It was a Labor Day tradition for God knows how many years. For close to 24 hours Jerry would stage an all-star glitzy show from Las Vegas raising money for Muscular Dystrophy (a more than worthwhile cause). The show was always entertaining in a mega cheese way. Jerry presented the last gasp of Rat Pack-era Vegas entertainment along with healthy dollops of oozing sincerity and self-importance.
The telethon has been gone for a number of years now. Jerry himself is gone. But I found this clip that in eleven minutes pretty much encapsulates everything the Jerry Lewis Telethon was. The entertainment and the treacle.
So for a few minutes, lets return to Labor Days gone by. Oh... and wear a mask.
I would stay up all night to catch the big acts. Cheesy, yes. But hearing Jerry sing at the end made me cry every year. I understand why they took him off the telethon, but it was a crappy thing to do.
ReplyDeletePam, St Louis
When you walk through a storm...
ReplyDeleteLike I always say, it isn't Labor Day (or a telethon) until someone sings "You'll Never Walk Alone."
ReplyDeleteSurely the finest version of You'll Never Walk Alone is the one sung by the Cheers gang for Carla.
Deletehttps://youtu.be/-vC83ewqPNw
Letterman said pretty much the same thing about the telethon in a 1980s Playboy interview. But then this was the same interview where he praised The Love Boat as "solid American fare".
ReplyDeleteThat bit where Jerry picks up Sammy and says, "I'd like to accept this award from the NAACP." You know who else once did that? Jerry's old partner Dean Martin, when he, Sammy, and Sinatra were appearing in some close-circuit TV broadcast in Vegas in 1965. It's since been shown on either Nick at Nite or TVLand (or both.).
ReplyDeleteI know that Dean Martin often "acted" drunk to play up that image even when he wasn't. But man did he seem sloshed during that reunion. Does anyone know if he really was?
ReplyDeleteAmazing how they magically hit their goal in the final minutes every year.
ReplyDeleteThey raised $2.4 billion, still no cure.
Hope we have better luck with COVID.
Speaking of icons appearing on the Jerry Lewis MDA telethon, ladies & gentlemen, John Lennon & Yoko
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEGTV8usZsI
In the immortal words of Sammy Davis, JR : "chonk, kachonk, chonk."
ReplyDeleteIs the Chabad telethon still happening? I haven't seen it since I lived in New York.
ReplyDeleteJerry's was only the best known of many telethons -- remember Dennis James for cerebral palsy? Their legacy is FarmAid, LiveAid, Comic Relief and other fund-raising events for worthy causes worldwide. There's probably one being organized for Beirut, which is in a desperate condition.
I was fortunate to have been at live performances of Sammy Davis, Red Skelton, Frank Sinatra and Jerry Lewis. In my opinion, there’s a reason those guys and other men and women like them are iconic performers. Whether you laughed or cried, they did the same thing great literature, great TV shows like MASH, CHEERS, etc., did...they crawled in, touched our hearts, our souls and gave us permission to feel.
ReplyDeleteI got to know Jerry Lewis a bit. Always nice to me, but could be a very difficult, unpleasant fellow at times. What quickly became crystal clear was, like it or not, he always told his truth. His speech about Sammy Davis at the end of the clip was certainly from his heart. They burned very bright next to each other for much of their adult lives. They loved each other. Without question, a painful loss. I admired his courage to be in the moment and splay himself open in front of millions. Was it designed to help move people to donate? Sure. It was also designed to make us all feel something. And those folks were geniuses at it.
I miss them all.
Well, Frank Sinatra certainly crawled in, touched the women he raped, like Natalie Wood and Marilyn Monroe, destroyed their souls and gave them permission to feel agony. Otherwise a fine performer.
DeleteI remember the first time the MDA telethon went over one million dollars. The tote board only had six columns. Jerry took a paint brush and and added a "1" to the board. Once that barrier was broken the donations grew larger every year. Eventually reaching the tens-of-millions.
ReplyDeleteI had a love/hate relationship with the telethon. While I always enjoyed the show it signaled the end of summer vacation. That meant we had to go back to school the next day.
Hey Jeff Maxwell! I watched "Kentucky Fried Movie, The" a couple of weeks ago.😉
M.B.
My first job in TV was at a station that aired The JLT. We did local cut-ins that brought the schlock to ground level. It also meant we had to stay up all night watching this thing.
ReplyDeleteThe incalculably massive good that Jerry created in this world is in the pantheon of goodness in history. I knew a family in Massachusetts for whom he dropped his evening plans so he could host them for a wonderful dinner. No, the illness which drew them to his attention was not MD. It was a fantastic example of character revealed.
ReplyDeleteNow, what I loathed with the fire of many suns...the way the local talent would glom on to the local hits and become "celebrities." Too many of them acted like they were freaking saints. The way they would carry on about the annual seminar MDA would put on for them all was a disgrace. How ELITE they all were - how SELF-IMPORTANT. Too many were simply feeding egos. Infuriating. Not all. Probably not most. But too many.
On the awesome side of things...the firemen with their boots. Heroes recognize.
This also brings up my 1960's youthful love of the original Jerry Lewis movies like The Bellboy and The Nutty Professor. I thought these were the funniest, most clever comedies possible. That is until I saw them again 30 years later. They are mostly awful. The Nutty Professor's alter ego Buddy Love is a complete asshole. Back then he was supposed to be ultra cool.
ReplyDeleteHopefully Adam Sandler fans will have this same realization in a decade or two.
'Troy McClure said...Well, Frank Sinatra certainly crawled in, touched the women he raped, like Natalie Wood and Marilyn Monroe'..
ReplyDeleteThere is no evidence that Sinatra 'raped' anyone, it is baseless internet gossip spread by fools, including on this site, surprisingly.
It's not baseless. There have been multiple accounts of women who were raped, all of whom were either too scared to press charges and only confided in friends or did report their attack and weren't believed.
DeleteWe also know for a fact he was close pals with ruthless mobsters.
Any way you look at it, he wasn't a good guy.
But yeah he could hold a tune.
The tribute to Mr. Davis was heartfelt.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad Buttermilk Sky acknowledged Dennis James, and I'll mention Lou Rawls, who for years led a telethon for the United Negro College Fund, which had perhaps the best motto ever conceived: A mind is a terrible thing to waste.
Let's drop this thread now. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteKen
The Jerry Lewis Telethon, I remember black tuxedos and lots of smoking.
ReplyDeleteMike Bloodworth nailed it. It was a blast to watch...especially the local cut-ins. Might get to see Beaver Cleaver from Ten-Q or any local jock manning the phone's. All the while, Ron Masak was pleading for money at 3am on KTTV Metromedia 11. But it sucked knowing summer is officially over and back to school. When you walk through a storm...
ReplyDeleteMike Bloodworth nailed it. It was a blast to watch...especially the local cut-ins. Might get to see Beaver Cleaver from Ten-Q or any local jock manning the phone's. All the while, Ron Masak was pleading for money at 3am on KTTV Metromedia 11. But it sucked knowing summer is officially over and back to school. When you walk through a storm...
ReplyDeleteLemuel,
ReplyDeleteThe Love Boat ran for 9 seasons -
that's pretty solid for prime time TV.
Every year I saw the telethon, Andy Williams would sing and then hand a check with a large donation to Jerry Lewis. Jerry always acted surprised by Williams' generous donation. When they invited Williams to sing, I wonder if after a few years they just took it for granted he'd also make a donation?
ReplyDeleteIt does seem cheesy looking back, but there was a lot of good entertainment mixed in there. We used to keep it going in the background and keep an ear out for the good stuff, but we weren't watching nonstop. I'd complain that networks today wouldn't get behind something it on the same scale today; but to be honest, even if they would, I am not up on contemporary artists and probably wouldn't appreciate it the way I did back then. Dang, I might be getting old!
ReplyDeleteTo a kid growing up in the 70s, it was awful. As an adult now I'm more than happy that they did it, for a great cause.
ReplyDeleteI would watch it to see how Jerry acted when he was too sleep deprived to put on a show. The answer was anti-climatic in one way (just like everyone else who hadn't slept in a long time) and not in another: it knocked some of the patina off the show business story.
ReplyDeleteSean
What I liked about it as a kid was simply that it was on all night. All the other stations were snow.
ReplyDeleteThe famed Martin & Lewis reunion occurred on the telethon, set up by Frank Sinatra.
ReplyDeleteBelieve is or not Kevin is hosting a revived version,
ReplyDeletehttps://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/kevin-hart-to-host-relaunch-of-muscular-dystrophy-association-telethon
Believe is or not Kevin is hosting a revived version,
ReplyDeletehttps://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/kevin-hart-to-host-relaunch-of-muscular-dystrophy-association-telethon