"Son, you look more like Buddy Holly than Buddy Holly ever did!" -- Jerry Lee Lewis
An excerpt from the upcoming memoir of my time on set of one of the great Rock 'n' Roll Biopics (not really, but i love the book it was mangled from, Myra Lewis Williams' eponymous memoir, 'Great Balls of Fire').
i was first cast as Steve Allen, until being replaced by the real man himself, and then downgraded to play (for the second time) Jerry Lee Lewis's best friend (a relationship unknown to most), Buddy Holly, featured in the infamous scene (filmed at the Orpheum Theater in Memphis, TN) -- the apocryphal reenactment of some iteration of some racist's 'rock fantasy' at the Paramount Theater, Brooklyn, NY, between and betwixt those two giants -- the Killer and Chuck Berry, whose only racial enmity was fueled by brokers, managers, and cash-mongers, but whose life of the ego colludes, clouds, and guarantees something as close as its closest quotient belies:
Jerry lee gives me the once-over twice, pops the Meerschaum out of the side of his leering suck-hole, and in a Dilaudid meets Ferriday accent, slurs in my direction:
i was first cast as Steve Allen, until being replaced by the real man himself, and then downgraded to play (for the second time) Jerry Lee Lewis's best friend (a relationship unknown to most), Buddy Holly, featured in the infamous scene (filmed at the Orpheum Theater in Memphis, TN) -- the apocryphal reenactment of some iteration of some racist's 'rock fantasy' at the Paramount Theater, Brooklyn, NY, between and betwixt those two giants -- the Killer and Chuck Berry, whose only racial enmity was fueled by brokers, managers, and cash-mongers, but whose life of the ego colludes, clouds, and guarantees something as close as its closest quotient belies:
Jerry lee gives me the once-over twice, pops the Meerschaum out of the side of his leering suck-hole, and in a Dilaudid meets Ferriday accent, slurs in my direction:
"Son, you look more like Buddy Holly than Buddy Holly ever did!"
*thanks for writing it, Myra Lewis Williams. i had fun being buddy holly. i then went on as first runner-up for the Buddy Holly Story role which played on the West End and toured forever, where I auditioned on Broadway, and then, finally, duetting with your sister-in-law, Linda Gail Lewis, on the New Rose disque, 'Every Day's a Holly Day,' where we sang "Oh, Boy!" for Patrick Mathe. (Before that, they used to say i looked like Elvis Costello.)
Kay Martin you were probably there. Mr. Brown says it never happened. what's your recollection?