Jerry Lewis on AllMovie

Born Joseph Levitch to show business parents, Jerry Lewis spent his early summers with his parents as they performed in resorts of the Catskills Mountain "borscht belt;" occasionally he would join their act by singing a song. After one year of high school, he dropped out and started looking for work as an entertainer, supporting himself with a variety of odd jobs. He was an experienced one-night-stand comic by the time he was 18; his act consisted in part of mimicking famous performers whose recordings would be played off-stage. He married Patty Palmer, a singer with the Jimmy Dorsey band, when he was 18, supporting himself and his wife by entertaining in the Catskills during the summers. He met Dean Martin, another small-time entertainer, in 1946, and the two formed a comedy team. Their first appearance, at Atlantic City's 500 Club, was a big success; soon they were playing to packed houses all over the country. Martin would sing and be interrupted by Lewis's wacky clowning, and the two would ad-lib and trade insults; by the end of the '40s they were the most popular comedy team in America, performing on stage, TV, and in nightclubs. They were signed to a Paramount movie contract in 1949 by Hal Wallis, debuting as supporting players in My Friend Irma (1949). Before splitting up in 1956, they starred in 16 films together, all with the same structure: Martin would play a calm, suave, romantic singer and Lewis would play a hyperkinetic misfit. The films were all solid performers at the box office. Lewis went his own way in order to have more control over his films, and subsequently he often produced, directed, and/or wrote the movies he appeared in. Generally unappreciated (if not panned) in America, his films were considered works of genius in France, where he became known as "Le Roi du Crazy;" two influential French film magazines agreed that his work brilliantly unveiled truths about America. He went to Paris in 1971, receiving a rousing welcome and playing 16 sold-out performances at the Olympia. The same year he published The Complete Filmmaker, in which he outlined his theory of film and its techniques. Since 1970 his film work has been very limited, but includes a noteworthy performance as a Johnny Carson-like talk show host in Martin Scorsese's The King of Comedy (1983). Every Labor Day Weekend he hosts a telethon to raise money in the battle against muscular dystrophy.