Bela Lugosi was already a legend in the late 1940's. Having starred as Dracula in the legendary Universal film of the same name, he had made a name for himself as a creepy, menacing monster. Unfortunately for Lugosi, his career fell victim to a checklist of Hollywood issues- he was typecast; the serials he had been making were all but dead due to the rise of television and he had become addicted to morphine. By the 1950's, he was taking any work he could get.
Meanwhile, the world (and especially France) had taken notice of a new comedy duo consisting of a straight man who would become a heartthrob and a crazy goofball who would literally do anything for a laugh- Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. Their success would spark a cavalcade of similar and copy cat acts flooding out to the various nightclubs. One of the better acts featured a Jerry Lewis lookalike named Sammy Petrillo and a passable Dean Martin knock-off named Duke Mitchell. Sammy's resemblance to Jerry Lewis was uncanny and caught the attention of Martin and Lewis' representatives. They did all they could to prevent Duke and Sammy from booking work at night clubs around the country. Desperate, they found their way to the one town that probably wouldn't care about unoriginality- Hollywood.
Hollywood's studio system ensured that the stars only worked at one place for years. This caused them to often go after similar stars who openly copied the original stars' schtick. The original star's complaints would go unheeded. After all, if they were locked up at MGM, why would Universal care what they thought? Mitchell and Petrillo were chased out of night clubs because Martin and Lewis' agents vowed that they would never perform anywhere that the faux duo had performed. While the bigger studios were uninterested in signing them, they found a more receptive audience at Poverty Row. After Universal Studios had found great success placing its legendary monsters into comedy films, Poverty Row was eager to try the formula themselves. Jack Broder Productions was a small independent studio just a few steps above Ed Wood with no chance of ever signing the likes of Dean Martin or Jerry Lewis. They couldn't be easily threatened, so they signed the bargain basement Martin and Lewis, who were eager for their big break, pairing them with Bela Lugosi, who was really just looking for a paycheck.
The mere slip of a film featured Bela Lugosi playing a mysterious mad scientist who turns dreamy Duke Mitchell into the fakest gorilla you've ever seen in the fakest jungle ever shown on film. The producers obviously hoped that viewers would mistake Sammy Petrillo for Jerry Lewis. (It was the strange time period when Lewis was considered a draw.) The film took barely over a week to film and cost just $50,000 to make. It was a modest hit, but it didn't have the effect that either Lugosi nor the guys had hoped for. Bela would go on to star in films for Ed Wood, while Duke and Sammy went back to their old gigs, performing in any club that would have them. Breaking up and reuniting more times than the real thing, the act would eventually end in 1981 after Duke Mitchell's death. Sammy Petrillo would occasionally come out of hiding, typically due to renewed interest in his faux Lewis act. He would never really forgive Jerry Lewis for hassling him all of those years, rejecting requests to make appearances on talk shows with him. He passed away in 2009, oddly the one person who would prove to harbor a grudge longer than Jerry Lewis.
