The Joker Is Wild

Plot

Joe E. Lewis (Frank Sinatra), a successful 1920s Chicago night-club entertainer is invited to work for the Mob during the Prohibition era. His eventual decision to work elsewhere results in his face being slashed and his throat cut, preventing him from continuing with his current act as a singer.

Lewis soon develops an acerbic and witty sense of humor and is given a break as a stand-up comedian from singer Sophie Tucker (playing herself). Soon, Lewis makes a career for himself, but heavy drinking and a self-destructive streak leads him to question his way of living and what his life has become.

Cast

Production

Sinatra read Art Cohn's book The Joker Is Wild: The Story of Joe E. Lewis during the mid-'50s, was immediately taken by the story, and bought the rights to the book after Lewis himself turned down a reported $150,000 from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for the film rights to his story. Variety reported in November 1955 that Paramount Pictures would finance what was, for all intents and purposes, an independent feature film which was headed by Lewis and Sinatra along with director Charles Vidor and author Art Cohn. Each of the four partners were paid a reported $400,000, along with 75% of the film's net profits. The New York Times would report that Sinatra's share was in the region of $125,000 along with 25% of the film's profits.

The filming of the movie was mostly done later in the day, Sinatra preferring to work at that time and the filming schedule being tailored around this. Sinatra also insisted that all the musical scenes in the film and songs therein be recorded live on set to keep the performances more genuine. Frank Sinatra: "When I do a concert and someone coughs, I like that," Sinatra remarked. "I like the scraping of chairs. You get the feeling that it's really happening. I've always thought Lewis was one of only about four or five great artists in this century - one of them was Jolson - and I remember him screaming like the devil when he made a soundtrack." (from All the Way: A Biography of Frank Sinatra)

Critical reception

The Joker Is Wild opened to mostly favorable reviews.

Los Angeles Times reviewer Phillip K. Scheuer: "Sinatra "catches the bitter inner restlessness almost too well...When Lewis, highball in hand, is reciting them [the drunk monologues] his natural clown's grin takes the curse off their cynicism; from Sinatra the gags come out bitter and barbed."

Films and Filming reviewer Gordon Gow: "One consolation in the glossy gloom of this downbeat drama is that Frank Sinatra has sufficient talent and taste to break through the wall of embarrassment that is bound to arise between an audience and the film case-history of an unanonymous alcoholic."

Variety commented on the "major job Sinatra does... alternately sympathetic and pathetic, funny and sad."

This movie won the 1957 Academy Award for Best Original Song, for "All the Way" by Jimmy Van Heusen and Sammy Cahn. When the film was re-released some years later, the title was changed for a period to All the Way due to the immense popularity of the film's theme song, which peaked at No. 2 on Billboard.

Sinatra actually became friends with the real Lewis, who commented that "You (Sinatra) had more fun playing my life than I had living it."