AllMovie

He is one of the most controversial filmmakers alive - at once praised by the French as a genius and an auteur, eschewed by American critics who dismiss his comedy as "low-brow," acknowledged by observers for his decades of philanthropic work with the Muscular Dystrophy Association, and notorious on both sides of the Atlantic for his on-set perfectionism and his insistence on traveling to vast lengths to get scenes, performances and gags right. He's also, unsurprisingly, as complex and multifaceted as anyone in the entertainment industry. But what is the truth about Jerry Lewis, that belies this series of contradictions? In this documentary profile of the entertainer, director Gregg Barson sets out to answer that question via candid interviews with the subject himself, plus insights by contemporaries including Phyllis Diller, Jerry Seinfeld and Billy Crystal.