Jerry Lewis stays one in all Hollywood’s most influential comedy stars of all time – however the actor and director was additionally well-known for his explosive character away from the cameras.
Lewis was by no means afraid to talk his thoughts when he was sad, whether or not he was beefing with comedy rivals like Joan Rivers or complaining about being snubbed by the Academy Awards. Whereas the comic was well known as a humanitarian for his work with the Muscular Dystrophy Affiliation (MDA), his partnership with the charity finally soured as nicely close to the tip of his life. Lewis even managed to carry a grudge from past the grave, as he notoriously disinherited his sons and grandchildren from his first marriage to Patti Lewis.
On what would have been Lewis’ 99th birthday on March 16, maintain scrolling for a glance again at a few of the comedy legend’s most infamous public feuds:
Dean Martin
Lewis’s private {and professional} life was outlined by his on-stage partnership with Martin. The pair grew to become one of many world’s most profitable comedy duos after World Battle II, starring in 16 motion pictures and promoting out stay venues throughout the globe.
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Lewis wrote in his 2005 guide Dean and Me that the pair began to butt heads on the peak of their success over Martin’s reluctance to comply with his associate’s artistic steerage. Martin was anxious to pursue solo initiatives, whereas Lewis was insistent that they have been most profitable when working collectively.
The 2 stopped talking across the time of their ultimate stay efficiency on the Copacabana on July 25, 1956 – 10 years to the day after their first-ever efficiency – and wouldn’t reconcile for one more 20 years.
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis John Springer Assortment/CORBIS/Corbis by way of Getty Pictures
Lewis informed Folks in 2002 that he “broke up the act,” which he stated “harm [Dean] desperately.” The pair’s mutual buddy Frank Sinatra famously organized a shock reunion for Martin and Lewis on the 1976 MDA Telethon. The previous buddies briefly appeared collectively on stage to lift cash for Muscular Dystrophy however didn’t reprise any of their previous routines.
Within the biography King of Comedy: The Life and Artwork of Jerry Lewis, creator Shawn Levy wrote that Lewis made “a number of overtures” in direction of reconnecting with Martin after their TV reunion however was ignored. The pair wouldn’t communicate recurrently once more till Martin’s son, Dean Paul Martin, died in a botched army coaching flight for the California Air Nationwide Guard in 1987.
Joan Rivers
The comedy icons took loads of light-hearted jabs at each other all through their careers, however it turned critical when Rivers publicly criticized Lewis’ charity work with MDA. Throughout an look on Sirius XM Radio in 2014, Rivers vowed to by no means carry out on the MDA telethon after observing Lewis brazenly discussing loss of life in entrance of the youngsters he was elevating cash for.
“You don’t say in entrance of a bit of boy who’s going to die, ‘This little one goes to die,’” Rivers angrily declared. “Who’re you? You unfunny, fortunate, silly a–gap? So, he took umbrage!”
Rivers was maybe underestimating Lewis’ response, as a result of he accused her of “setting the Jews again 1,000 years.” In his personal Sirius XM interview that very same 12 months, Lewis stated he would “all the time really feel dangerous when somebody passes away apart from Joan Rivers.”
Joan Rivers Harry Langdon/Getty Pictures
“She went to Israel and uprooted two bushes in my title,” he joked throughout an interview with Maria Menounos.
Lewis objected to Rivers’s declare that the MDA telethon benefited his sagging profession, including: “I wrote her a be aware that night time. I stated: ‘Expensive Ms. Rivers, we by no means met and I’m wanting ahead to conserving it that method.’”
The pair reportedly by no means reconciled earlier than Rivers died because of issues from a throat process in September 2014.
Eddie Murphy
Certainly one of Lewis’s most iconic film performances was his twin roles taking part in neurotic professor Julius Kelp and sinister playboy Buddy Love in 1963’s The Nutty Professor. As a result of Lewis cowrote and produced the comedy traditional, Murphy needed to get his permission to remake The Nutty Professor in 1996.
Lewis consented to Murphy’s remake, although he was disillusioned by the movie. Murphy spoke in press interviews across the time of The Nutty Professor‘s launch about why he solely loosely tailored Lewis’s unique film.
Jerry Lewis seems to be at Stella Stevens in a scene from the movie ‘The Nutty Professor’, 1963. Paramount/Getty Pictures
“The Nutty Professor is the skeleton of the script, and we stripped down the story to its naked bones and constructed it as much as this complete totally different factor,” Murphy informed the Los Angeles Instances.
Regardless of Murphy describing his model of The Nutty Professor as “an homage to Jerry and the way good he was,” Lewis informed Leisure Weekly in 2009 that he regretted his involvement within the remake.
“I’ve such respect for Eddie however I shouldn’t have performed it,” Lewis insisted. “What I did was excellent the primary time round and all you’re going to do is diminish that perfection by letting another person do it. When he needed to do fart jokes, he misplaced me.”
Lewis’ reservations apart, The Nutty Professor remake ushered in a profession renaissance for Murphy and made a staggering $273 million on the worldwide field workplace.
Bing Crosby
Within the early Fifties, two comedy duos dominated the roost in Hollywood – Martin and Lewis, and their predecessors Crosby and Bob Hope. All 4 males got here collectively for a 1952 U.S. Olympics telethon, hosted by Hope and Crosby, the place dangerous blood between the duos got here to the floor stay on air.
After being launched, Lewis rushed to the stage and jumped on Hope, kissing him and hugging him within the trademark model of his energetic alter-ego “The Little Boy.” Crosby wished no a part of Lewis’s act and instantly left the stage. Lewis and Martin repeatedly known as for Crosby to come back again so they may proceed their deliberate routine, however the cohost flatly refused.
“He’s hiding and I don’t blame him,” Hope joked to viewers.
Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin Paramount Photos/Getty Pictures
Crosby by no means defined his stay TV stroll off, however there was hypothesis that he was afraid Lewis would pull off his toupee. In a TV interview many years later, Lewis confirmed that he “by no means spoke to Crosby” once more after their telethon debacle.
“That he didn’t know me nicely sufficient to know I’d by no means do such a factor [as pull off his toupee],” Lewis insisted. “I used to be so offended by it that, that was ’52, within the subsequent eight years, I by no means talked to Crosby and our dressing rooms have been proper adjoining to 1 one other.”
MDA
Lewis was the general public face of the Muscular Dystrophy Affiliation for greater than 40 years and host of its annual Labor Day weekend telethon. The charity leaned into its affiliation with the Hollywood famous person by referring to Muscular Dystrophy sufferers as “Jerry’s Children.”
All through their many years of affiliation, Lewis and MDA have been criticised by some for utilizing a “pity method” to generate donations. Incapacity activists – together with a gaggle calling itself Jerry’s Orphans – complained about MDA’s fundraising tactic, saying it took away the company of individuals residing with Muscular Dystrophy to depict them as pitiable.
By the 2010s, the skilled partnership between Lewis and MDA soured. Lewis famously needed to apologize for utilizing a homophobic slur in a joke on the telethon. He additionally had a historical past of creating controversial statements through the annual present, such because the time he inspired drug-traffickers in Miami to donate their earnings to MDA with a view to absolve their responsible consciences.
Jerry Lewis speaks through the forty fourth annual Labor Day Telethon. Ethan Miller/Getty Pictures
In 2011, MDA introduced that Lewis was abruptly stepping down from his position inside the group, although neither facet supplied any rationalization as to why. Negotiations came about about Lewis saying goodbye to viewers on that 12 months’s telethon, however phrases have been by no means reached. MDA declined to say its lengthy affiliation with Lewis in any respect in all the press supplies for its telethon in 2012.
Lewis initially stayed silent about his cut up from MDA, however finally made it clear to Time journal that he was sad about the way in which his departure was dealt with.
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“That’s not a spot I need to go. As a result of if I am going there, you’ll by no means get me again,” he warned in 2012. “It’s not that I don’t need to speak about it. However I’ve already ingested all that I need from that complete f—ing journey.”
MDA rebranded its yearly televised fundraising drive as its Present of Energy, quite than calling it a telethon, following Lewis’s departure. In more moderen years, Kevin Hart has change into a spokesperson for the group in a task just like the one Lewis as soon as held.
The Lewis Kids
Lewis had an acrimonious cut up from first spouse Patti in 1980, with a authorized conflict between the previous couple carrying on for 3 years till they lastly reached a divorce settlement in 1983. Jerry allegedly had a baby with Lynn Dixon Kleinman outdoors of his marriage in 1952.
Following his divorce, the comedian reportedly had a rocky relationship along with his and Patti’s six sons, particularly after he married second spouse SanDee Pitnick in 1983. Jerry and SanDee’s daughter Danielle was born in 1992 and regularly appeared along with her father on his annual MDA telethon.
In 2009, Jerry’s youngest son, Joseph Lewis, died by suicide after scuffling with dependancy all through his life. Jerry reacted to his son’s loss of life 5 years later by telling The Hollywood Reporter that the tragedy was “unfair.”
Jerry Lewis and his son Gary, of their residence. Hulton Archive/Getty Pictures
“To today I don’t perceive it as a result of it’s unfair — not unfair to me, however unfair to him,” Lewis stated . “That he went that method made the unfairness stupidity. However he was my son and he’s gone, and there’s not so much I can do about that. I beat myself a thousand instances. Sam will come to me and say, ‘Are we beating ourselves once more?’ I’ll say, ‘Slightly bit.’ [She’ll say]: ‘You had nothing to do with that. You despatched him out into the world when he was 25. You despatched what you thought was an ideal human being. What he did along with his time away from you is what the tip consequence confirmed.’ However I’ll let you know this: You don’t recover from that.”
Jerry died from coronary heart failure at age 91 in 2017. It was later reported that Jerry’s will particularly acknowledged that his sons and their youngsters “shall obtain no advantages” from his fortune.
Jerry Lewis at residence along with his 4 sons in circa 1956 in Los Angeles, California. Richard C. Miller/Donaldson Assortment/Getty Pictures
Jerry’s son Gary Lewis – a musician who had a Billboard No. 1 hit with “This Diamond Ring” in February 1965 – was quoted saying his father was “by no means loving and caring” in direction of his youngsters. Nonetheless, Jerry and Patti’s son Christopher Lewis supplied a extra optimistic portrait of life with the comic in a 2025 interview with Nearer.
“I can’t let you know what number of dinners I sat at that I couldn’t eat as a result of I used to be laughing so exhausting,” Christopher recalled. “My mother can be so mad at him. She’s like, ‘Would you cease and allow them to eat?’ Which might encourage him extra to make us snicker.”
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