Dean and Me_ A Love Story - Jerry Lewis [6]
I just stared at him. The name certainly fit.
“And look at me, a family man, too,” he said, pulling out a couple of snapshots. His wife, Betty, was pretty—she looked like the girl next door in an MGM movie. And there were three little kids: a boy, Craig, and two girls, Claudia and Gail. Quick work for a young guy! The fact that he’d been out looking for quiff earlier that evening didn’t faze me: This was showbiz.
“I’ve got a kid on the way, too,” I told Dean.
He snapped out of his reverie. “You’re kiddin’ me,” he said. “How old are you, pally?”
Suddenly, I felt as shy as a girl. “I just turned nineteen,” I said. “But I’ve been married to Patti since October, and we have a baby due in July.” I couldn’t help smiling proudly. “How old are you?” I asked, like a kid at grade school.
“Gettin’ up there,” Dean said. “About to turn twenty-eight.”
Nine years’ di ference, I thought. He could be my big brother. I smiled at the idea.
While Patti got more and more pregnant, I ran up and down the Eastern Seaboard, doing my act in little clubs and old theaters in Baltimore and D.C. and Philadelphia, always for the same princely salary: a hundred twenty-five a week. The big money came from the Big Apple, where my periodic gigs at the Glass Hat landed me an extra ten bucks per. And I was happy for that sawbuck, believe me: It bought Patti a maternity dress, which she wore until the eleventh month. The baby came, but a dress is a dress when you take it in.
It was funny—wherever I happened to land a job that spring and summer of 1945, Dean always seemed to be there, too, usually a week or two ahead of me or behind; it was like the two of us had a minicircuit within the circuit. Sometimes, if I saw he was booked after me, I’d leave a note for him in the dressing room (which was a nail on the wall), something about the classy surroundings we were privileged to work in. I never got a note back. He didn’t seem like much of a one for writing.
Then I returned to New York, this time to a nightclub on Broadway between Fiftieth and Fifty-first called the Havana-Madrid—to find that, miracle of miracles, Dean and I were both booked there at the same time, March of 1946.
The Havana-Madrid was one of a number of Latin-themed clubs that had sprung up in Manhattan with the rise of the rumba craze in the late thirties. The owner was a guy named Angel Lopez, and he liked to alternate Anglo and Hispanic acts. Dean was the singer; I was there with my fright wig and records. On the bill with us were a dance team called the Barrancos, Pupi Campo and his orchestra, and the headliner, the great Cuban singer Diosa Costello.
I was thrilled to be on the same show, at last, with my fantasy big brother. But it wasn’t enough for me to just be in the same place with him at the same time. Like all little brothers, I craved attention. And one night during the third show, as Dean stood on the Havana-Madrid stage entrancing the audience (but especially the ladies) with his honeyed version of “Where or When,” I figured out how to get it.
The Barrancos had preceded Dean on the bill, finishing up with a hand-clapping, foot-stamping number that climaxed with Mr. Barranco bending Mrs. Barranco over a pot of fire. Very dramatic. They left the stage to big applause, and they also left their fire pot burning. With the houselights down low for Dean’s romantic number, the flickering flame in the pot behind him cast a cozy glow.
The third show was in the wee hours of the morning, when there were only around eight people in the audience. In fact, at that time of night, there were more waiters in the house than customers—the waiters and captains were standing around with their napkins over their arms. It was a good time to go for broke, and that was exactly what I decided to do.
My impression of Dom DeLuise.
The spotlight was on Dean and the rest of the stage was in shadows, so it was easy for me to sneak out from the wings in my borrowed waiter’s suit. I’d prepped the man on the lighting board. As Dean began to sing, I suddenly went into a tremendous