‘Why We Broke Up, I’ll Never Know’: The Fallout and Reconciliation Following Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis’ Bitter Professional Split
One of the most famous and, initially, acrimonious professional breakups in show business history — the split between Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis — is also one of the most heartbreaking of such stories. But a look at their trajectories afterward shows occasional emotional moments of reconciliation and redemption, even if those moments took years or even decades to arrive.
After meeting and becoming friends in 1944, Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis partnered up professionally as the comedy team of Martin and Lewis, debuting their act at the 500 Club in Atlantic City on July 25, 1946.
Not very popular at first, by the late ’40s and early ’50s, the duo had their own NBC radio program, The Martin and Lewis Show (1949-53), and also began making guest appearances on some of the most iconic shows of the early television era, including Texaco Star Theater, What’s My Line? and The Colgate Comedy Hour. The pair’s first appearance on TV came when they were among the guests on the June 20, 1948, series premiere episode of Toast of the Town — which would become more famously known as The Ed Sullivan Show over its 23-year run.
The comedy team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis perform on the first episode of The Ed Sullivan Show (known then as Toast of the Town) on June 20, 1948
But it was on the big screen where Martin and Lewis really found large audiences and began their rise as one of the hottest acts of the ’50s. They appeared in 16 movies together between 1949 and 1956, beginning with My Friend Irma in 1949, and including classics like My Friend Irma Goes West (1950), At War With the Army (1950), The Caddy (1953) and more.
As a testament to their popularity, the duo also made a memorable cameo in 1952’s Road to Bali, the sixth of the famous Road pictures led by Bing Crosby, Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour.
Courtesy Everett Collection
Lewis and Martin in 1950’s At War With the Army, their third film together
However, as with many close relationships, personal and/or professional, friction eventually developed between Martin and Lewis. Also like a lot of relationships that dissolve, it seems hard to point to just one thing that eventually brought the strain to its breaking point, but a lot of it here seemed to be creative differences.
By the time they were working on what would be their final film together, Hollywood or Bust (1956), tensions had gotten so high that at one point, as Lewis recalls in his funny and touching 2005 memoir, Dean & Me (A Love Story), Martin angrily told Lewis that he was “nothing to me but a f***ing dollar sign.” For his part, it sounds like Lewis’ feelings toward Martin weren’t outwardly directed at him, but rather the film’s director, Frank Tashlin, seemed to take the brunt of the complaints.
Hollywood or Bust was released nearly five months after Martin and Lewis split up, which occurred following their last contractually obligated stage performance on July 25, 1956 — 10 years exactly from the day when they made their debut as a team.
Remind In 1957, both men began their solo film careers, Lewis with The Delicate Delinquent (1957), a comedy that also marked his debut as a producer (and he was an uncredited writer on the screenplay), and Martin with the romantic comedy Ten Thousand Bedrooms.
While their breakup arguably led to both men being able to more fully flourish in their creative careers — with Martin not only becoming a hit recording artist but also a leading man across a variety of film genres, a host of his own long-running TV variety series and a charter member of the Rat Pack, and Lewis able to have more creative control as producer and writer over many of his famous solo movies, even becoming Paramount Pictures’ biggest star for a time — it seems clear that the feud had an emotional impact on both of them.
The love and respect the men continued to have for each other, even during years of silence, can be seen and felt in Lewis’ memoir, and in the few public reunions they had in the decades after “Martin and Lewis” ceased to exist. There are even little traces of regret that can be felt at times, and, again, it’s like any number of other breakups, where over time, you almost forget why you split in the first place, even if you know those little things would probably build up again if you reunited.
The first time Martin and Lewis publicly appeared together following their parting was during the memorable Sept. 30, 1958, episode of The Eddie Fisher Show.
As you can see in the clip from that episode below, Martin briefly surprises Lewis and host Fisher while they are talking onstage, before Bing Crosby of all people hilariously drags Martin off. The incident only lasts a few seconds, but leads to uproarious laughter and screams of delight from the audience, as well as funny responses from Lewis, who seems excited to see his old partner.
Despite this, however, the two appear to not have spoken privately for nearly 20 years after their 1956 breakup, until Frank Sinatra, using the show biz power only he could muster, arranged for another surprise reunion between the pair, during the 1976 broadcast of Lewis’ famed Labor Day telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, seen in the clip below. According to Lewis, he and Martin “spoke every day after that.”
In Lewis’ Dean & Me, among the emotional moments that stands out during his account of his 50-year relationship with Martin is when he writes about how they publicly reunited for the last time in 1989, on Martin’s 72nd birthday. Lewis was the one who surprised his former partner onstage at that time, at Bally’s Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, where Martin was doing a week of shows.
Lewis presented his friend with a birthday cake, and in the book he recalls how, as they hugged, Martin told him, loud enough for the audience to hear, “I love you and I mean it.” Lewis responded: “Here’s to seventy-two years of joy you’ve given the world. Why we broke up, I’ll never know.”
This would be the last public reunion of the duo before Martin’s death on Christmas Day 1995, at age 78. Lewis passed away Aug. 20, 2017, at age 91.
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JERRY LEWIS FILM LINEUP DURING TCM’S 2024 SUMMER UNDER THE STARS — SATURDAY, AUG. 17, 2024, BEGINNING AT 6AM (ALL TIMES EASTERN)
While Lewis and Martin are no longer with us, we and future audiences are fortunately able to enjoy their talent, and the hilarity and pure entertainment they brought to everything, as a team and individually, especially in their movies.
A great chance to see a number of these films is during Turner Classic Movies‘ 2024 installment of Summer Under the Stars (click for full August lineup). Somehow, comedy icon Lewis has not yet been featured in the daylong celebrations of specific movie stars the network broadcasts each day during this popular August event, but that is rectified on Saturday, Aug. 17, 2024, with a 12-title lineup that includes five of the movies Lewis made with Martin, and seven of his equally memorable solo film appearances. The schedule is just below.
Remind Martin & Lewis Movies
8am: At War With the Army (1950) — the pair’s third film together
10am: Sailor Beware (1951)
12pm: Scared Stiff (1953)
2pm: You’re Never Too Young (1955) — one of their last films together
4pm: The Caddy (1953)
Jerry Lewis Solo Movies
6am: Which Way to the Front? (1970) — Lewis was also director and producer
6pm: Rock-a-Bye Baby (1958) — one of Lewis’ first solo films, he was also a producer
8pm: The Nutty Professor (1963) — Lewis also directed and was a cowriter with Bill Richmond
10pm: The Ladies Man (1961) — Lewis directed, produced and cowrote with Richmond)
12am: The Disorderly Orderly (1964) — Lewis was also an executive producer
2am: Smorgasboard (1983, aka Cracking Up) — Lewis also directed and cowrote with Richmond
4am: Cookie (1989) — Lewis had a smaller supporting role in this comedy led by Peter Falk and Emily Lloyd
Remind