To my utter astonishment, seven minutes of behind-the-scenes footage from Jerry Lewis' infamous unreleased film THE DAY THE CLOWN CRIED have been posted on YouTube -
This could be posted in General Discussion as well with Lewis talking about his use of temp tracks.
I hope this film gets a release someday. I'm also curious how much an influence Pierre Etaix had on this. I recently watched the Etaix set from Criterion in which it noted that he and Lewis were friends around this time.
Cinematic Clarification from the Authoritative Jerry-philes Out There, Please Department:
Was there ever any actual doubt the footage (not to mention the film in some form or another) reely existed or that any general assemblage would truly see the brilliantly-belated light of public discovery?
And here's Harry Shearer, one of the few people who has seen the film, discussing it with Howard Stern. Note he says it only had a temp track and no credits, so even if the negative still exists, the film is probably in an unfinished state.
Wow. That sure isn't what he said back in the '90s. At that time he claimed he wanted to get his hands on the film and finish it but it was locked up in some French vault somewhere that he couldn't get to. I'm paraphrasing, but I distinctly remember him indicating that he wanted to release the film but couldn't for several troublesome legal reasons. But Jerry is infamous for telling different stories about the same subjects, including his own upbringing.
So...perhaps his comments in the video represent how he feels now about it, but it's a very different tune than I recall...
