Show HP V 0-- - Youthful Jimmy Durante in his Harlem days with his original jazz band (above) and cutting a caper with two other great favorites friends George M Cohan and Claudette Colbert (right) in every branch of show business and it couldn't have happened to a nicer guy defies description but will never be forgotten by those who were privileged to see it The Club Durant was packed every night with an audience ranging from socialites to the most vicious gangsters of that stormy period Clayton a tough customer himself maintained the peace Patrons had to check their firearms before entering and consequently there never was a shooting in the club But there was just about everything else Twice Durante was into letting in visitors who claimed to be childhood friends On both occasions they turned out to be Prohibition agents who closed the club But no matter how many times Jimmy was fooled he was always fair game the next time Clayton once said wonderingly: "God gave Jimmy Durante his great talent A thousand Lou Claytons could never have put that talent into this man But I loved him and I knew then as I know now that he was a true genius in his own way" Broadway and motion pictures next beckoned to Durante and his partners and shortly after their stage debut in Florenz Ziegfeld's "Show Girl" (with Ruby Keeler and Duke Ellington) they were signed by Paramount Pictures soft-heart- fast-talk- ed ed But several months after Jeanne's death Jimmy heard through the Ritz Brothers that Eddie Jackson was holed up in Akron O running a third-rat- e night club divorced from his wife and desperately unhappy Jimmy sent for Jackson and Clayton prevailed on the two of them to go back to work — at the Copacabana in New York That's where Clayton joined them for one night in the final appearance of Durante Clayton and Jackson Meantime Hollywood had forgotten Jimmy and there were long periods of idleness when he returned to the West Coast In desperation he even took a part in a Gene Autry movie where he had to be lashed to the horse to stay aboard "I'd never rode a horse" Jimmy recalls "and the horse never had been rode So we both started out on even terms It was a catastrastroke" Jimmy's final triumph and one of his greatest losses came almost simultaneously In his last illness Lou Clayton arranged the beginnings of Jimmy's television career He never lived to see the resurgence of Jimmy in this new medium that projected the Durante warmth to a whole new generation of Americans 1"oday Jimmy is as busy as he wants to be but The trio's first break-u- p came in the early '30s offered Jimmy a Jeanne Durante was overjoyed Jimmy heartbroken He went only on condition that Jackson and Clayton go along Clayton stayed with Durante as his manager through the next decade of making mediocre to bad movies Jackson finally drifted away after a few years to try show business on his own During this period Jimmy conquered radio too Although he was making a great deal of money he couldn't hang onto it He insisted on paying Clayton a third of his income his staff and taxes took large bites and the rest he distributed with typical Durante openhandedness He was a sucker for every hardluck story but the fact that he was being taken never bothered Jimmy "I only wish" he said many times "that I was Metro-Goldwyn-Ma- five-ye- ar yer contract — alone Rockinfellow" for JimIn 1940 the world turned topsy-turv- y my Durante Within two years he lost his brother his father and his wife Jeanne died after a prolonged illness and Jimmy worked little during this time He lost interest in everything he is also lonely He craves companionship and four men surround him constantly: his manager Lou Cohen pianist Jules Buffano drummer Jack Roth and Eddie Jackson All have been associated with Jimmy through most of his entertainment life Scarcely an evening goes by that these four aren't hanging out at Durante's modest eight-roohouse in Beverly Hills which is distinguished mainly by the plaques awards and other mementos of a lifetime in show business Unless some dire emergency — such as working — dictates otherwise Jimmy arises about noon He calls anything earlier a "predickalous hour" Once he's up and going though he operates in a whirlwind of feverish activity One of Jimmy's few concessions to Hollywood living is a swimming pool which he uses with the same gusto he displays in everything else he does — looking in a bathing suit something like Mahatma Gandhi on a binge Jimmy also enjoys fishing horse racing reading- - and song writing when he gets around to them which isn't often He's a terrible eater and has been concerned about his waistline for so long that he just nibbles on a weird assortment of nonfattening foods m cigar-smoki- ng taj A— mmmmmmmmmmmmmmf-JS- t Jimmy's wife Jeanne who first came to him as a young singer was a driving force in his career His losing battle with the English language is no phony Since Jimmy's early Bronx and Coney Island days when his associates talked out of the sides of their mouths his English has been a curious mixture of lower East Side Mrs and an elegant vocabulary His fascination with big words without knowing how to handle them has resulted in such Durante classics as "financial typhoon" "exterior motive" "stupendous" "catastrastroke" and hundreds of others Jimmy who seldom hides anything from anybody has managed to preserve one secret over the years: the identity of the "Mrs Calabash" to whom he says good night at the end of each of his radio and TV shows This started back in the early '40s and has since become a ritual Jimmy was quite disturbed on several occasions when his shows ran long and he was cut off before he could say good night to Mrs Calabash No one — not even Lou Clayton who was closest to him — could discover the origin of the remark Questioned about it today Jimmy just looks skyward and says "A guy's gotta have some secrets" Currently working under a contract with NBC which has five more years to run Jimmy probably will be back on television with a weekly half-hoshow next Fall although the deal hasn't been closed yet In the meantime he plays a few choice night clubs and appears as a TV guest star Jimmy has regained and probably will never again lose his place as America's most beloved clown If he wears his mantle carelessly today he has earned the privilege after almost a in show business And millions of Americans are hoping that Mrs Calabash whoever she is won't be saying good night to Jimmy Durante for a long time to come Mala-propis- ur hajf-centu- ry Family Weekly June 29 1958 ms |