Return of The VVitch!! MARY POPPINS RETURNS is the sequel to 1964’s MARY POPPINS, where Julie Andrews played a witch who fell from the sky to nanny a British family during their hardship. In this new story, produced 54 years after the original (yet is set about 25 years after the original’s events), Emily Blunt plays the same Poppins witch, … Read More
ROCKETMAN 2019
Tripping the Bitch Fantastic! It’s that floating thing. At the Troubadour. That’s what sells ROCKETMAN, a “musical fantasy” of Elton John’s rise to stardom. That metaphorical moment when time stops, and artist and crowd levitate in slow motion simpatico. It’s happened to me. And if you are a performer, it’s happened to you, once, twice, maybe three times in your … Read More
HOLLYWOOD OR BUST
A Road Movie for the End Of The Road. Dean walked one way, I walked the other, and we never saw each other again. — Jerry Lewis, on the final Martin and Lewis show at the Copacabana New York, 1956. Way back in their second film, MY FRIEND IRMA GOES WEST (Jul 1950), Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis boarded a … Read More
ARTISTS AND MODELS
Comics and comicbooks, cultures and vultures. Colors scream louder than Jerry Lewis dreaming about Vincent the Vulture, catchy songs and willing dames, snappy writing and vivid characters careen at us in this 14th Martin and Lewis musical-comedy farce, ARTISTS AND MODELS. Out-of-work cartoonist Rick Todd (Dean Martin) and unemployed writer Eugene Fullstack (Jerry Lewis) moved to New York City to … Read More
MONEY FROM HOME
Martin and Lewis on the money! Honey-Talk Nelson (Dean Martin) is in deep to the mob. To make good on his debt, he is ordered to “fix” a horserace so that the favorite loses. He enlists the aid of his innocent veterinarian cousin Virgil (Jerry Lewis) to dope the favorite, but then falls for the horse’s owner, whilst Virgil falls … Read More
SAILOR BEWARE
Kissed Off. Probably the stoopidest Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis musical-comedy, SAILOR BEWARE is about two pals enlisting in the Navy and getting involved in a kissing contest that somehow gives one of them the reputation of a Lothario – even though he is allergic to kissing women. Then it ends before it gets mistaken for a movie. After an … Read More
MY FRIEND IRMA GOES WEST
B-characters Bedazzle in B-movie. Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis once again make a B-movie watchable. But only just. In MY FRIEND IRMA GOES WEST, the gang from the first IRMA aim for Hollywood, end up in Las Vegas, and are still barely watchable. Honestly, I don’t know why Paramount Studios insisted on a sequel to the execrable MY FRIEND IRMA … Read More
PARDNERS
Partners, Buddies, Pals… at least, onscreen. Jerry and Dean in the Wild West! PARDNERS, the penultimate musical comedy from Martin and Lewis opens with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis as two aged cowboys named Slim Mosely and Wade Kingsley, in a shootout to retain their property against the marauding Dan Hollis gang, who want to take it by force. Their … Read More
JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR 2018
SUPERSTAR falters, as Legend lacks. Poor John Legend! He’s a great soulful rhythm and blues vocalist, a great composer, a great performer; he’s won Oscars, Grammys, Golden Globes and Tonys; he’s a friend to the last great American president, Barack Obama, and he was instrumental in bringing a whole generation to that inspiring 2008 election. He’s a producer, actor and … Read More
YOU’RE NEVER TOO YOUNG
It Never Gets Old… Jerry Lewis, whose whole shtick is “an adult playing a kid,” gets to play an adult playing a kid, in YOU’RE NEVER TOO YOUNG. And Dean Martin, as usual, can’t tell the difference. Jerry is Wilbur Hoolick (of COURSE that’s his name), an aspiring barber, planted with a stolen diamond and then pursued by the diamond … Read More
3 RING CIRCUS
Circus of Pain. In the first film appearance of Martin and Lewis, 1949’s MY FRIEND IRMA, Jerry Lewis was “written in” as a sidekick to Dean Martin’s character, who was integral to the plot. 5 years and 11 films later, now Dean is the fifth wheel in 3 RING CIRCUS. Jerry is Jerome “Jerry” Hotchkiss, and Dean is Pete Nelson, … Read More
LIVING IT UP
Sham – Wow! Homer Flagg is dying of radiation poisoning. His last wish is to visit New York. An avaricious New York editor, hoping to boost sales of his newspaper, brings Homer and his exclusive doctor on an all-expenses-paid final fling to New York. But Homer’s not really dying. His doctor made up the disease by mistake – and continues … Read More
THE STOOGE
Bill and Ted’s Formative Adventure. Well, Dean played Dean, and I played Jerry; we were two different characters, but it was us all the time, including the almost-breakup scene, which was tough for us to do. — Jerry Lewis, INSIDE THE ACTORS’ STUDIO, 1999. THE STOOGE is the Martin and Lewis roman à clef of their rise to glory. Egotistic … Read More
MY FRIEND IRMA
Big things have small beginnings… “and introducing Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis” Thus it begins; with an innocuous “and introducing” credit in MY FRIEND IRMA – the comet-across-the-skies film career of the comedy team known as Martin & Lewis. Dean Martin (born 1917; 32 years old at the time) and Jerry Lewis (born 1926; a strapping 23 years old, nine … Read More
THE CADDY
The Gulf between Golf and Guff. A talented golfer and his equally-talented yet disruptive caddy enter golfing tournaments and end up in comedy. Kinda like Tiger Woods. THE CADDY opens with massive crowds jamming the streets of New York. They’re all cheering at something high in one of the hotels lining the street. Flyers are seen fluttering down onto the … Read More
SCARED STIFF
Dead Serious Comedy. Every comedy team needs its ABBOTT AND COSTELLO MEET FRANKENSTEIN moment. Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis get theirs in SCARED STIFF, ironically a remake of THE GHOST BREAKERS (1940), which starred Bob Hope, one of their comedy compatriots/rivals. A nightclub singer, Larry Todd (Dean Martin), and his busboy buddy Myron (Jerry Lewis) get tangled up with the … Read More
JUMPING JACKS
Jumping to Contusions. JUMPING JACKS marks the third time Martin and Lewis have been in the military. Army, Navy, now Paratroopers. Through an identity mixup, civilian Hap Smith (Jerry Lewis) finds himself in the paratroopers with his old nightclub partner, private Chick Allen (Dean Martin); though Chick tries to protect Hap from the authorities and discovery, he finds that Hap … Read More
THAT’S MY BOY
Not Letting The Apple Fall Far… Following in the wake of their soporific debut (AT WAR WITH THE ARMY, Jan 1951), Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis prove themselves a formidable film comedy duo in THAT’S MY BOY, an original film written for them, which showcases their talents as actors and comedians. Junior Jackson (Lewis) is the sickly son of legendary … Read More
AT WAR WITH THE ARMY
No Laughing Matter. Technically, the first film appearance of “Martin and Lewis” is MY FRIEND IRMA (1949), where they played B-characters to the two female leads. AT WAR WITH THE ARMY is the first starring vehicle for the world’s premier comedy team at the time – Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. The most amazing thing about this stagnant yawner is … Read More
HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 3: SENIOR YEAR
High on Schrooms-ical. Three words describe HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 3: SENIOR YEAR: Ab. Bombin’. Nation. Once again, choreographer Kenny Ortega directs, and clueless, unoriginal screenwriter Peter Barsocchini writes what will eventually end up a laughing fart from the buttocks of Satan. Zac Efron returns as Troy Bolton, beefcake boy-beauty of East High School, with his indeterminate-Latina girlfriend Gabriella (Vanessa Hudgens, … Read More
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