Read Online Dean and Me: A Love Story by James Kaplan, Jerry Lewis - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: James Kaplan, Jerry Lewis
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Freeman, William Holden, William Demarest, and Dorothy Lamour. . . . All big, big names of the day. I tapped my partner on the shoulder and—I couldn’t help myself— screamed, “Now,
this
is show business!” Despite his blasé appearance, I knew Dean couldn’t have agreed with me more. He idolized Raft, who’d had a rough background similar to his own. As a kid, he’d seen every movie the tough-guy actor ever made.
As the sun set, Keller came by Raft’s house to pick us up for our press conference at the Brown Derby. When we got there, we met the queen of gossip columnists, Louella Parsons, aka The Headhunter from Hearst. She spoke like a Muppet without a hand up her back. As she interviewed us, she wrote on a little pad given to her by the Shah of Iran during a polo match at the Will Rogers estate in Pacific Palisades on a hot summer day when Clark Gable was sitting on a horse but couldn’t get a game.... We found all this out because we asked, “Where did you get the cute pad?”
Lolly Parsons may have sounded like Betty Boop, but she wielded a lot of power. She was the Big Mamoo, the Chief, the Ultimate Journalist. Give me a break. She was an old, fat has-been who couldn’t make it in Hollywood, so she made it with everyone she could, including William Randolph Hearst. She’d tried acting and flunked, and Mr. Hearst needed a spy to live in the underbrush of Hollywood and tell him all the stuff that eccentric old men need to hear, so poof! She was a columnist.
At the press conference, Lolly tried to take us down a peg. Sure, we’d been a hit in New York, but Hollywood was a very different place, she told us. From the outset, though, I made it clear that I wasn’t about to kneel before her. “We’ll be an even bigger hit here,” I predicted flatly. Lolly made a face like she’d bitten a lemon. I was always outspoken and honest with her, and would eventually get in deep trouble because of it. Later Keller said, “If you think of the cosmos, we are but sand on a world of beaches . . . we almost mean nothing when you count it all. What are you trying to be? The conscience of the world of show business? Wise up, sonny. They won’t hear you, but I love that you try!”
At the Brown Derby, Dean whispered to me, “Please, don’t flag-wave. We’re lucky we’re here!”
I said, “We’re not lucky! We’re good at what we do, and don’t ever forget that.” Then I made the face of a little kid who has just spoken out of turn. . . .
That night we opened at Slapsy Maxie’s, on the Miracle Mile—Wilshire Boulevard between Fairfax and La Brea. After all the publicity about these two crazy people, the Crooner and the Monkey, every big shot in town had come to watch.
It was an era when all the stars went out at night—to dance and dine, to see and be seen. Los Angeles was a city of fabulous nightclubs: Ciro’s, Mocambo, Trocadero. But the biggest, poshest, most fashionable club in L.A. was Slapsy Maxie’s. The ringside was huge—it looked like 180 degrees when you were standing at the center of that great stage. And at the tables were (get a load of this): Barbara Stanwyck, Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Jane Wyman, Ronald Reagan, James Cagney, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Donald O’Connor, Debbie Reynolds, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Rita Hayworth, Orson Welles, The Marx Brothers (the important ones: Harpo and Chico), Edward G. Robinson, Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Carmen Miranda, Al Jolson, Mel Tormé, Count Basie, the whole “Metro” group, including Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney, not to mention Greer Garson, Spencer Tracy, William Powell, Billy Wilder, June Allyson, and Gloria De Haven (more about these last two soon)....
Keller was outside our dressing room, announcing every name as they entered the club—names that could not only excite but make you shake with fear. . . . And we were about to go out there in front of all those people and do our stuff.
I looked at Dean a moment, and he saw the
this
is show business!” Despite his blasé appearance, I knew Dean couldn’t have agreed with me more. He idolized Raft, who’d had a rough background similar to his own. As a kid, he’d seen every movie the tough-guy actor ever made.
As the sun set, Keller came by Raft’s house to pick us up for our press conference at the Brown Derby. When we got there, we met the queen of gossip columnists, Louella Parsons, aka The Headhunter from Hearst. She spoke like a Muppet without a hand up her back. As she interviewed us, she wrote on a little pad given to her by the Shah of Iran during a polo match at the Will Rogers estate in Pacific Palisades on a hot summer day when Clark Gable was sitting on a horse but couldn’t get a game.... We found all this out because we asked, “Where did you get the cute pad?”
Lolly Parsons may have sounded like Betty Boop, but she wielded a lot of power. She was the Big Mamoo, the Chief, the Ultimate Journalist. Give me a break. She was an old, fat has-been who couldn’t make it in Hollywood, so she made it with everyone she could, including William Randolph Hearst. She’d tried acting and flunked, and Mr. Hearst needed a spy to live in the underbrush of Hollywood and tell him all the stuff that eccentric old men need to hear, so poof! She was a columnist.
At the press conference, Lolly tried to take us down a peg. Sure, we’d been a hit in New York, but Hollywood was a very different place, she told us. From the outset, though, I made it clear that I wasn’t about to kneel before her. “We’ll be an even bigger hit here,” I predicted flatly. Lolly made a face like she’d bitten a lemon. I was always outspoken and honest with her, and would eventually get in deep trouble because of it. Later Keller said, “If you think of the cosmos, we are but sand on a world of beaches . . . we almost mean nothing when you count it all. What are you trying to be? The conscience of the world of show business? Wise up, sonny. They won’t hear you, but I love that you try!”
At the Brown Derby, Dean whispered to me, “Please, don’t flag-wave. We’re lucky we’re here!”
I said, “We’re not lucky! We’re good at what we do, and don’t ever forget that.” Then I made the face of a little kid who has just spoken out of turn. . . .
That night we opened at Slapsy Maxie’s, on the Miracle Mile—Wilshire Boulevard between Fairfax and La Brea. After all the publicity about these two crazy people, the Crooner and the Monkey, every big shot in town had come to watch.
It was an era when all the stars went out at night—to dance and dine, to see and be seen. Los Angeles was a city of fabulous nightclubs: Ciro’s, Mocambo, Trocadero. But the biggest, poshest, most fashionable club in L.A. was Slapsy Maxie’s. The ringside was huge—it looked like 180 degrees when you were standing at the center of that great stage. And at the tables were (get a load of this): Barbara Stanwyck, Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, Jane Wyman, Ronald Reagan, James Cagney, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Donald O’Connor, Debbie Reynolds, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Rita Hayworth, Orson Welles, The Marx Brothers (the important ones: Harpo and Chico), Edward G. Robinson, Bob Hope, Bing Crosby, Carmen Miranda, Al Jolson, Mel Tormé, Count Basie, the whole “Metro” group, including Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney, not to mention Greer Garson, Spencer Tracy, William Powell, Billy Wilder, June Allyson, and Gloria De Haven (more about these last two soon)....
Keller was outside our dressing room, announcing every name as they entered the club—names that could not only excite but make you shake with fear. . . . And we were about to go out there in front of all those people and do our stuff.
I looked at Dean a moment, and he saw the
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