Jerry Lewis, RIP

The Nutty Professor shows the troubled, naïve vein of seriousness on which Lewis's comedy is based.
--David Thomson, The New Biographical Dictionary of Film

I have written about Lewis mostly in his relationship with Frank Tashlin (April 11, 2014; Oct. 22, 2015; March 25, 2016) but he did direct six significant and innovative films, The Bellboy in 1960 and The Nutty Professor in 1963 being my favorites. After 1970 he was burned out, as often happened quickly with comedy directors, and his serious 1974 film, The Day the Clown Cried, was never released, for unknown reasons. He did do some serious work after that, particularly with Martin Scorsese in The King of Comedy in 1983 and in the TV show "Wiseguy" (1988-89) but probably is known mostly now for his yearly telethon for muscular dystrophy, though even that stopped several years ago, after that slobbering spectacle of sentimentality raised over two billion dollars.

Not that long ago it was difficult to defend John Wayne because of his right-wing politics.  Now that his political views are being forgotten his roles for Howard Hawks and John Ford are being appreciated for their power and beauty.  I think eventually Jerry Lewis's public persona will fade and his movies will be appreciated for their exceptional visual humor, something some French critics have long understood and appreciated.  Lewis -- like Chaplin, Stan Laurel, Buster Keaton -- played a little man beset by an incomprehensible world and in his case found his own exaggerated and goofy response to modern life. I, for one, am sorry that J.D. Salinger would not sell him the rights to make a film of Catcher in the Rye.