Actors - Jerry Lewis

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	Actors - Jerry Lewis

Jerry Lewis (born Joseph Levitch March 16, 1926), is an American comedian, actor, producer, and director, known for his slapstick humor and his charity fund-raising telethons for the Muscular Dystrophy Association.

Career

Lewis was born in Newark, New Jersey to a Jewish American family, the son of a vaudeville performer named Danny Lewis, He began in burlesque in 1942 at age 16 (if the birth year of 1926 is correct) and married two years later in 1944 at age 18. He gained initial fame with singer Dean Martin, who served as a straight man to Lewis' manic, zany antics as the Martin and Lewis comedy team. They distinguished themselves from the majority of comedy acts of the 1940s by relying on the interaction of the two comics instead of pre-planned skits. In the late forties, they quickly rose to national prominence, first with their popular nightclub act and then as film stars. Critics often found it difficult to describe their chaotic act beyond the laconic "Martin sings and Lewis clowns". They continued to perform in film and on television until their partnership ended in 1956. Following their split, the two became involved in a well-publicized and long-running feud that never truly ended; the next time they were seen together in public would be a surprise appearance by Martin on Lewis's telethon in 1976, arranged by Frank Sinatra. Lewis wrote of his kinship with Martin in the 2005 book Dean and Me (A Love Story). When Frank tried to bring Lewis back to Martin, Jerry was quoted as saying "I'll never work with that drunk ever again". Dean died and unfortunately to Martin-Lewis fans, there was never any reunion.

Lewis returned as a solo act with his debut film The Delicate Delinquent in 1957. Teaming with director Frank Tashlin, whose background as a cartoonist suited Lewis's brand of humor, he starred in five more films before he produced, directed, co-wrote with Bill Richmond, and starred in his own movie entitled The Bellboy in 1960. Using the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami as his setting, on a small budget, a very tight shooting schedule and no script, Lewis shot the film by day and performed at the hotel in the evenings. During production, Lewis developed the technique of using video cameras and multiple closed circuit monitors to allow him to view scenes at the same time as he was filming them. This allowed him to review his performance instantly. Later, he incorporated video tape, and as more portable and affordable equipment became available, this technique would become an industry standard known as video assist.

Lewis directed several more films which he co-wrote with Richmond including The Ladies Man
, The Errand Boy, and the iconic film, The Nutty Professor
. During this period he was consistently praised by some highbrow French critics in the influential Cahiers du Cinéma for his absurd comedy, in part because he had gained respect as an auteur who had total control over all aspects of his films, comparable to Howard Hawks and Alfred Hitchcock. This is the likely origin of the common but inaccurate belief in the United States that Lewis is a superstar in France.

Lewis' box office appeal waned by the mid 1960s. In 1966, he began hosting an annual Labor Day Telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, a charity with which he had been publicly associated since 1950.

Later, Lewis starred in and directed the unreleased The Day The Clown Cried in 1972. The film was a comedy set in a Nazi concentration camp. Lewis has explained why the film hasn't been released by suggesting litigation over post-production financial difficulties. It has been seen by very few select individuals, but those who see it either praise it for comedic genius or decry it as the utmost in bad taste (as Spy Magazine did in 1992).

After an eight year absence from movies, Lewis returned in the early 1980s with Hardly Working, a film he both directed and starred in. He followed this up with a critically acclaimed performance in Martin Scorsese's 1983 film The King of Comedy in which Lewis plays a late night TV host plagued by an obsessive fan. Ironically, the role had been offered to, and turned down by, Dean Martin. Lewis continued doing interesting work in small films in the 1990s, most notably his supporting role in the underappreciated dark comedy, Funny Bones (1996), and also in Arizona Dream
(1993).

Jerry and his popular movie characters were animated in the cartoon series Will The Real Jerry Lewis Please Sit Down? which premiered on ABC and lasted two seasons from 1970 to 1972. The show was produced at Filmation Studios, and starred David Lander (later of Laverne and Shirley fame) as the voice of Jerry Lewis. Only 17 episodes were created. Jerry Lewis was the show's partner.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Jerry Lewis ]

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Actors - Jerry Lewis

Career

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