Jerry Lewis

Jerry Lewis (1926-2017)

I want to salute today one of the greatest entertainers of all time, my favorite childhood comedian who made us laugh with his energetic and slapstick humor. Jerry Lewis died last Sunday August 20, aged 91. Incidentally I just wrote an article about him in a local newspaper a month ago, in the series of profiles I share with the Maltese, and people told me how much they enjoyed it, especially since they did not know about his philanthropic Telethon, where he raised over £2.6 billion for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. Born Joseph Levitch of Jewish-Russian parents in New Jersey in 1926, he was introduced to comedy and the world of entertainment by his parents, his mother being a pianist and his father a Master of Ceremonies in a popular show. He appeared on TV for the first time with Dean Martin in 1948, and together they made 10 classic movies between 1949 and 1956, besides many TV shows. After they split in 1956, Jerry continued making one film after another, all with his inimitable slapstick humor.

Among his most popular films, we can mention At War with the Army (1950), Living it up (1954), The Delicate Delinquent (1957), Rock-A-Bye-Baby (1958),  The Geisha Boy(1958), The Ladies Man (1961), The Errand Boy (1961), It's Only Money (1962), The Nutty Professor (1963), The Big Mouth (1967), Don't Raise the Bridge, Lower the River (1968), Hardly Working (1981), The King of Comedy (1983), Cracking up (1983), and Max Rose (2013.) In all Jerry made 63 films, and frequently appeared on TV shows with Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr, and an occasional reunion with Dean Martin. Between 1966 and 2010, every year on Labor Day weekend, on the first Monday of September, Jerry Lewis would host the Muscular Dystrophy Telethon, a sickness that effects the muscles close to the bones, and this to help especially the young children, known as Jerry’s Kids, affected by this illness. Over the years he raised $2.6 billion for this cause. Another of our beloved, clean and family-oriented comedians is gone.