Kup's Chicago - Irv Kupcinet [101]
Since then, ever)’ Festival has featured a parade of stars such as few live shows ever could hope to equal.
Dean Martin, Jerry Lewis, Ava Gardner, Marilyn Maxwell, Marge and Gower Champion, Jerry Lester, Peggy Ann Garner, Lex Barker, and Dave Garroway – with Bob Hope and Jane Russell as bonuses – highlighted one card. Another offered Danny Kaye, Perry Como, Jack Carson, Keenan Wynn, Jackie Cooper, John Garfield, Dorothy Shay, and Celeste Holm.
Picture Jerry Lewis, Eddie Fisher, Louis Armstrong, Charlton Heston, Zsa Zsa Gabor, Jayne Mansfield, Cleo Moore, James Arness, and Archie Moore on one bill, as in the 1956 Festival.
Or Carol Channing, Sammy Davis, Jr., George Gobel, the McGuire Sisters, Patti Page, Bob Mitchum, Andra Martin, and cartoonist Milton Caniff all entertaining from the same stage. That was only part of the 1957 Festival.
And imagine the size of the computer required to figure the payroll for booking comedians Jack Benny, Milton Berle, Jimmy Durante, Red Buttons, Edgar Bergen, George Jessel, Jerry Colonna, Robert Q. Lewis, George DeWitt, and Dick Shawn, and comedienne Phyllis Diller.
And for Dinah Shore, Debbie Reynolds, Eydie Gorme, Betty Hutton, Sarah Vaughn, Lisa Kirk, Mahalia Jackson, Julie Wilson, Ann Miller, Fran Warren, Anna Maria Alberghetti, Elaine Stewart, Dale Evans, Yvonne DeCarlo, Rhonda Fleming, Janet Leigh, Dorothy Lamour, Terry Moore, Jeri Southern, Rita Gam, Marta Toren, Dorothy Provine, Diana Lynn, Betty Garrett, Genevieve, Angie Dickinson, and Ann-Margret.
And for Tony Curtis, Tony Martin, Tony Bennett, Harry Belafonte, Fabian, Nat (“King”) Cole, Vic Damone, Van Johnson, Burt Lancaster, George Montgomery, Gordon MacRae, Walter Pidgeon, Jose Ferrer, Gary Crosby, Dennis Morgan, Harry James, Stan Kenton, Skitch Henderson, Hugh O’Brian, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Troy Donahue, Roger Smith, Louis Ouinn, Keefe Brasselle, Roy Rogers, and Bobby Van.
And for Rocky Marciano as bodyguard!
All these stars and many others, as the Sun-Times gratefully acknowledges in thank-you advertisements each year in Variety and the Hollywood Reporter, have donated their services at the Harvest Moon Festival. Several, in fact, have performed more than once – and Bob Hope, the benefit champ himself, has appeared more often than anybody. (Imagine the computer you would need just to pay him.)
“Just let me know when you need someone to fill out the cast,” says Robert. “I’ll be there with jokes on.”
In giving away the only thing they have to sell – their ability to entertain – these entertainers have been a credit to themselves and to the profession they represent. And considering the willingness of these performers to sacrifice their time and money, I’m happy to report that special benefits have often accrued to them as a result. (These, too, are “miracles.”)
It was at the Harvest Moon Festival that Jerry Lewis made one of his first appearances without his former partner Dean Martin. The enthusiastic response of the capacity crowd, says Jerry, assured him as nothing had before that he could “make it” as a single.
A 1957 Festival appearance marked a similar milestone in the career of Sammy Davis, Jr.
“Working without my father and uncle was still new to me,” Sammy told me. “But the way this crowd reacted, that was the boost I needed.”
And every entertainer thrills to the experience of working before such a large and appreciative audience. As George Jessel once put it:
“That crowd – twenty-five thousand at one sitting! When can an entertainer nowadays stare so many people in the face at one time? If I’d had that situation in the old days, I’d never have left vaudeville!”
For this, special praise must go to Russ Stewart, Mel Barker, and the other Sun-Times executives who help make the Harvest Moon Festival an event in which all of us who participate take great pride.
In addition to the Festival, Chicago has supported many of those hypnotic