Las Vegas Now

CIRCLE F LOUNGE STAR
JACK E. IS BACK

A Personal Interview By Allen Rich
July 16, 1971

It was a steaming Las Vegas day outside. But inside Jack E. Leonard's suite at the Frontier Hotel the air conditioner riffled some papers on the desk of the living room and partially drawn drapes kept the hot mid-afternoon sun out.

Jack E. is a man who believes in comfort and hospitality. He stripped to his shorts and because there was no booze in the room, offered to phone room service and get me a brew. I declined. Too early. We compromised on a couple of pots of coffee and chocolate cake.

These amenities over, Jack E. eased his bulk into a chair and the interview was about to start when he remembered he had to call New York. Excusing himself he said the call concerned "an employment offer."

I could only hear one side of the conversation between Jack E. and the guy on the other end of the line who turned out to be none other than Peter Lawford.

"A movie, Pete? Sure I'm interested if it's a good part. I think I'm as good an actor as George Raft -- or Don Rickles," he said with a chuckle. "Send me the script and I'll look it over and let you know."

"You putting Don Rickles down?" I needled. (Many compare the techniques of the two.) Some say Leonard resents Rickles, but Jack E. had this to say:

"Don Rickles is a fan of mine from way back. Sure he took a little of my stuff, I don't mind. He'd been 24 or 25 years reaching the top, he's paid his dues. Don's a nice guy and deserves his success."

Leonard, currently packing them in at the Frontier's Circle F Lounge, says he rarely insults the audience, except in the case of hecklers — as many a heckler has found out to his sorrow.

"There was this heckler. It was a slow audience. Some were half-stoned. This guy was a real pest. I said, 'I have a terrible toothache, but compared to you it's a pleasure! I don't know where you came from, but it's not far enough,' " explained Jackie, master of the squelch supreme.

Leonard writes about 90 percent of his own material. He's an avid reader of the newspapers. He gives the news a personal twist and the result is his famous topical joke pattern that you see onstage.

"But nothing about war, because that ain't funny, far from it," said Leonard.

But war is about the only exclusion in Jack E.'s barbed bag of contemporary humor.

On smoking: "Well, I finally stopped smoking after 40 years. (He did.) "Now, I've stopped coughing in the morning and only cough at night."

On marriage. His own. He married his present wife, Gladys, a year and a half ago. She was then manager of the art gallery at the Frontier Hotel. "I was looking for risqué pictures and there she was," quips Jack, who can never resist a one-liner.

You look at Leonard and you are not likely to confuse him with a star athlete. Which he was as a young man. His forte: Swimming.

"I competed big time for eight years, went to Northwestern U. on an athletic scholarship. My college education lasted 'six consecutive months' because they found out I didn't even know the answers to questions like they ask in the second year of high school. In high school I didn't need to know the answers. They used to fix my marks so I could stay on the swimming team," said Leonard wryly.

He added: "I once swam against Johnny Weismuller. He was so fast I haven't seen him since!"

Leonard, A trim 190-pounder in his early Chicago days, also excelled as a Charleston dancer. And his brains were as agile as his feet. He carried a claque with him every time he entered a contest. They'd applaud like mad and to further insure his winning he'd wind up his dance by doing a spectacular flip-flop. "Only problem was I had to split my prize money with the claque and generally wound up with peanuts," grinned Leonard.

But Jack's carefully thought-out act, if you could call it that, caught the eye of Billy House, a top vaudeville star of those days and he joined House's act, marking the start of a show business career which is now in its 41st year.

Like other stars to whom I have spoken, Leonard prefers the Vegas lounges to any main showroom. "In the main rooms you have two problems, (a) You have to keep filling them to justify your big salary, and (b) You have to work seven days a week, which can be a drag," he explained.

Leonard has a contract with the Frontier running through the end of 1972. He plays here four months a year.

At the price he commands Jack E. wouldn't have to do another thing. But he likes to keep busy and when he closes here he takes his act to top spots in Pittsburgh, Boston and Detroit "and will do anyone's TV show that wants me as a guest." (He's already made over 500 television appearances.)

Jack E. is one of a kind . . .

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