The Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon
Identifier
F.2021-04-0019b
Date Of Production
1980
Abstract
Chuck Kleinhans and Liz Schillinger's “comedy verité documentary” about the annual Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon.
Description
"Like the Super 8 format he chooses to work in, Chuck Kleinhans' films are unpretentious and casual to the point of seeming haphazard. They are also filled with the discoveries that only casual observation can catch. In The Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon--a whimsical documentary on Chicago events in support of the annual drive to raise money for children who are the victims of muscular dystrophy--an interview is conducted with a local media person who speaks knowingly of Jerry and the kids. The interview is hollow, the emotions empty. But in the background an unforgettable woman in a red dress paces the street, anxiously awaiting we know not what. Her nervous gum-chewing, her look of anxiety verging on disgust completes the empty foreground image to provide a multiple, conflicting image of the event. In another sequence a file of kids tiptoe across the screen in a semi-crouch determined not to get in the way of the camera. Of course they are in the way, are, in fact, as much a part of what the film is about as the supposedly main action. It is characteristic of Kleinhans' camera to maintain an open field of vision, including in that vision moments of interaction between foreground and background as well as with the eye behind the camera. Although full of the inherent grotesqueries of the Jerry Lewis event, the film itself suggests none of the attributes of a work that sets out to satirize its subject. It is, surprisingly, a very honest record and analysis of a most American ritual." — Linda Williams, “Super 8 Films by Chuck Kleinhans,” undated.
Format
Super 8
Extent
292 feet
Color
Color
Sound
Mag Stripe
Reel/Tape Number
1/1
Has Been Digitized?
Yes
Notes
Dictatorship of the Proletariat and The Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethon are spliced together on the same reel.
Element
Reversal Positives
Genre
Form
Subject
Related Collections
Related Places
Main Credits
Kleinhans, Chuck (is filmmaker)
Schillinger, Liz (is filmmaker)
Participants And Performers
Schillinger, Liz (is interviewer)
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