Country Gal/City Woman: "The Day I Saved the Careers of Martin and Lewis..."

Those Early Days in Southern California ... ca 1948-1949

Looking back to then, one of those Early Days had all the ingredients of being a Magical Kind of Day ... if you call "magical" nearly being trampled under those crazy legs of one young and mostly unknown comedian, Jerry Lewis, newly arrived in Hollywood with his just as mostly unknown, suave and handsome singing straight man, Dean Martin.

This comedy team, yet to make it big via radio or the movies -- although they were fast gaining favor with small-time comedy club audiences in the Midwest territory -- was called to big-time Los Angeles to test the market, so to speak. Wise studio executives hired Lucille Ball, already an up-and-coming actress/comedienne, to be the unsuspecting "foil" for their trial appearance at a theater smack dab in the middle of Tinseltown.

Two tickets appeared out of nowhere, but I'm thinking they were "comps" given to my Ralphs' employee-slash-husband by a customer with "pull,"  so Del and I put gas in the 1938 Chevrolet coupe and off to Hollywood we went, in the back of my mind thinking what a story to write the folks back home in good old Iowa come Christmastime!

There was only one freeway then ... the infamous Pasadena Freeway that included a bridge from which a number of people have jumped ... and arrived in plenty of time to do a little sight-seeing and gawk at a few famous celebrities who were there for the same purpose of deciding the future of Martin and Lewis! Lucy was on her own at least for that day.

Not so much Del, but I pretty much separated myself early on from the true sophisticates arriving by waving at a couple of A-picture actors, gushing inane words when acknowledged by a young blond starlet on her way to a career we would eventually read about in a movie magazine. Once again, I was really out of my league! If Del were here right now, he could tell you their names ... oh yes, Eleanor Powell and her then husband, Glenn Ford (the A people!).

Eleanor and Glenn were properly seated in the A-people section, down in front. Not knowing then that in order to get premium seats in the Hollywood seating arrangement one tipped the usher a whopping five dollars if you were a non-celeb. We were seated about five rows from the back, but I had an aisle seat, which is prime territory to my way of thinking and great for seeing the studio-sized orchestra on stage, the Martin and Lewis comedy duo and my gal, Lucille Ball, a real MOVIE STAR!

The entire routine was scripted, which means they were reading from pages of paper, throwing to the floor each page as the lines were spoken. The three were supposed to stand in front of the three available microphones, which they did until the ad-libbing began. Absolute bedlam! Jerry was really beyond being "outlandish" for that fate-deciding performance, roaming the stage, straightening the music sheets of the musicians. spewing gibberish that in later years paid him and his sidekick millions of dollars.

Dean stood there with his mouth open in apparent aghast, hand to mouth a la Jack Benny, until his turn to perform, the beginning of my infatuation with his voice to this very day.  "Foil" Lucille Ball of the bright orange hair, approximately the lipstick shade of Tangee, lost it completely at the unscripted antics of Jerry and swooning over Dean's song.  So did we, the mesmerized audience ... I was more like stunned and in complete awe of what was unfolding before my slightly-myopic eyes.  This was so much better than singing along with the bouncing ball at the Atlantic Theatre.

Encore after encore finally satisfied the audience ... these young daring-to-be-different kids just might have a chance in Hollywood.  Only time would tell at that proverbial box office.

Oh, yes, the trampling part of this story. Remember ... my seat was on the aisle, in the "backest back" of the theater, and it was in this direction that Jerry Lewis, with vast childlike energy still unspent, came lumbering up this aisle, long legs and long arms flailing in two-to-four different directions, drawing ever nearer to the seat where I was sitting.   Tomorrow's Atlantic News Telegraph headlines filled my head:  "Local Woman Trampled in Hollywood!"  And shooting down any thoughts of becoming Shirley Temple's Girl Friday...

Jerry must have noticed my near-cringing yet convulsing-with-laughter body as he came nearer to my seat for he smiled, patted my shoulder and, never missing a flail, continued on his way out the door and probably into the welcoming arms of some very happy studio executives, hearing in his ears what had to have sounded better than anything good ol' Dean, could have warbled ... the laughter and applause of an audience that helped seal their future for many years to come.

For a movie-star-struck country gal from Atlantic, Iowa, my future was sealed also. I declared myself a born-again Californian at that instant; and decided that I would do my best to become more sophisticated if ever I should find myself in the company of celebrities and such again ... yes, I am still working on it!