Dean and Me_ A Love Story - Jerry Lewis [108]
I wanted to get together with him, but I sensed Dean preferred talking on the phone, so I respected that. I called him whenever I could, as often as I could without feeling I was intruding. The conversations always began the same way.
“Hey, Paul, how you doin’?”
“How you doin’, pally?”
“You still don’t remember my fucking name?”
Now and then, he even laughed.
In the spring of 1989, I saw an announcement that Dean was going to play Bally’s in Vegas. I was impressed: He’s found a way to go on, I thought.
I stayed away, though, not even sneaking in to see him perform. I wanted him to have his own space.
Then one day I looked at my calendar and saw that it was June 6. The next day, unbelievably enough, would be my partner’s seventy-second birthday.
I phoned Claudia Stabile and told her to buy the biggest and best cake she could possibly find, have it delivered to Bally’s, and get somebody to guard it until I got there. We planned the whole thing with military precision. I found out what time Dean went on stage and arrived at the club a few minutes later. The management knew me well, of course; everyone was in on the plan, including Dean’s conductor and pianist, Ken Lane.
Birthday cake at Bally, 1989.
I went backstage while Dean was on and watched him from the wings for around twenty minutes. He was wonderful. Ken had told me there was a certain point in the show when Dean bowed off and exited— stage right, as always. After that, Ken would play the introduction to the next number and Dean would come back out. This all went exactly as planned, except when Dean returned to the stage, Ken stopped the music and I yelled from the wings, “How the hell long are you gonna stay on?”
Dean looked startled, turning toward the familiar voice, Ken cued the band into “Happy Birthday,” and I wheeled that giant cake out onto the stage. The place went apeshit.
“You surprised me,” Dean said. He held his arms out. His eyes were full of tears. I blinked hard, not wanting to start bawling in front of 1,500 people.
As we hugged, he said, loud enough for the audience to hear, “I love you and I mean it.”
And this is what I said, also loud enough for everyone to hear: “Here’s to seventy-two years of joy you’ve given the world. Why we broke up, I’ll never know.”
’Nuff said.
AFTERWORD: GOOD-BYE, HELLO
I HEARD THE NEWS FLASH WHILE I WAS IN DENVER, ON TOUR with Damn Yankees. The devastating bulletin came at 8:30 in the morning on Christmas Day. I was stunned, terrified, not believing any of it, and still knowing it was real. It had happened. I had lost my partner.
When I finally pulled myself together, I hired a private jet to fly to Los Angeles as soon as possible, to be with his family—and with him.
My four-year-old miracle daughter came home from school around 3:30—and when I saw her face, the pain of the reality of that day shook me again. I hugged my Princess ... thinking of the life we’d lost, but holding on to this new life. Danielle helped me pull it all together.
Sam and Dani went with me to the airport. I didn’t want them to have to go to a funeral. In fact, if it hadn’t been Dean’s, I wouldn’t have gone at all. I believe funerals are fundamentally uncivilized. If you have something good to say about a person, for Christ’s sake, say it to their face while they’re still alive. It doesn’t mean squat to them after they’re gone!
I arrived in Los Angeles in time for the memorial service—thank God, I missed the burial itself. I was asked to speak, and I prayed I would have the strength to say what I had to say without breaking down: I knew Dean would have called me a wuss if I had.
I told the people, “You are so lucky that you knew my partner and my friend. I will not fall into that drone of pain about death, but I will ask you all to just yell ‘Yeah!’ that he lived... that he was with us for all that time. ‘Yeah!’ ‘Yeah!’ And that, my friends, is my celebration of his life. Long may he drink!”
I stepped down from the podium and walked to my seat. I stopped along the way to kiss Jeanne.... He loved