Mr. Ward called me after Tom Poston died, upset by an obituary he saw in a major newspaper. It described Mr. Poston as "the pasty faced comedian." "This is his obituary!" Mr. Ward said. "They can't give the guy a break?" Well, today the New York Times referred to the face of Jerry Mathers as "half owlish, half doughy." It was not an obituary, thank goodness! (Mr. Mathers famously has been the subject of premature obituaries, and I do not wish this to be mistaken for such.) But still... my goodness! There must be better ways of describing a person's face. Moving on, the article mentions the play BOEING, BOEING in which Mr. Mathers appeared onstage with Tony Dow, who of course played his brother on LEAVE IT TO BEAVER. I already knew about this reunion from reading Mr. Mathers's autobiography for work (long story. On an unrelated note, Mr. Mathers also plays a key role in the title novella of my new book). I have always wanted to mention here at the "blog" the fascinating fact that JERRY Mathers took the JERRY Lewis role (from the film version of BOEING, BOEING) and TONY Dow took the TONY Curtis role! Wow! Stuff like that really gets me worked up! Crazy! But I have never had any "internet" corroboration... until now. Finally, speaking of Jerry Lewis, everyone should be aware that the second box set of Martin & Lewis films comes out today.
