“‘Skokie’ brings out serious side of Danny Kaye”
November 6, 1981 – Daily Herald
By: Diane Mermigas
Danny Kaye reaches deep into his vast pool of experiences as a Jew, a father, a dapper comedian and a world philanthropist to play concentration camp survivor Max Feldman, who chases the Nazis out of “Skokie.”
The riveting CBS-
After spending more than four decades as a good humor song and dance man of the screen and stage, Kaye discovered, while working on location a year ago in the Near North Chicago suburb, that “the essence of good drama is something I’ve always unconsciously practiced.
“I don’t think just because you do a dramatic part that suddenly you are a dramatic actor. There is such a fine line between good comedy and good drama. You can find some element of comedy even in the most tragic circumstances and something sad even in the most hilarious circumstances.” Kaye said during a recent return visit to Chicago.
His casual attire was an indication that Kaye would be in the Windy City only long
enough to reflect thoughtfully on the 2 ½-
“There is so much more to comedy than just being funny. There is pantomime, satire, a hundred nuances that make it different,” he said. “I don’t want to invest this role in ‘Skokie’ with too much of a romantic aura. I haven’t longed to do drama all my life. This just came along and appealed to me because it is such a real slice of life.”
The six-
“The kind of Jewish experience we’re talking about in ‘Skokie’ is very individual. It is different from my own. So many people in that town were survivors of the concentration camps or knew others who perished,” he said. “The good thing about the script is that there is no resolution because there really can be no resolution when you’re dealing with so many questions of legality and emotionality.
“I think the opening scene in the temple says it all. My character gets up to make a speech about how Jews who survived the Holocaust cannot reconcile the Nazi Party’s constitutional right to march in a predominately Jewish town.
“You know, when I finished giving that speech in the synagogue when we were filming, there was dead silence and the extras all around me were weeping I realized that what my character said, they understood. Most of them were Holocaust survivors. It was their story.”
Kaye approached several intense scenes in which Feldman poignantly discusses his
Holocaust experiences and feelings with his curious teenage daughter by drawing from
heart-
“What it boils down to is the old communicating with the young. I can remember telling my daughter when I thought t was time for her to leave home. Even though I loved her and told her so, I knew it was time for her to go out in the world alone and be everything I knew she could be. It wasn’t an easy thing to say, but I know now it was the right thing,” Kaye said. Dena now is a freelance writer living in New York.
Kaye’s comments were much more personal and comfortable than they had been a year before on the set of “Skokie,” when he resorted mostly to amusing curt remarks so as not to break his concentration.
“When I make a movie, I can’t think about anything else. That’s my baby. When I do something, it’s the most important thing in my life at that moment,” he said.
At other times, Kaye has kept his interviews as light and frolicking as appearances
that span his 1939 Broadway debut in “The Straw Hat Revue” to his own CBS-
But the somber nature of the day might have had something to do with his more serious redirections. The television blared in the background during the interview as the networks reported on the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar Sadat earlier that morning.
“I feel strongly about our government’s attitude toward Israel and what’s happening throughout the Middle East. We keep hollering about the uncertainty of world peace and the strange anomaly is that we’re probably the largest arms supplier in the world. When you give a lot of people matches, they’re going to start a fire,” Kaye said.
Kaye, who jokes about having been Henry Kissinger’s foreign policy adviser when Kissinger
was Richard Nixon’s secretary of state, said he recently wrangled with his close
friend over selling AWACS to Saudi Arabia. As a self-
Since 1954, he has combined his celebrity status with his love of classical music to raise more than $6 million for musicians’ pension funds by conducting some of the world’s leading symphonies in benefit concerts. Although he cannot read music, Kaye most recently played out his fantasy of becoming a symphony orchestra conductor by leading the New York Philharmonic on public television in September.
“It’s the greatest feeling of neurotic power in the world. The secret is combining
careful rehearsal with the orchestra and letting the impulses of the moment go to
work for you. Instead of people approaching an orchestral concert with intimidation
and fear, they come to it feeling they are at least familiar with the fellow holding
the conductor’s baton. I’ve done the same thing with opera,” Kaye said, referring
to the Emmy Award-
Kaye’s desire to break down the barriers of mystery and awe that keep people from exploring new areas also has made him a frequent observer of intricate surgery, a licensed pilot and a certified Chinese chef.
“When I was a kid, I wanted to be a doctor. Whenever someone was sick and called for the doctor, there was sudden aura of mysticism about what he did and how he did it. I’ve always wanted to understand more about it,” Kaye said.
“What I’ve tried to do in my life is to take things out of the realm of the difficult by just plunging in. When one dares, he discovers something about the world and something more of himself. When you lose your curiosity, you lose your most valuable asset because our thirst to learn is what keeps life fresh.”
But early in his youth, whether hamming it up in class plays in New York’s public school system or running away to Florida with a friend who played the guitar, Kaye knew he was destined for a show business career.
Legend goes that Kaye’s big break occurred when Ira Gershwin composed a song for him in the 1940 Broadway play “Lady in the Dark” that required Kaye to rattle off the names of more than 50 Russian composers in 38 seconds.
It was the kind of rollicking humor that for five straight seasons in Great Britain, beginning in 1948, brought the normally, reserved British to rolling hysteria in the aisles.
“The unbelievable response I received in England is something of which I’m especially proud. Those were the years just after the war. The people of England especially had endured a lot of bombing and needed a reason to laugh. I’m glad I was there of supply it,” Kaye said.
To this day, his actress/wife of 41 years, Sylvia Fine, still assists Kaye in writing
and rehearsing sketches. [Sylvia Fine was never an actress. She was a lyricist. –
J.N. webmistress] His stage partner during the 1930s and 1940s, [Sylvia was his pianist
on stage in the ‘30s and early ‘40s. – J.N. webmistress] she had begun producing
public television specials about the musical stage in which Kaye frequently co-
But in a moment of unguarded candor, Kaye admits to relishing most such roles as Captain Hook in “Peter Pan” or the kindly Geppetto in “Pinocchio” as the kind of fantasy flings that will keep him forever young, at least on the silver screen.
“Acting gives me a greater sense of fulfillment in expressing myself than anything else. I can be outrageous on the stage. I can be anything I want to be up there. It gives me the chance to say the things in my heart and sometimes to appeal to the child within us all,” he said. “It’s been a lifetime of giving out little pieces of love.”