There has been a lot of internet discussion about this recent interview of Jerry Lewis:
A guy who used to fill 21 hours of live television can’t give more than one word answers?
Jerry has his defenders who point to his body of work, which is indeed extensive and (in many cases) impressive. He has also raised a lot of money for Muscular Dystrophy. I will happily give him all that.
But he is also an insufferable crank. For God sakes, he’s done enough interviews to know what he did was asinine. For a brief time he HOSTED a talk show (very brief -- he was epicly bad). And it’s not his first rodeo. Having been interviewed before THOUSANDS of times I would submit he knows better.
He simply chose to be a prick.
That’s a lot different from someone who is just painfully shy in front of a microphone. I had one of those when I was broadcasting for the Baltimore Orioles.
Remember Harold Baines? Great hitter, outstanding ballplayer. Played mostly for the White Sox and A’s (but also Texas, Cleveland, and ironically, Baltimore). He was a six-time All-Star.
Anyway, he was playing for the A's when I was with the O's and when Oakland came to town I thought he’d be a terrific pre-game show guest. After all, he was from Maryland.
I approached him, he was very gracious, agreed to do the interview (although I could sense he was not wild about the idea). We sat down in the dugout, I turned on the recorder, began the interview, and every answer was one or two words. I usually prepared six or seven questions (for a four minute interview) and rarely got to them all. In this case I went through them in one minute. Oy. It was painful. But it was very clear to me that he was just ill at ease. He wasn’t just fucking with me (as some ballplayers will cheerfully do). I ultimately didn’t use the interview and knew better for the future. But my point is, I never held it against him. Facing a hundred mile an hour fastball wasn’t nearly as intimidating as a gawky nerd announcer with a microphone.
But that’s not Jerry. That’s not “Mr. Showbiz.” He obviously knew better. And for my money, I don’t care who you are, or how famous or important you are, there’s such a thing as simple human kindness and common courtesy. So I don’t care if he’s beloved by the French, or was a comedy God, or at one time was America’s most popular entertainer – when people ask me about Jerry Lewis:
Asshole.
(Hey, I was able to answer in one word.)