Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis: The Fun And The Fury! The not safe for work side.
There was a lot more to Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis than the public ever saw or heard.
Before Elvis and The Beatles, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis were just as big in comedy. No other comedians before or since created such mass hysteria as they did.
Photo: Dean and Jerry toss photos to massive crowd outside their hotel.
Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis at the New York Paramount 4 July 1951. Absolute bedlam on 44th Street! Come on up for coffee!
Jerry, Bob Hope and Dean take a break. Notice that Bob Hope is not smiling.
The above photos were taken by Mack Gray, who was Dean’s assistant, and later in life arguably his closest friend. Dean and Jerry met him when they first came to Hollywood; they attended one of actor George Raft’s parties, and Jerry referred to Gray as Raft’s ‘Man Friday’. (It’s also worth noting, by the by, that Raft and Gray were in a relationship.) Raft was mobbed up, had he been caught not only would he have faced arrest, the mob would have killed him. Being gay was not allowed in the Cosa Nostra in those days.
Dean, Jerry and George Raft
While speculation still runs rampant about Sinatra and the mob (by the way, the horse head scene in THE GODFATHER - the head was fake contrary to myth. The singer was not Sinatra. Sinatra got the part in FROM HERE TO ETERNITY because Ava Gardner, his unbelievably sexy and bisexual lover and wife offered to do a film for free if Sinatra got the role. Sorry to disappoint), it was Dean who had the mob ties, who had sold points to his career to mobsters beyond 100% (that Jerry had to buy the “contracts” for out of their earnings).
Consider:
Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr. at Villa Venice, Chicago - Live 1962 Live
The Villa Venice was owned by then-Chicago-boss Sam Giancana. The elaborate and gaudy nightclub was unlike anything of its day, built to resemble the canals of Venice. The building had a boat landing and patrons could actually ride in a gondola. The showroom seated 800, and a Quonset hut nearby housed an illegal gambling casino. Visitors were transported between the supper club and the roulette and dice tables by the syndicate. So wide open was Chicago at this time under corrupt Mayor Daley (his law partner ran illegal sports betting for the mob) the Villa Venice operated in the open and the casino was never busted!
Famous entertainers performed at the Villa in the early 1960s, including such notable singers as Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis, Jr., Dean Martin, and Eddie Fisher. Tina Sinatra, Frank’s daughter, explains that the “Rat Pack” of movie fame that included Sinatra, Martin, Davis, and President John Kennedy’s brother-in-law Peter Lawford, performed there as a favor to owner Giancana, who had helped get union support for John F. Kennedy in the 1960 Presidential election.
The Villa Venice burned down in a “mysterious” fire in 1967, and today a Hilton Hotel is on the site of the old nightclub.
This is the actual FBI file on the club: you will have to copy and paste the link to open it:
file:///C:/Users/wreck/Downloads/sinatra09c.pdf
The FBI contrary to mythology was aware of mob activities. The myth they weren’t came from what were believed to be the lack of prosecution of the members. They were prosecuted, just not for being in the Cosa Nostra. Just as the FBI relied on illegal break-ins and wiretaps when they gathered evidence on Communist Party members who were also spying for the Soviet Union, they did the same for the mob. They couldn’t prosecute with evidence gathered illegally.
For the mob’s help in fighting Mussolini in World War 2 they were basically given Las Vegas to run after the war. The KKK had been charged with tax evasion and broken up at war’s end, Democrats needed enforcers to replace the Klan so they began making alliances with the mob. Of course, the joke was the Mafia in Italy was mostly jailed or killed by Mussolini, the resistance they offered Uncle Sam didn’t actually exist. They conned the U.S. government out of millions. 70,000 troops died because they expected a resistance by the mob that never happened. Sadly, if troops had landed north in Italy the partisans there, led by women, had actually fought and beaten German troops in face to face combat. The troops could have united with them and marched to Sicily.
An irony of history. To repay the Mafia for actions they never did, the mob was put in charge running the towns. Towns like Turano were in shock, and tried to stop that, but Truman had made up his mind. There is still a lot of animosity between Northern and Southern Italy.
QUOTE: Portions of Martin’s FBI file detail his early underworld connections as a gopher, blackjack dealer, dice man and aspiring boxer under the auspice of the mafia in Steubenville, Ohio in the 1930s. Michigan State Police records from the 1970s highlight Martin’s friendly relationship with leaders of a number of Midwest mob families.
Martin began running errands for local mob boss Jimmy Tripodi and his second-in-charge Cosmo Quattrone at a young age and worked as a stock boy at Tripodi’s Star Cigar Shop, which doubled as a backdoor casino. After he hung up his gloves and gave up his dreams of glory as a prize fighter but before he found his calling as a brilliant, velvet-voiced singer and performer in the entertainment industry, he was employed as a card dealer and stick man at Quattrone’s backdoor casino ran out of his Rex Cigar Shop and after that in Youngstown, Ohio’s infamous Jungle Inn gambling den owned by future Cleveland Godfather James (Jack White) Licavoli.
Latter in life, Martin would recall stories of stealing from customers at Quattrone’s games held at “The Rex,” and how Licavoli and other Youngstown Mafiosi helped land him early gigs singing in nightclubs around the Mahoning Valley. At that time, Licavoli looked after the “Valley” for mob superiors in Cleveland and Detroit.
Jimmy Tripodi lorded over the Steubenville underworld from the end of Prohibition until he retired in the late 1970s. His arrest record dated back to 1920s where he made his name on the streets as a bootlegger and prolific mob killer. He was acquitted of the Dominic Spinetti slaying in state court in 1936 and arrested but never put on trial for the Jimmy Fratini hit in Ohio and the Diego Delisa murder in West Virginia. His most significant conviction was a federal gun charge he did three years in prison for.
The Steubenville mob was a wing of the Cleveland mafia. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, FBI surveillance teams followed Tripodi and Quattrone to Cleveland to meet with and deliver tribute to longtime Cleveland mafia consigliere Anthony (Tony the Old Man) Milano at Milano’s Italian American Brotherhood Social Club. Per FBI documents from 1967, Tripodi also maintained close links to the Pittsburgh mob via Steel Town crime family capo Antonio Ripepi and the New York mafia through Genovese crime family power Rocco Pellegrino.
While Tripodi headquartered his activities out of The Venetian Italian Restaurant, Quattrone based his affairs out of a bar and supper club known as The Baron. Martin could be seen at both establishments holding court during his trips home in the Rat Pack period, his FBI file notes. The Midway, a restaurant, lounge and backdoor casino owned by Tripodi and Quattrone, often made it into Martin’s rounds on visits back to Steubenville, too. UNQUOTE via Gangster Life
Who was the first pot comedian? Cheech and Chong? George Carlin? You better sit down for this. Dean Martin!
Dean was also the first pothead comedian. According to Jerry, from the late 1940's on Dean had pot mailed to him from around the world as he hated Mexican pot. He would smoke before going onstage. Here is rare footage of Dean out of it on pot, making pot jokes the audience pre-hippie didn't get but laughed because that was the charm of The Rat Pack. Everyone wanted to be hip and part of it. Jerry's description by the way in DEAN AND ME of the only time he got high with Dean before a show ( in the early 50's!) is hilarious. BTW- Jerry's kids have stated that Jer kept bags of pot in their bathroom medicine cabinet all through the late 50's and 60's - you just never know.....
Listen carefully to the jokes here:
Here is the infamous Martin & Lewis - The Caddy Promo - Language Warning!
The Caddy is actually one of my favorite Martin and Lewis films:
The workload this team was put under was shocking, even for those days. Everybody wanted to make money off them. For several years they had no vacation, no break. Radio, TV, live shows, movies and finally they imploded. Contrary to mythology, they actually reunited several times over the years.
On March 13, 1960, Dean called Jerry up on stage at the Sands in Las Vegas. By the AP account, it looks like they did the Boxer Routine (from "Sailor Beware") as well as a duet of "My Heart Cries for You."
The 4/6/59 Academy Awards show.
Yet another documented reunion has only recently come to light and certainly is a mystery. The location and date is not known. I would venture a guess it's in Las Vegas sometime in 1977. ( 8/23/77 at the Aladdin in Las Vegas). The liquor tray was a standard part of Frank and Dean's act at the time.
I could go on but you get the idea.
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