Quote

Postwar America was a very buttoned-up nation. Radio shows were run by censors, Presidents wore hats, ladies wore girdles. We came straight out of the blue - nobody was expecting anything like Martin and Lewis. A sexy guy and a monkey is how some people saw us.

Jerry Lewis

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Jerry Lewis
Age: 91 †
Born: 1926
Born: March 16
Died: 2017
Died: August 20
Comedian
Film Actor
Film Director
Film Producer
Musician
Screenwriter
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
Stage Actor
Television Actor
Newark
New Jersey
Joseph Levitch
The King of Comedy
Shows
Saws
Monkeys
Girdles
America
Nation
Ladies
Postwar
Anything
Nobody
Hats
Censors
Like
Came
Expecting
Lewis
People
Guy
Sexy
Monkey
Nations
Straight
Presidents
President
Radio
Wore
Running
Blue
Martin
Buttoned

More quotes by Jerry Lewis

Image
If I've learned anything in the more than 50 years that I've led MDA, it's that the generosity of the American people knows no bounds. I'm sure that with their fellow citizens in such dire need, they'll dig deep and do everything they can to help. I'm hopeful that many people will be willing to make two phone calls and donate to both causes.
Jerry Lewis
Image
The doc told me I had a dual personality. Then he lays an 82 dollar bill on me, so I give him 41 bucks and say, 'Get the other 41 bucks from the other guy.'
Jerry Lewis
Image
Don't give me paper - I can get the same lawyer who drew it up to break it. But if you shake my hand, that's for life.
Jerry Lewis
Image
I don't want to be remembered. I want the nice words when I can hear them.
Jerry Lewis
Image
A lot of people resent that I've been in someone's life for 50 years. Why shouldn't people have an affection for me and what I've done? Didn't I have to be genuine for them to buy into what I did? There are children who grow up today who will not have that when they're 55 years old. With whom will they have it? Name an example for me.
Jerry Lewis
Image
I turned down 'Some Like It Hot.' See how smart I am? I felt I couldn't bring anything funny to it. The outfit was funny. I don't need to compete with the wardrobe.
Jerry Lewis
Image
People think I'm against critics because they are negative to my work. That's not what bothers me. What bothers me is they didn't see the work. I have seen critics print stuff about stuff I cut out of the film before we ran it. So don't tell me about critics.
Jerry Lewis
Image
Don't you understand how dramatic it is to be a comic? To be a fool, to get people to laugh at this show-off? Milton Berle could take Laurence Olivier and stick him under the table if he wanted to. And so could I.
Jerry Lewis
Image
Comedy is a man in trouble. And without it, there's no humor.
Jerry Lewis
Image
I've had the greatest respect for my work in this country by Americans. Critics have no brains.
Jerry Lewis
Image
Every man's dream is to be able to sink into the arms of a woman without also falling into her hands.
Jerry Lewis
Image
When I would be myself, I was being big-headed. I was being egotistical. I was a megalomaniac, when it really was just having not to be a monkey for a few hours a day. And fulfilling the need to be a man.
Jerry Lewis
Image
This is the pain pacemaker. I've got a battery under my skin. From that battery are two electrodes that go into the spine where they cut bone away to accommodate it. Now I put on the power here. If I have the pain, the stimulator starts. It's tingling, like when your foot falls asleep, you know?
Jerry Lewis
Image
I never tell an audience what they can expect. I never have and I never will. I'm an entertainer for 75 years.
Jerry Lewis
Image
The young man who's had the Guggenheim fortune behind him all his life - he can hire all the authorities on the subject to teach him how to do a monologue, but he's never going to have the right stuff to pull it off. If he doesn't walk out onstage needing to walk out there, he doesn't have a dream of doing well.
Jerry Lewis
Image
It'll keep you alive for another 10 years if you get yourself a laugh once a day: either provoke it, or look around in the wildest laboratory in the world, the public.
Jerry Lewis
Image
When I was a kid, I said to my father one afternoon, 'Daddy, will you take me to the zoo?' He answered, 'If the zoo wants you, let them come and get you.
Jerry Lewis
Image
If you're an old pro, you know how well you're doing when you're doing it, and your inner government spanks you if you're not doing well.
Jerry Lewis
Image
If I found the cure for dystrophy tomorrow, I would do a telethon in four weeks for acute pain that in this country is a bigger problem than cancer, heart, sickle cell, anemia, name it. It is - it's hitting 70 million Americans.
Jerry Lewis
Image
When I hit around 65, 66, I started to feel tremendous worth and incredible personal esteem. I was becoming very cognisant of my contribution to the American spirit of helping your fellow man and all of the good stuff.
Jerry Lewis