Rating: 
Summary: Yes and no
Review: King of Comedy is fun to read. I couldn't put it down. Jerry Lewis had his start watching his parents in burlesque shows. That's a step down from vaudeville. From there his comedy sprang from a vulgar side of life. Dean Martin looked on him with contempt in their act. He also did in real life. Jerry Lewis was a strict father who believed in hitting his kids. He had too much on his mind with his career to give his family the attention they needed. He could do comedy antics but the kids had strict rules at the dinner table! Hal Wallis had a nightmare time managing Jerry. This book has all the juicy details, including details of the muscular dystrophy telethon days!
Rating: 
Summary: Masterpiece
Review: King of Comedy is fun to read. I couldn't put it down. Jerry Lewis had his start watching his parents in burlesque shows. That's a step down from vaudeville. From there his comedy sprang from a vulgar side of life. Dean Martin looked on him with contempt in their act. He also did in real life. Jerry Lewis was a strict father who believed in hitting his kids. He had too much on his mind with his career to give his family the attention they needed. He could do comedy antics but the kids had strict rules at the dinner table! Hal Wallis had a nightmare time managing Jerry. This book has all the juicy details, including details of the muscular dystrophy telethon days!
Rating:
Summary: So This Is The Real Jerry!
Review: Kudos to Shawn Levy. His exhaustive research is the definitive bio of the contradictory performer that is Jerry Lewis. On the one hand, the gifted entertainer; on the other hand an egotistical monster. I'm glad Levy had the unenviable assignment of getting to know the man behind the clown. I've had a few laughs from Lewis's bits, but I wouldn't want to get near him!
Rating:
Summary: Levy's King: Exhausting, Fascinating Look at Complex Artist
Review: My life-long fascination with Jerry Lewis has been inexplicable. At once smarmy and gentle, straight forward and evasive, Jerry Lewis is once and for all crowned King. Jerry's admirable drive is offset by his often marred by his blurred judgement. Every facet of Jerry's multi-faceted career and life is shadowed by a dark side and brought to light by Shawn Levy. And, Levy dives in without protective boots, digging through the muck of Jerry the Man without ever losing his ultimate regard for Jerry the Artist. The ending of the book is exhausting, Levy crucified by the comic for shining a light on ugly truths regarding this complex man. The ultimate irony is that, through the very contradictions of his nature, Jerry Lewis emerges as one of the twentieth century's most honest and vulnerable performers. Long Live The King...and I mean that babe, sincerely. You are a mahvelous pafawma!
Rating:
Summary: Yes and no
Review: On the one hand, this was immensely readable. On the other hand, the negative things Levy has to say turn out to be for personal reasons. You have to wait for the afterword at the back of the book to find out that he and Lewis didn't see eye to eye and Levy felt hurt by this. Hence, the dirt. It's the Mommie Dearest Syndrome. Christina Crawford, we learn when we read that book, actually had made up with and was very close to her mother at the time of Joan Crawford's death. Then, inexplicably, Crawford left Christina out of her will. Hence, the dirt. So if Levy had (a) just skipped the afterword altogether, (b) put it up front as a preface so we could go into the book knowing the motivation, or (c) eased up on some of the vitriol, it would have been a better book. I'll read more books on Lewis, but I won't be reading anything else by Levy.
Rating:
Summary: Buddy Love in the Flesh
Review: Shawn Levy has written a fascinating and objective critical biography of Jerry Lewis -- an entertainment legend whose flaws and virtues cannot be denied. Levy tried to collaborate with Lewis on "King of Comedy," but found himself cut off by Jerry's volatility and distrust. It's easy to see why, since Lewis would prefer to emphasize the positive aspects of his life and work. Nevertheless, Levy delivers a balanced account of Jerry's enduring show-biz career and monstrous personal life -- Buddy Love in the flesh. Whether you like or loathe Lewis, "King of Comedy" remains a compelling study of a multi-faceted artist unable to control his demons. Levy rightfully acknowledges Jerry Lewis' comic legacy and cinematic influence, but never lets the reader forget the pain and turmoil that lies within.
Rating:
Summary: Buddy Love in the Flesh
Review: Shawn Levy has written a fascinating and objective critical biography of Jerry Lewis -- an entertainment legend whose flaws and virtues cannot be denied. Levy tried to collaborate with Lewis on "King of Comedy," but found himself cut off by Jerry's volatility and distrust. It's easy to see why, since Lewis would prefer to emphasize the positive aspects of his life and work. Nevertheless, Levy delivers a balanced account of Jerry's enduring show-biz career and monstrous personal life -- Buddy Love in the flesh. Whether you like or loathe Lewis, "King of Comedy" remains a compelling study of a multi-faceted artist unable to control his demons. Levy rightfully acknowledges Jerry Lewis' comic legacy and cinematic influence, but never lets the reader forget the pain and turmoil that lies within.
Rating:
Summary: Buddy Love in the Flesh
Review: Shawn Levy has written a fascinating and objective critical biography of Jerry Lewis -- an entertainment legend whose flaws and virtues cannot be denied. Levy tried to collaborate with Lewis on "King of Comedy," but found himself cut off by Jerry's volatility and distrust. It's easy to see why, since Lewis would prefer to emphasize the positive aspects of his life and work. Nevertheless, Levy delivers a balanced account of Jerry's enduring show-biz career and monstrous personal life -- Buddy Love in the flesh. Whether you like or loathe Lewis, "King of Comedy" remains a compelling study of a multi-faceted artist unable to control his demons. Levy rightfully acknowledges Jerry Lewis' comic legacy and cinematic influence, but never lets the reader forget the pain and turmoil that lies within.
Rating:
Summary: Caustic biography of the man behind the comic boy
Review: Shawn Levy has written a no-holds-barred biography of the guy the French consider a genius, from his meteoric rise with Dean Martin in the 1950s to his erratic career as cinematic auteur to his work with Muscular Dystrophy. Jerry' s shown as an abusive father and distant husband who's ruined more than one major project with his tirades. His talent is exceeded only by his ego
Rating:
Summary: The Lives of Buddy Love
Review: We all grew up watching Martin & Lewis movies and Jerry's solo projects, but there were those National Enquirer stories in the 1970's about Jerry being nasty to old people. Then a good friend of mine told me about when he worked at the Vegas Aladdin and saw Jerry Lewis completely lose his mind on a group of little children who'd talked their way backstage during a telethon to give him a donation. Jerry screamed every type of profanity at them. (A humiliated Chad Everrett hustled the kids to his limo for a ride home and my friend said he trembled in rage to keep from throttling Jerry).
When I saw Jerry on stage in the 1990's, I was stunned by the amount of swearing he did--even as I've seen him in interviews swear he never cusses on stage!
Obviously, any honest account of Jerry Lewis will have to try to reconcile the sweet, clumsy "nine-year-old" clown and the rampaging, egocentric monster. Shawn Levy has done that and I admire his book for not going too far one way or the other. I picked up the book to read about the unseen film, THE DAY THE CLOWN CRIED, and for any insight into the Martin & Lewis split (I'd also read Nick Tosches' DINO), and I'm glad I did.For the people (including Jerry himself) who would dismiss this book as a "hatchet job," you only have to look at Jerry's behavior and quotes himself to see both sides of him: Jerry not only disowned one of his sons for talking to the Enquirer, he completely wrote him out of every biography of him ("Love hard, hate hard"); Jerry's dismissal of all women comics as "unfunny" and "predominately here to have children"; his recent interview with Bill O'Reilly where he declares that JFK never had an affair with Marilyn Monroe--because Jerry did! (Even O'Reilly, a man not known to be caught unawares, blinked, speechless). Jerry's wretched behavior, whether drug-induced or simply chosen, can't diminish his contribution to entertainment, only diminish one's opinion of him as a human being. And I don't think Jerry cares what you think about him.
I can just see him as Buddy Love (a creation mistaken for Dean when it was really Jerry), lighting up a smoke and saying, "I've done it all, baby."
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