Subject: [removed] Digest V2002 #350
From: "OldRadio Mailing Lists" <[removed]@[removed];
Date: 9/8/2002 10:50 AM
To: <[removed]@[removed];

------------------------------


                            The Old-Time Radio Digest!
                              Volume 2002 : Issue 350
                         A Part of the [removed]!
                                 ISSN: 1533-9289


                                 Today's Topics:

  Re: Martin and Lewis Feud             [ "Michael Hayde" <mmeajv@[removed]; ]
  Greatest OTR show                     [ "Richard Carpenter" <sinatra@raging ]
  If hope vs crosby wasnt a feud, then  [ Bill Harris <radioguy@[removed] ]
  OLDE TYME RADIO NETWORK SCHEDULE      [ HERITAGE4@[removed] ]
  Re: Segregation in the North          [ Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed] ]
  Feuds                                 [ Bill Harris <radioguy@[removed] ]
  The disipline of history              [ "Brian Johnson" <CHYRONOP@worldnet. ]
  Roosevelt and "internment camps" dur  [ Jer51473@[removed] ]
  SAMBO                                 [ Sandy Singer <sinatradj@[removed]; ]
  Internment camps                      [ charles <chascav@[removed]; ]

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 7 Sep 2002 23:42:25 -0400
From: "Michael Hayde" <mmeajv@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Re: Martin and Lewis Feud

Kenneth Clarke wrote:
I've also heard about a feud between Dean Martin
and Jerry Lewis.  Is it true?  Does anyone have any details?
Did it exist during their time on radio or later?

Hoo boy.  On the surface, Dean and Jerry's was the quintessential show biz
feud, but that's mainly due to the highly colored volumes penned by Arthur
Marx, Nick Tosches and others, and the varying degrees of anger, hurt,
bitterness and indifference registered by the principals during the years
after their breakup.

I've been researching this subject for a project that's now on hold, thanks
to Jerry Lewis's forthcoming volume on his years in the team, for which he's
reportedly received a million dollar advance.  The end result is bound to be
an interesting, if not entirely reliable, read.  I'm going to apologize
right here for the length of what's to come, but it's been hanging over my
head for a long time, and I need to let it out.

There are two persistent myths about Martin and Lewis that should be
dismissed as soon as possible.  First: that Dean Martin sashayed through
life without caring a rat's posterior about anyone or anything - especially
Jerry Lewis.  One thing life teaches us is that it's only the people we
deeply care for who are capable of causing us great hurt and anger.  And
each man *was* hurt by the other, more than once, and that bitterness lasted
at least twenty years.  In fact, it took Dean a whole lot longer to "get
over it" than it did Jerry.

The other myth is that Jerry spent their entire partnership years trying to
build himself up at Dean's expense.  In truth, what made their work together
so dazzling, so captivating, is that each man made the other look positively
brilliant.  At their height, they were the highest paid, most successful act
in show business.  The Smoothie from Steubenville and the Nebbish from
Newark transcended any demographic you'd care to name when they were
together.  America loved them.  And discovering their TV and radio shows
during the early fifties is to enjoy two guys in love with each other and
their work, and having the time of their lives.

So what happened?  Ironically, things began to unravel just after their
second radio series ended.  When "That's Amore" became Dean's first big
smash at the end of 1953, it created a strain.  Martin was justifiably proud
of his accomplishment; it was something he'd been striving for since before
the team was born.  Unfortunately, the insecurity within Lewis's psyche that
had remained relatively under control during the glory years began to flare.
  Maybe Dean would decide that he didn't need Jerry anymore.  Maybe Dean was
beginning to listen to those hangers-on who enjoyed telling each one that
he'd be greater without the other.  Rather than talk out his feelings, Lewis
began to brood - and to assert his presence in their act.

And Dean noticed.  There's a telling moment during their "Radio and
Television Party for Muscular Dystrophy" (which aired on the ABC network
during Thanksgiving 1953), where Dean, introducing a serious song from his
partner, ad libs, "He's not skinny anymore, he's gained quite a bit of
[removed] most of it in his head."  Later still, Jerry ORDERS Dean - coldly,
and in his normal voice - to move the piano into the wings.

During the first half of "Colgate Comedy Hour" that aired on January 10,
1954, Jerry presents Dean with a gold record for "That's Amore."  At the
close of the show, as Dean is trying to sing the song, Jerry has the
cameramen push Dean into a corner; whereupon "the monkey" climbs up on "the
organ grinder's" shoulders and *repeatedly* slams his hand against Dean's
right ear.  Dean, trying to go along with the gag, does a little mock
crying.  Jerry starts pulling Dean's hair, and Dean cries out, "You're
over-acting, Jerry!" - their code phrase, used by one whenever the other was
getting carried away.  Lewis, however, continues boxing Martin's ears and
pulling his hair until Dean, *clearly* angry now, says, "It's over!"  And
the picture fades.

One month later, while in Phoenix shooting "Three Ring Circus," Dean
discovered that Jerry was being interviewed alone, and a fuse finally blew:
"Anytime you wanna call it quits, just let me know," said Martin before
storming off.  It didn't help that the script for "Three Ring Circus"
emphasized Jerry Lewis as a sympathetic clown, with Dean in a minor role as
a selfish heel.  The two men didn't speak for the next eight days, and
shooting was suspended.  They were forced into a cordial reconciliation by
their agency (MCA) and Paramount brass, but it was another month before the
two men decided they'd better sit down together and really talk things out.

But it was never *quite* the same after that.  Dean later made it clear that
it was their films - the one element of their work destined for posterity -
that dissatisfied him the most.  Most of them - especially those produced by
Hal Wallis - were cut from the same cloth: Jerry was the innocent simpleton
hero and Dean the smooth sharpie who never seemed deserving of Jerry's
friendship until the final reel when he suddenly became "a right guy."

The inevitable next blow-up came in June 1955 when Jerry scheduled the
premiere of "You're Never Too Young" - which had been produced by the team's
own company, York Productions - at Brown's Hotel in the Catskills, where
Lewis did his earliest performances.  Martin didn't like the idea, pointing
out that *his* career didn't begin there, but chose not to argue.  Instead,
he simply told Lewis, "I don't give a #$%& where we hold it," and simply
opted not to show up.  For Jerry, it was like a stab in the back.  This
time, the two didn't speak for eight *weeks.*

Once more, MCA and Paramount gave them a facts-of-life briefing, and the two
announced a reconciliation in August.  But it was mainly a facade.  Neither
man could bring himself to trust the other again, and the very real
affection each had felt degenerated into deep hurt.  They went through the
motions, but it all became too much.  In early 1956, Jerry made one final
attempt to reclaim the love between them by commissioning a script that told
a modern-day Damon and Pythias story - a sympathetic cop (Dean) risks his
career and life by taking a young juvenile delinquent (Jerry) under his wing
and teaching him to be a policeman.  Unfortunately, Jerry commissioned this
script from Don McGuire, the writer of "Three Ring Circus."  McGuire made no
secret his opinion of Martin's thespian skills: "He could barely talk" - and
as before gave Jerry the bulk of the film.

Not surprisingly, Dean hated the script and refused to do it.  It was
another crushing blow to Lewis, and the result was that they went through
the production of their latest film, the Wallis-produced "Hollywood or
Bust," without speaking to each other off camera.  It was the first time
they'd actually worked together under those [removed] and the last.
Toward the end of the shoot, Lewis tried one last time to reach Martin,
venturing his opinion that it was "the love we have for each other" that
made them as great as they were.  Dean's reply? "You can talk about love all
you want. To me, you're nothing but a dollar sign."

That was it.  After nearly two years, both men had finally found something
they could agree on - they didn't want to be partners anymore.  All of MCA's
horses and all of Paramount's men couldn't put Martin and Lewis together
again, and they parted ways in July 1956 - exactly ten years after they'd
teamed.  Only Hal Wallis balked, granting the two permission to do only one
film apart.  And so Lewis made the Damon and Pythias picture - now titled
"The Delicate Delinquent" - with Darren McGavin, and had a smash hit.  Dean
went on loan to MGM and made "Ten Thousand Bedrooms" - and flopped badly.

Suddenly, in late 1956, Dean was telling the press that he wouldn't be
averse to making a movie or two with Jerry again, "if we can find the right
story."  After all, they both still owned York Productions.  But Jerry,
who'd already had more hurt from Dean than his ego could stand, put a stop
to that.  *His* comments to the press were along the lines of: "after ten
years, I'm rid of a cancer" and other such pleasantries.  The final thrust
came in a LOOK magazine article written by Lewis and journalist Bill
Davidson. Jerry depicted Dean as lazy and unappreciative of all that had
been done for him by his loving partner.  Most damaging was Lewis's
assertion that trouble between the partners began with Martin's 1949
marriage to Jeanne Bieggers - "suddenly our families weren't friendly
anymore."  Now it was Dean's turn to feel stabbed in the back.  It was fine
for the two to snipe at each other man-to-man, but how dare Jerry take
potshots at Dean's wife?  In Martin's eyes, it was the lowest of blows, and
the pain would sting even after he and Jeanne had divorced.  Dean
immediately ordered his lawyers to sell his share of York to Jerry, and Hal
Wallis was forced to acknowledge reality and revised their contracts.

That's how things stood until September 1976, when Frank Sinatra requested
that Dean accompany him to Jerry's MDA Telethon, and effect a
reconciliation.  Dean recognized that Sinatra's "request" was in fact a
command, but he went along with the idea, albeit reluctantly.  The resulting
reunion was touching to see, but once it was over, Dean went back to
ignoring Jerry and sniping about him and their films together to the press.
Still, Lewis was impressed that Dean even showed up and allowed the ice to
thaw.

The feud finally ended in 1987, with the sudden, tragic death of Dean and
Jeanne's eldest son, Dean-Paul (Dino).  Jerry attended the funeral but stood
in the back and quietly left without greeting Dean, respecting the solemnity
of the occasion and refusing to let the papparazzi make a tabloid story out
of it.  Later in the day, Dean's manager Mort Viner mentioned that he was
pleased to see Jerry in attendance - and Martin's jaw hit the floor.  He
asked Viner to get Jerry on the phone; Viner did so, Martin departed to a
private room and the two ex-partners talked for nearly a half-hour.  Some
fifteen minutes after their conversation, Martin emerged from privacy and
declared "I just thanked him," to Viner and Greg Garrison - but later told
his son Ricci that he and Jerry professed renewed love and respect for each
other.  While never becoming buddy-buddy, the pair remained friendly here on
in, culminating in Jerry presenting a giant birthday cake to Dean on a Las
Vegas stage in June 1989:

LEWIS: "I am here to present you with this happy birthday cake for
seventy-two years of joy that you've given to the [removed] and why we broke
up, I'll never know."

MARTIN: "Me neither."

Michael

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 7 Sep 2002 23:42:37 -0400
From: "Richard  Carpenter" <sinatra@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Greatest OTR show

  Michael Biel wrote: "I've mentioned before that I consider the best
broadcast ever done during the OTR era is Norman Corwin's 'We Hold These
Truths.'" Well, I've mentioned before that I consider the best broadcast
ever done during the OTR era is Norman Corwin's "On a Note of Triumph,"
marking the end of World War II in Europe. That show grabs the emotions and
stirs the soul in a way that the powerful but preachy "We Hold These
Truths" does not. As TV's Dennis Miller used to say, "Of course, that's
just my [removed]"

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 00:46:16 -0400
From: Bill Harris <radioguy@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  If hope vs crosby wasnt a feud, then---

Hope and Crosby were always taking friendly shots at one another.
NBC had Hope and CBS had [removed] said NBC stood for "No Bing
Crosby"

Bill H.

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 00:46:23 -0400
From: HERITAGE4@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  OLDE TYME RADIO NETWORK SCHEDULE

Here's our schedule for the week starting Sunday  9/8/02     24/7  streaming
audio
at:   [removed]

SAME TIME, SAME STATION with Jerry Haendiges
A special Edgar Allen Poe week broadcast:
1. CAVALCADE OF AMERICA   2/26/41   "Edgar Allen Poe"  stars Karl Swenson.
2. CBS RADIO WORKSHOP   7/28/57   "Never Bet the Devil Your Head"
    subtitled "Edgar Allen Poe with a Moral"    John Dehner stars as Poe.
3. NBC UNIVERSITY THEATER OF THE AIR    3/6/49  "Tales of Edgar Allen Poe"
    Short stories:  "Noseology" - "The Cask of Amontillado"   and
    "Fall of the House of Usher"     Stars: Joseph Schildkraut.

HERITAGE RADIO THEATRE with Tom Heathwood
1. THE MILTON BERLE SHOW   NBC  1947   "Presidential Candidates"
2. SUSPENSE   CBS   1/18/45    "To Find Help"  stars Frank Sinatra  and
    Agnes Moorehead in one of the series classics!
3. COLGATE SPORTS NEWSREEL with BILL STERN    NBC  5/12/50
    Guest: Larraine Day.

Enjoy ---      Tom & Jerry

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 00:46:05 -0400
From: Elizabeth McLeod <lizmcl@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  Re: Segregation in the North

On 9/7/02 11:05 PM OldRadio Mailing Lists wrote:

BTW, let's dispense with the notion that racism in any of its forms was
restricted to the South. In an earlier digest Elizabeth McLeod mentioned that
"Allen received a ration of hate mail from the Deep South, condemning him for
'allowing a Negro [Joe Louis] to call him Fred on the radio.'" Elizabeth, you
are the last person on this list whose scholarship I would question, but are
you certain all the complaints came from the Deep South?

While it's possible that complaints came from other locations, the
telegram which really set Allen off, and provoked his "these are the kind
of morons I have to put up with" remark came from Houston, Texas. It
stated in part:

"WE BEYOND THE MASON AND DIXON LINE DON'T TOLERATE OR LIKE IT AND WE OF
THE SOUTH WILL APPRECIATE IT IF YOU WILL REFRAIN FROM ALLOWING NEGROES TO
CALL YOU FRED OVER THE RADIO."

--quoted by Robert Taylor in "Fred Allen: His Life and Wit," page 227.

But, I'll also grant that the South had no corner on this sort of thing.
De facto segregation was a fact of life in the North -- while not
codified by law as it was in the South, it was nevertheless widely
practiced, and many New York City hotels routinely refused to register
African-American guests well into the 1950s. Most blacks visiting the
city in the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s ended up staying at hotels in Harlem
(if they could afford the rates) or the West 135th Street branch of the
YMCA: the only branch of the Y in the city where blacks were welcome.
Black guests were routinely barred from several of the popular Harlem
nightspots, including the Cotton Club and Connie's Inn -- which were only
open to white patrons.

Elizabeth

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 01:27:11 -0400
From: Bill Harris <radioguy@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Feuds

 "Arte" <arte@[removed]; says:

Then there was, of course, Charlie McCarthy & [removed] Fields.
"Don't tell me I don't love you. I'll break every knot in
your body."

Or,

WC  - "Tell me Charles, is it true that your Father was a gate
legged table?".

CM - "Well if it is, your Father was under it".

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 02:46:14 -0400
From: "Brian Johnson" <CHYRONOP@[removed];
To: <[removed]@[removed];
Subject:  The disipline of history

Just a word (and I hope a final one) on the racial slur-internment [removed]

First, history is the most linear of disciplines. You can not lift the mores
and morals of one time and transpose them on another, nor can you isolate a
time and ignore everything that came before it.

Consider this: Radio performers in December of 1941 were almost exactly as
many years removed from the end of the American Civil War as we are today
from the birth of NBC and CBS as radio networks.  Think how easily you
identify with this bygone era we celebrate in this Digest and think how
easily it would be, for better or worse, for some to have had nostalgia for
the Antebellum South back then. It does NOT excuse their racism, but it DOES
explain how they may have trafficked in it casually without realizing how
deeply they were offending others. And if one traces the lineage of American
show business, it is most assuredly grounded in minstrelsy.

Now, for the internment question - what some may see as a opening to
criticize the current Administration, the fact is that both sides of this
argument may both be terribly right and terribly wrong at the same time. I
don't think any one could say, "Never mind that NONE (my emphasis) of the
Japanese Americans that were interned had been planning to bomb Los
[removed]" I say that because of the volume of the internment has been
placed at around 120,000 people.

Could you or anyone personally vouch for 120,000 people? And is stopping,
say 20 sabatouers  intent on driving airplanes into well-populated
landmarks, a justifible excuse for locking up the other 119,980? I don't
know and neither does Michael Biel. One can feel smug about making a
judgement about history. Results are known. And criticism about decisions on
current problems usually comes easiest to those who can make them without
accepting responsibility for them.

"It is not given to human beings, happily for them, for otherwise life would
be intolerable, to foresee or to predict to any large extent the unfolding
course of events. In one phase men seem to have been right, in another they
seem to have been wrong. Then again, a few years later, when the perspective
of time has lengthened, all stands in a different setting. There is a new
proportion. There is another scale of values. History with its flickering
lamp stumbles along the trail of the past, trying to reconstruct its scenes,
to revive its echoes, and kindle with pale gleams the passion of former
days. What is the worth of all this? The only guide to a man is his
conscience; the only shield to his memory is the rectitude and sincerity of
his actions. It is very imprudent to walk through life without this shield,
because we are so often mocked by the failure of our hopes and the upsetting
of our calculations; but with this shield, however the fates may play, we
march always in the ranks of honour." - Winston Churchill, on the death of
Neville Chamberlain, 12th Nov. 1940

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 12:08:07 -0400
From: Jer51473@[removed]
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Roosevelt and "internment camps" during ww2

<PRE>And thats what they were, they were NOT concentration camps. Roosevelt
gave
the ok and even though im not a big fan of his, i believe he did what he
thought he had to do to protect this country. For those who were not here,
believe me these were serious and scary times. People were frightened much
more than they were to  the debacle of 9/11. 9/11 made us just as mad, but
didnt cause as much fear as did pearl harbor, excluding maybe the people of
new york and dc. I was only 5 when we got into ww2 but remember the times
very well. I used to have nightmares as a kid about the "japs" getting me and
i occasionally have these same type dreams today only they dont scare me
nearly as much and the "villains" are not necessarily japanese, in fact i
cant really identify them. But those early days of the war were frightening
and whose to say that there wasnt someone, if not interned, was a spy and
could have killed thousands of citizens including japanese citizens.
Roosevelt was undoubtably aware that the vast majority interned were good
citizens, but he considered the chances good that this action would stiffle
some sabateurs. You know the japanese population in hawai was made up mostly
of good american citizens and/ or allies too, but its a known fact that there
were many spies among them and they did indeed play a part in the planning of
the bombing. Roosevelt did what he felt he had to do knowing that it would be
very controversial especially in later years to generations that had no idea
of the times. You had to have been here to experience the mood, fear, and
excitement of those days. Mistakes may have been made, but we sure have made
out well as a country.

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 12:09:12 -0400
From: Sandy Singer <sinatradj@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  SAMBO

Sambo also became, and remains, an offensive [removed]

A chain of pancake house type restaraunts named Sambo was forced out of
business.

      [removed]
      A DATE WITH SINATRA

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 8 Sep 2002 12:08:48 -0400
From: charles <chascav@[removed];
To: [removed]@[removed]
Subject:  Internment camps

  The internment camps did have barbed wire and guns. They were
supposedlyto protect the internees but I remember hearing and reading
comments about the guns facing into the camps.
  Many things are done during war tim that with the benifit of hindsight
are seen to be wrong, but minimising twat was done id also wrong
  There are many internet sites dealing with this but it takes a little
work to find the barbed wire.
 try
[removed]

I think we are getting a little off topic.

Charles

--------------------------------
End of [removed] Digest V2002 Issue #350
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