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Like most baby boomers, I first met Jackie Mason when he appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show several times. Of course there were aunts and uncles and others who saw him in the Catskills and his legend among them was immense.
I first met him in person in the late 1970s after, according to legend, his blacklisting by Ed Sullivan for an on-air “middle finger salute” aimed at the host had hurt to its visibility and commercial viability. The fact that I met him at a fundraiser he agreed to appear at for a Brooklyn candidate for a state assembly seat seemed to indicate his career was at an all-time low.
A few years later, “The World According to Me”, the first of five one-man shows on Broadway (four of which I would be the “General Press Representative”) was hailed by the New York Times and almost everyone as “genius”. And Jackie is once again an A-List star, loved by millions for his observational humor.
His routine about Starbucks was incredibly funny, it was used as a marketing case study by Harvard Business School. (just Google ‘Jackie Mason Starbucks’ to like it)
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His show ended, but in the years that followed, when I traveled over 200,000 miles a year on business, I would meet with him whenever we were in the same city. We met and kibitzed in Sarasota, San Francisco, Washington, DC, Chicago and others and, of course, New York.
Every time I was in New York I saw Jackie; mostly at his late-night “reunion” of friends, a collection of sad bags, has-beens and losers (he called me his only “normal” friend) where no subject was taboo and everything was. on the table, but sometimes for dinner with his wife, Jyll Rosenfeld and his best friend Raoul Lionel Felder (the lawyer and former client who introduced us).
What do I remember the most? Whenever Jackie did TV interviews, he refused makeup. And fearing that the makeup artist would be punished for his appearance after refusing, he would ask “Are they going to blame you?” And rub them with a green beak or two in their palms.
In all those late-night coffee sessions, he took the check and left a more than generous tip for the waiter. And, most importantly, he always stopped and spoke to anyone who recognized him and he did so in a warm and genuine way.
Jackie Mason was my friend and an inspiration and a mentor to me. May my friend Jackie know peace, and may Jyll, Raoul and everyone like me who loved Jackie know peace. And may his memory be for a blessing.
The writer is a expert in marketing, branding and messaging who was the architect who built Israel21c and the evangelist of the “beyond conflict” message that changed the way Jews advocated for Israel in the 2000s.
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