not that technically perfect so he had a shoe to protect the surgery which came down to the lip now when you're carrying this piece of plastic that's up and you got to live I mean it's funny it's just hysterical I said you're not singing with this he said no know how to take two weeks off now he's eating and having to lift this to get the lip to bite well when he lifted this to put a piece of tuna salad in his lip and then when he would drop it the chewing would make it dance where you know there's no sitting there with a straight face and I said are you sure you know what you did did they leave holes for breathing and I went through this for two or three days his nose gets better and he goes back to sustaining and sure enough in that interim Sinatra opened out what was the Rio Bamba he got sick and they called in to replace it well it was a great break for Dean and he went in to Rio de Rio Bhama substituted for Frank but nothing happened so Dean plays the Rio Bamba I don't remember it was two nights or three nights Frank was out with a really bad strep throat and he did terrific but nothing happened from that and I was so disappointed I was there he did great he really was terrific but you know when people buy a ticket to see Frank Sinatra and he's not there they tend to be a little less appreciative and when I say he did great he maintained his I'd have been a nervous wreck and when Dean was nervous you would never be you were never able to tell and I was really disappointed nothing came from it and then he was back on radio and now it's been a year and oh I don't know a year and 10 months that we've been friendly and one night I went to Leon and Eddie's for the celebrity they had celebrity night Leon and Eddie's where everyone in New York was there and I don't know if I ever told you the Sam but it was an incredible I can a movie they announced my name at Leon and Eddie's what and there was four people clapping heard my name no it's the worst sound and children is when you just hear three or four the last thing I heard was a cricket like I don't know what to do so I I get up and I take about and sunny King is M seeing Leon right come on let's get him up folks let's hear it and then you heard five more well I didn't I was don't founded so I get up and thank you ladies and gentlemen I don't talk because I do a record act and I don't know why they asked for me to come here unless they thought I had my records I don't have them so um I'm glad to be here and it's nice everyone is glad and I ran out of air and words and Dean jumps up on the stage hey I saw you at the Belmont Plaza tonight you were terrific I was yeah and we're working together the audience thinks it was a setup and we did ten minutes and it was incredible and it was all about where do you get your records from this is no store what store I don't know and who carries your needles and whatever I have no idea what we did it was terrific they asked us to come back the next Sunday then I go to Atlantic City I don't see Dean now for he went to the real real Cabana in Chicago with buddy Lester I go to Atlantic City to five hundred club and a singer called Jack Randall had a strep throat couldn't go on and skinny D'Amato comes back to me and says we got to get another act you know you've got any suggestions I said no I don't know you want another singer he said no no not another singer I said but wait a minute I know a singer that's not only a singer but I also do stick with him so you could give that you'll be getting two things the singer and the guy that I'll do more than just a record I I didn't know what I was talking about Dean Martin Dean has just come back from Chicago was in New York doing nothing and they called them he came to Atlantic City the first night he goes out and does three songs the orchestra was six pieces Fife and drum I mean we're talking about small little place sat 200 people the 500 club and Dean and I are doing this first show he does his three songs I do my three records and we're off the stage skinny comes backstage and says where's the funny stuff that you were going to do with him I said well you know we have to warm up warm up if in the next show which is on in an hour you don't do something together you both type cement shoes I'm eating a pastrami sandwich and I tore the bag in half and I used a pencil that was laying on the biggest a dresser was a nail so you can see what we had there and I'm writing on this pastrami bag thoughts thinking back to my dad what could we do in the next show and the stains of the pastrami are on the bag the bag is in my safe at my bank at home still got that bag with the rundown of things that I'm thinking and I'm now going to sit with him and tell him what I'm thinking and I did and we went out in the second show and did two hours and 40 minutes I had the bag on the piano so I remember what next stick was that I told him about now I have to say this about Dean and I've said it all of my life he had a brain like a UNIVAC he would soak up what you're telling him and he was incapable of forgetting it I said to him if you just sing gee what I'd love to see that all gang of mine my own gang of mine I'll put on a busboy jacket I'll come out with my hair my hair was like up to here I looked like an Miller I had such a head of hair and it was terrible about a melody here that she fell down a broke her hair wait so I'm I've got this hair right and I put it in my face and part it with grease and I've got the the napkin and Dina singing that old gang of mine and I'm doing goodbye forever I start to cry and that turned into a marvelous bit but Dean was impeccable his natural sense of time was like nothing I'd ever seen in my life he almost knew where I was going when I started he almost knew when to pull back and when to go get me in that first night I was feeling that which of course for the next ten years I found I was working with his genius and for ten years I watched this man do magic his his innate sense of comedy was so give an example the first week were in Atlantic City I know that he's marvelous and I know that Jesus Christ if I can just give him the material to bring out all of that stuff it would be sensational we go to have a cup of coffee after a show one night and he orders pumpkin pie now picture the pumpkin pie the wedge of pumpkin pie I'm watching him he takes the fort and puts it cuts it like you do the edge of the pie but he leaves the little piece there and sticks his fork in the largest part of the pie and sticks it up to his nose and it's licking what's now dripping all over his face and I thought I would have a hemorrhage from laughing it was the most brilliant most marvelous physical heat because he put his napkin on his lap he took the fork and he's building and getting my attention cuts that little piece as most people would take in their mouths and when he stuck the fork in the large part and moved this way I said what I'm you know I got lightning in a bottle hear it and and remember my mind I know we've got to build on what we're doing because the lines around the 500 club are now 100 and hundreds and maybe thousands of people who have heard Matt word to mouth about these two crazy kids into two hours and 20 minutes the first night and now you can't get in path now there's cops and there's police officers on horses that's what happened within seven days I don't think we have what is commensurate with that I think what we have is is a little lightning in the bottle but I was a stickler on getting things nailed and locked in place because I knew from my dad that if you did that you could break out and always come back to what you have locked in place so I was writing every night every single night and then I'd have to catch him coming off the golf course and that would be like 4:00 in the afternoon and I'm sitting in my car waiting for him at the Country Club to drive him home and tell him this stick I just wrote we did it that night and did it the next show and that night I'd write and we would put it in the next night by the time we finished the 500 club we had seven hours of material and all in order but we broke away from it and it was I mean we were getting he was getting a hundred and a half a week I was getting 175 because I did comedy cider $25 more in less than six months we were getting six thousand a week in the first year we were up to 20,000 at the capital theater and 30,000 at the Copa so it happened very very quickly but I had never ever seen what looked like this quiet laid-back man put that brain into first gear on the stage you

Channel: FoundationINTERVIEWS

Views: 830,826

Rating: 4.8076096 out of 5

Keywords: Jerry, Lewis, Interview, Comedy, Comedians, LEwis, MArtin, video, excerpt, oral, history

Id: iKNCm7hSgHo

Length: 15min 29sec (929 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 01 2010