by Wes Gehring
Ultimately, Skelton’s alter ego, Deadeye, proved the more insightful. Television Westerns were even more dominant in the years to come, which guaranteed Deadeye would continue to be a prominent figure in Skelton’s one-person stock company. And though his comic cowboy took a backseat to Freddie and Clem in overall importance among Skelton figures, Deadeye represented an important line of continuity with Skelton’s screen career-making character Wally Benton in the 1940s Whistling trilogy. That is, like Wally, Deadeye’s dual focus persona fluctuates between being a smart aleck and a cowardly antihero.
Despite this throwback connection, Deadeye also doubles as Skelton’s only topical 1950s figure—a character that parodies the decade’s most popular television genre. A timeliness moniker was unusual for Skelton’s gallery of goofy figures, since many period critics still found his humor a corny regression into a yesteryear entertainment tradition. But two developments the following year brought critical raves about the comedian’s versatility.
Skelton’s range is defined through two well-publicized accomplishments in 1958 that dovetail into another pivotal story about the amazing sweep of his talent. In August Skelton opened at Las Vegas’s Riviera Hotel to reviews that rivaled the comedian’s notices from his last appearance in the desert community in 1953. Variety said, “[Skelton] proves without a doubt that he is one of the great clowns of modern times. The romp is a decathlon of comedy.”73 The Los Angeles Herald Express, under the headline “Red Skelton Big Vegas Hit,” added, “For an incomparable 90 minutes … the rangy redhead gave a sold-out-in-advance opening night audience … the spectacle of the art in human comedy.”74
One of Skelton’s many scrapbooks is devoted to a more personal slant on this 1958 triumph.75 The numerous photos and telegrams document a show business love fest for the comedian, with stars such as Bing Crosby, Carol Channing, and Debbie Reynolds in attendance. Gunsmoke star James Arness sat with Davis opening night and was later the recipient of a gift from Skelton—a gun the comedian had found during a recent visit to Japan. (As an avid gun collector himself, Skelton thought the Western star would appreciate the present.) Stars sending telegrams included Benny, Eddie Fisher, George Gobel, Frank Borzage, and Elvis Presley and his manager, Colonel Tom Parker. A note from Danny Thomas was the most personal. It read: “Thank God you’re back where you belong—making people happy. Have fun.”
Contrast this big boisterous 1958 cabaret success, anchored in broad renditions of such classic material as the “Guzzler’s Gin” sketch, with Skelton’s special Thanksgiving 1958 episode of his television series that was entirely devoted to the holiday trials and tribulations of Freddie the Freeloader in pantomime. As television historian Wesley Hyatt later wrote, “He got glowing reviews … [and television critics] began to realize that maybe, just maybe, this comedian that they had written off a few years earlier as being unable to handle the medium or had come back just due to lucky scheduling had more talent and versatility to offer than they thought.”76
A ninth memorable Skelton news item from the 1950s involved a celebrated appearance on someone else’s television program. Guest spots were something Skelton seldom did. They had to be heartfelt for the comedian, like his 1956 visit to the show of fellow Hoosier Herb Shriner. In a very honest TV Guide interview/article from 1960, Skelton also confessed, “I don’t do very many guest shots. Frankly, nobody asks. I don’t like those swap deals where you do my show and I do yours. They’re contrived, they’re not spontaneous—and I think the audience senses it.”77
These comments notwithstanding, the previous year Skelton had made a very popular appearance on the Lucille Ball-Desi Arnez Show, which was a series of one-hour specials showcasing the continued misadventures of the I Love Lucy cast after that program ceased weekly production. Playing upon the recent statehood of Alaska, the story involved a bad land deal and was called “Lucy Goes to Alaska.” As with most personality comedian-driven entertainment, the plot did not get in the way of a charming Freddie the Freeloader duet between Skelton and Ball, as well as a slapstick plane ride. For viewers with good memories, this teaming of television’s favorite redheads brought back memories of their rousing “Friendship” finale number from DuBarry Was a Lady (1943).
The episode took an added significance in later years when Skelton kept his old programs out of the marketplace, and “Lucy Goes to Alaska” was one of the few quality examples of Skelton’s television work readily available to fans. As a final footnote to this episode, Ball did not enjoy Skelton’s ad-libbing tendencies during the shoot. She was a strictly by-the-script performer and found any variations thereof to be less than professional. In contrast, Ball’s I Love Lucy costar, William Frawley (Fred Mertz), had gotten along famously with Skelton when he had supported the comedian in the 1958 Freddie the Freeloader Thanksgiving program.
Sadly, the final notable news story from the decade dwarfs all the others, as is invariably the case when the unthinkable occurs. The Skeltons lost their nine-year-old son Richard to leukemia in 1958. Like a work of tragic literature, the calamity played itself out in five acts. First, there was simply shock—how could this happen to a little boy that close friends of the family described “as a carbon copy of his father, and a comedian in his own right?78 Less than two weeks after the January 1957 diagnosis, the comedian thanked the public for their great outpouring of support and “Skelton said the boy knows he is seriously ill with leukemia. He was listening when a television commentator broke the story. ‘Perhaps it is better that he does know,’ Red added. ‘Now he will cooperate better with the doctors. We are not giving up hope. All of us, including Richard, are praying hard. He’s a good boy.’”79 (Ironically, Skelton friend Humphrey Bogart died of cancer the same month Richard was diagnosed.)
Act two involved what came to be called the “See It All Tour,” where the comedian “plans to pack a lifetime of adventures for his young son into less than four months this summer.”80 Richard, though on medication, was still able to lead a relatively normal life, so the exploration of East Coast historic sites began. The many stops ranged from seeing Philadelphia’s Liberty Bell to steering a ferry to New York harbor’s Statue of Liberty. Soon Skelton decided, “The little fellow got such enjoyment out of that [American] trip—and no ill effects—that we decided to show him the rest of the world.”81
Richard essentially remained in remission, and medical specialists said the child was fit to travel overseas; however as a precaution during the family’s tour of Europe, Richard underwent periodic checkups. In addition, Skelton hoped that all this contact with international specialists might trigger some sort of breakthrough. The family spared no cost, and there was even a plane “standing by at all times to take Richard home … in case of an emergency.”82 Initially, the European trip went well, including a private audience with the pope, where Richard received a silver medal, and a visit to the ruins of Pompeii—both special highlights for the boy. Even reports of a squabble between the Skeltons had a comic family-on-vacation tone to them. That is, the couple argued about touring in a Volkswagon van: “Mrs. Skelton was afraid of his driving on the twisting, narrow European roads and living off the beaten track in a foreign country.”83
Both Richards (the child was named after his father) also provided intended comedy. When the boy asked the comedian why the Mona Lisa was smiling, Skelton replied, “Because everyone’s looking at her.”84 But the article’s author reported the crowd was really looking at the Skeltons. Moving from Paris to London, young Richard showed a dark sense of humor at the airport when he dryly asked a reporter, “I say, how is the Skelton boy?”85 That was the trip’s last bit of levity.
The catalyst for act three (nasty criticism of the tour) came from a press conference at the Skeltons’ London hotel, the Savoy. London Daily Sketch columnist Simon Ward wrote of the gathering, “I found myself in the middle of a nauseating jamboree. Publicity men, looking like mourners, were gravely handing out printed copies of Red Skelton’s life story. Waiters were brin
ging in trays of drinks.”86 Ward felt little Richard was a frightened victim of a publicity stunt staged by the comedian. Ward’s perspective, however, was an aberration. A more typical response to the press conference can be found in the title of John Camsell’s syndicated New York Journal American article, “Little Dick Skelton Looks at Death—And It Has No Terror For Him.”87 Moreover, American journalists were quick to point out that it was customary in the United States for background material to be handed out at news conferences.
Still, Skelton told the London Daily Mail, “I’m furious. People have been very unkind. This is not a publicity stunt.”88 The Skeltons’ tour continued with a short visit to Scotland, but a damper had fallen on their trip, and they soon left Europe for home. Yet, “Despite their troubles, Skelton said the entire family thought the trip was a success. ‘The kids had a lot of fun. Probably we would still be there but both of them are anxious to see their little friends back home.’”89
Skelton and his family on the way home from their “See It All Tour,” July 1957. (Wes D. Gehring Stills Collection)
In the United States there was a backlash against the British press accusation, with this excerpt from a Los Angeles Herald Express editorial being a typical response: “The cruel implication that Red Skelton might be interested in obtaining personal publicity through his son’s incurable ailment during this tour was acid poured on wounds in the heart.”90 Indeed, the outcry was such that the British Consulate issued a diplomatic denial that London newspapers “insulted” Skelton.91 The consulate’s case in print again laid the blame on the aforementioned London Daily Sketch columnist.
Skelton let the issue drop and soon returned to the challenge of being funny on a weekly basis. One of the most difficult aspects of doing the television program was maintaining his habit of periodically mentioning his children in the monologue. Prior to Richard’s diagnosis, Skelton had sometimes even used his son as a surrogate Junior character. But when he stopped talking about Valentina and Richard, his son complained. Consequently, heart-rending or not, back they went into the monologue.
The original prognosis for Richard was only five months. But even then, Skelton and Davis were in denial. When their son was still alive a year later, however, they could not help hoping maybe he could beat the disease. Paradoxically, the parents were now themselves having health issues. Skelton almost died in December from a severe asthma attack, brought on by stress, and in January Davis was hospitalized for exhaustion. Richard’s condition started to deteriorate in April, and he began to spend an increasing amount of time at the University of California at Los Angeles Medical Center. Readmitted in early May, he suffered through daily blood transfusions and died the evening of May 10, less then two weeks before his tenth birthday.
Skelton and Davis had taken a room in the medical center near Richard’s, spending as much time with him as possible. That final day’s activities included watching one of his favorite Saturday morning cartoons, Mighty Mouse, and talking about his upcoming birthday. The couple and Valentina had then left briefly for supper, only to be immediately called back when Richard took a turn for the worse. Fittingly, for a little boy who was a “carbon copy of his father,” Richard managed to impart his last minutes with a darkly comic pronouncement. Sensing his death was near, he requested a final kiss from his mother, father, and sister. A few days later Skelton recalled, “He asked Valentina to pull up a stool [for added height] and give him a kiss, too. [But she was slow to respond to this dying wish. And] I remember Richard said, ‘Hurry up, Valentina, I haven’t got all day.’”92 (Of course, given the comedian’s hyperbolic tendencies, one cannot help wondering if this was one of his many embellishments.)
This fourth act, the death of their son, left the Skeltons inconsolable. A sense of their extreme grief is suggested in one of two telegrams from composer/actor/author Oscar Levant, “Please bear up for our sake. My deepest sympathy and love.”93 (At the Forest Lawn funeral three days later, neither parent could walk without assistance, and they spent most of their time in a room adjacent to the main chapel.) The sympathy cards and telegrams filled a huge scrapbook and part of another. Mamie Eisenhower wrote, in part, “The President joins me in sending our heartfelt and deepest sympathy to you both. Having lost our first little boy, we both know the empty place it leaves in your heart.”
Several letters poignantly, though indirectly, praised the Skeltons’ special travel tour for Richard. For example, General George Marshall wrote, in part, “He was a brave little fellow and, as parents, you did a most noble thing by pouring into his life all that time would allow.” J. Edgar Hoover, head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, even provided a firsthand memory of the tour: “I recall so vividly your visit [to Washington, D.C.] last year. He was such a happy and courageous little fellow and a regular little trouper. I deeply regret this tragic loss to you.”
Probably the two most eloquent letters received came from Sammy Davis Jr. and Academy Award-winning actor Paul Muni. The latter wrote, “Your goodness, courage and wisdom throughout your ordeal has inspired a world and somehow resounded to the credit of all in our profession. My wife and I know from personal experience what you have lived through.… May the concentrated thinking of millions who love you be of solace to you and yours.”
Appropriately, among the who’s who of entertainers chronicled in the funeral scrapbooks, comedians are especially well represented. Their numbers, listed in the order by which the cards and telegrams are arranged, included: Jackie Coogan, Edward Everett Horton, Harold Lloyd, Cantiflas (Mario Morena Reyes), Jack Carson, Marion Davies, Red Buttons, Wonderful Smith (one of Skelton’s radio sidekicks). Sterling Halloway, Henny Youngman, Gleason, Charles Ruggles, Thomas, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Benny and Mary Livingstone, Ed Wynn, Lucille Hardy (the widow of Oliver Hardy), Eddie Cantor, and Steve Allen.
As luck had it, Allen’s card also serves as an unintended ironic segue to act five—life after one’s loss. Allen’s note said, “As a writer I could think of some appropriate words to say to you at this difficult time but as a father I know that words in themselves couldn’t bring you any comfort. Only time can do that.”94
Chapter 12 Notes
1. Jimmy Starr, “Skelton Wows ’Em at Las Vegas Club: Just Like Atomic Blast,” Los Angeles Herald Express, July 15, 1953.
2. “Ailing,” Newsweek, December 22, 1952, 57.
3. “Red Skelton,” Variety, July 22, 1953.
4. Dorothy Beck, “Red Skelton Signs with CBS at Last,” San Francisco News, July 30, 1953.
5. Valentina Skelton Alonso, telephone interview with author, February 27, 2007.
6. Benedict Freedman and Nancy Freedman, Lootville (New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1957), 102–3.
7. Ibid., 87.
8. Red Skelton’s Writing, box 11, Gene Fowler Folder, Red Skelton Collection, Vincennes University, Vincennes, Indiana.
9. Arthur Marx, Red Skelton (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1979), 217.
10. “Red Skelton Reconsiders Divorce Plans,” Seattle Times, December 3, 1952.
11. Freedman and Freedman, Lootville, 144.
12. Lloyd Shearer, Red Skelton cover story, Parade (January 6, 1963).
13. Lloyd Shearer, “Red Skelton Never Stops Clowning,” Parade (May 8, 1955): 28.
14. David McIntyre, “Skelton’s Fans Suffer for Him,” San Diego Evening Tribune, October 23, 1953.
15. John Heisner, “Red Skelton: TV Institution,” Rochester (NY) Democrat and Chronicle, October 8, 1967.
16. Harry MacArthur, “Red Skelton Is Summer Sub for [Arthur] Godfrey on Wednesdays,” Washington Star, July 15, 1954.
17. Ibid.
18. Dwight Newton, “Day and Night,” San Francisco Examiner, October 8, 1952.
19. Steve Allen, “Red Skelton,” in The Funny Men (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1956), 270.
20. Sherwood Schwartz (panel speaker), “Salute to Red Skelton,” Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, Beverly Hills, California, October 21, 1998.
21. Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh, The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network TV Shows, 1946–Present (New York: Ballantine Books, 1979), 803–8.
22. Schwartz, “Salute to Red Skelton.”
23. Martha Brian, “Skelton Comedy Taken from Life,” Columbus (OH) Dispatch, August 23, 1962.
24. Red Skelton (guest columnist for syndicated writer Erskine Johnson), “Red Skelton Writes About 5 Characters Used in His Act,” Muskogee (OK) Times Democrat, [1956], in Red Skelton Scrapbook Number 26, January-December 1956, Skelton Collection.
25. Brian, “Skelton Comedy Taken from Life.”
26. John Crosby, “Radio and Television: Minority Report,” New York Herald Tribune, January 6, 1952.
27. Marc Pachter, “The Biographer Himself: An Introduction,” in Telling Lives: The Biographer’s Art (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985), 14.
28. Jim Knipfel, Quitting the Nairobi Trio (2000; reprint, New York: Berkley Books, 2001), 277.
29. Hal Bodley, “Dream Comes True for Duo,” USA Today, August 1, 2005.
30. Groucho Marx, Groucho and Me (1959; reprint, New York: Manor Books, 1974), 136.
31. “Red Skelton: A One-Man Stock Company,” Chicago American, November 19, 1967.
32. Paul Corkery, Carson (New York: Randt and Company, 1987), 67.
33. “‘Johnny’ of Woodland Hills Wows ’Em with Ad-Libbing as Red Rendered Hors de Combat,” Van Nuys (CA) News, August 22, 1954.