The Stooge

When song-and-dance man Bill Miller marries singer Mary Turner (Polly Bergen), he hits the vaudeville circuit as a single act, and is urged by his agent and friend, Leo Lyman (Eddie Mayehoff), to use a stooge to bolster his weak act A song-plugger's vacant-minded assistant, Ted Rogers (Jerry Lewis), is hired, and quickly snaps a spark into the act that brings it to big-time Broadway. But Bill never once calls the act anything but a single or give Ted the slightest credit without whom Bill would still be getting nixed by the hix-in-the-stix. But slow-thinking Ted never complains and is loyal to his employer and hero. Bill withstands pressure from both his wife and agent to give Ted billing, while Ted tosses over Genevieve Tait, his first romance, when she insists Ted demand his rights. Finally a hit in a hit revue on Broadway, annoyed at the pressure, Bill fires Ted and goes single with no stooge support and flops with a dull thud barely heard over the boos from the audience. Coming to his sense, Bill apologizes to the audience, acknowledges Ted's full right to equal billing and brings on Ted from his usual staged-placement in the audience.