An Interview with Al Lewis

The many faces of Grandpa Munster

(Best known as Grandpa Munster from the 1960s television show "The Munsters," Al Lewis talks about his acting career, his life-long involvement in social and political activism, and his thoughts on today's crop of radical activists in this entertaining and funny interview. This appeared in the Winter 1998 issue of Alternative Press Review. Al Lewis died February 3, 2006.)

This interview with Al Lewis and SHADOW editors Chris Flash and A. Kronstadt took place on October 21, 1997

You may know him best as Grandpa Munster on The Munsters TV show, or as Officer Schnauzer on Car 54, Where Are You? I remember seeing Al Lewis in countless parts on almost every TV show I watched in the 1970s and 80s, from Lost In Space to The Night Stalker to Here's Lucy to Taxi, not to mention movies like They Shoot Horses, Don't They? and They Might Be Giants. I've always enjoyed his performances, whether comedic or dramatic (he was fucking hilarious in the Taxi episode!!) In recent months though, we've discovered that there's a lot more to Al Lewis than just playing TV and movie roles. Beside being a Talmudic scholar, Al Lewis has devoted his life to social and political activism from the 1930s through the present. Now at 87 years of age, Al Lewis has settled back in New York City, where he shares his insights, his razor sharp wit and viewpoints with a receptive audience on his radio show on listener-supported WBAI (Saturdays at noon, on 99.5 FM.), when he's not making movies.

Shadow: It's only recently that we found out there's more to Al Lewis than most people think.

Al Lewis: There's more to anybody. Just because you haven't noticed it, that's your problem, that's not mine.

Where did you grow up?

Upstate New York near the Canadian border, on a farm.

When did you first come to New York City?

About 1924. I lived in Brooklyn, Manhattan, never lived in Queens, never lived in the Bronx.

When did you start getting involved in show business?

1923.

How old were you at the time?

13-14. I was born April 30, 1910.

Was this the stage or vaudeville?

No, it was in the circus. I worked about eight and a half years in three different circuses -- Barnum and Bailey, Cole Brothers' Circus, and Clyde Beatty.

What did you do?

I started out as a roustabout, cleaning up -- elephants are vegetarians and leave a lot to be desired and I was the guy who was shoveling the "lot to be desired." And then I worked myself up into a clown and did a trick unicycle act and a trapeze act. I did anything to make a living.

We did a little reading up on your career….

Where was that? In Screw magazine?

We found out that you were on Broadway for a while.

Oh yes, I probably worked every single entertainment medium, including some that don't exist. I worked the circus, carnival, I had my own medicine show, I worked 18 years of radio.

What kind of medicine did you sell?

Whatever I made. I made it in a bathtub.

What was it good for?

Whatever ailed you. I probably kept your grandfather alive. That's why you're here.

What was it called?

Various times, different things -- "The Professor" --"Little Alfie," I used to be called. Made it in the bathtub the night before, bottled it, put a label on it and sold it the following day in town.

In New York City?

No, no, no, all through the south. That was in the south.

Did you have any experience during Prohibition?

Did I sell whiskey?

Medicines very often had alcohol in them.

No, that came only later. You read the wrong things; you don't know American history. The United States, per capita, at a certain period in its history, had the most junkies of any country ever in the world. That was right after the Civil War. The most brutal war, the greatest amount of casualties that America's ever had. We fought each other. And cocaine came on the scene at that time as a pain-killer. It was so prevalent that if you had a five-year-old son, you could send him to the drugstore with fifty cents and he'd bring back a bottle, a tincture of cocaine. It was sold that prevalently. It was also the basis of the original Coca-Cola, where they made their fortune. Then in 1919, they passed the Harrison Act, where they made cocaine illegal, so the OTC, the "over-the-counter drugs," the base became alcohol.

At what point did you go from the circus to Broadway?

From the circus I went to carnival, and then drifted into medicine shows. First I went out with somebody, then I had my own. Then I started in radio in Chicago at WGN, which was then and still is, the largest radio station in the Midwest, owned by the Chicago Tribune. And after a couple of years, I came to the big time radio in New York. That's when radio was king, there was no television. Most young people think television was around during the cave man days, but that's a "Johnny-Come-Lately," television. That was big time, radio in New York. The 1930's, I worked in soap operas. The largest sponsor was P & G, Proctor and Gamble. That's where the term "soap opera" comes from. And then television came around, the old Dumont Network, days of live television. I worked live television, plays, Broadway, Off-Broadway, films. Do what you got to do. Still do. The old mule still pulls the wagon. Not as fast, but still pulls it, gets it home.

If you had to choose, what are your favorite memories of radio shows or TV shows that you were involved with?

I don't deal with memorabilia. I have no nostalgia items, I don't keep anything.

Anything that comes to mind? Any favorite experiences?

Just anything where I can work in front of an audience. So I prefer a circus, a medicine show, vaudeville, burlesque. I prefer that for my own satisfaction over radio, there's no audience. TV, there's no audience. I need the response of the audience, even if it's a silent response.

That sort of show business is pretty much gone nowadays. There isn't too much of that left.

That's your loss, not mine. I did it. (Laughs)

Back in the 1930s, there was a lot of political activity going on. A lot of labor demonstrations, strikes, the organization of the CIO. Were you involved in any of that?

Yup, yeah, Scottsboro, Tom Mooney, Warren K. Billings. I was an organizer in the Food, Agricultural and Tobacco Workers Union down in North Carolina.

You worked in that industry?

No, no, I accepted a challenge. The industry I worked in just before the war, World War II, was the National Maritime Union.

You were a seaman?

Yup, yup. The late 30's and then into the war. I was torpedoed twice, once in the Mediterranean and once off Murmansk.

You were carrying goods to the Soviet Union?

Like 600 other sea ships in a convoy. You never knew what you carried. You could have been carrying potatoes, which of course we weren't, or you could have been carrying explosives. And you saw those ships go up. Boy, Coney Island never had fireworks like that. And all those men died. In a convoy, you had 200-300 Victory Ships. Henry J. Kaiser made millions on those. And if you saw guys swimming in the water, you never stopped to pick them up. You let them die there. Because of the submarines. You could be a target. You'd look out the port hole and see these guys screaming for help, covered with oil, or they're on fire. "Later Jack, later!"

Did you ever have to abandon ship?

Sure, in the Mediterranean and in Murmansk, the ship was sunk. You don't know what it's like to be in the middle of the Atlantic ocean. There is no more lonely feeling. You see nothing, nothing, nothing. And there comes the British Corvettes -- "bwoop, bwoop, bwoop" -- them fuckers, they didn't give a shit about the few of us that were in the water. They were circling and dropping the ashcans looking for the German U-boats. And we were screaming "You motherfuckers!" And they finally pulled us in. And then in Murmansk, the Yops, Russian planes, spotted us and a Russian trawler. All women manned the ships, pulled us out of the water and took us to the hospital.

What was it like being a labor organizer in the 1930's?

Depends where you were. In the South? You faced death at any moment.

The Ku Klux Klan?....

You'd get shot at. Not the Ku Klux Klan -- the poor people there who had no jobs. They were hired by the boss, they gave them a gun -- "You see this son of a bitch? Blow his head off."

What industry was this?

Food, Agricultural, Tobacco Workers Union. Fayetteville, North Carolina.

What about the National Maritime Union? What was it like organizing among seamen back in those days?

You were more on home ground on the port than organizing in the south, even to this day. Even John L. Lewis, who organized the United Mine Workers. He didn't get very many Southern mine workers. American history -- people don't know it. You know who his organizers were? Communists from the North. He writes about it. Went down south to Harlan County Kentucky, Hazard Kentucky. Many of them got blown away. Just step off the train, they blow your head off. You don't know what fear is. (Laughs)

So what kept you going?

Who knows? I don't know. Maybe stupidity! (Laughs) He [John L. Lewis] was smart enough. He wasn't interested in their politics, whether they supported Russia and Stalin, nothin' -- "I gotta get this local organized." He got Communists, young men from the north, and many of them paid with their lives.

So what motivated you, what politicized your life? Some people say they want to make a lot of money, other people say "I'm gonna change the world," other people say "I don't give a shit about anybody…."

Those are full of shit statements. That's shit. What motivated me? My mother. My mother was an immigrant woman, a peasant woman, struggled all her life, worked in the garment center. Understood what the struggle was about. My mother. Couldn't read or write, but she had more sense than many a graduate from Harvard.

Was she also an organizer?

No, my mother was a worker, a floor lady, a shop lady in the garment center here in New York.

So when did you start becoming political, when did you start becoming in touch with things going on in the world?

I guess having been in my mother's household I was probably political at five or six. I don't know what you mean --what is "political?" It's all bullshit terminology. You're aware of bread and butter issues. How could I not be aware during the Depression that people were starving? And I was helping my mother sell apples. How could I not be aware? Forget that philosophical bullshit terminology, "you become aware." It hits you in the stomach and then a cop hits you on the head (laughs) -- you become aware!

So what was the first political activity that you were ever involved with?

I don't know. Probably when I shit on the grass in Prospect Park, I don't know. I don't know what that means. What is a political activity? What does it mean?

The first demonstration, for instance?

I was very young. My mother used to take me to Mayday parades. That was big in New York. It used to culminate in the old Union Square, not the shit they have now, where they've built it so you can't have a demonstration. But they used to have a hundred thousand people there in Union Square Park. I remember my mother used to go on the parades for the Scottsboro boys. Those guys were arrested in Alabama on the testimony of two prostitutes -- we struggled to free them. I remember participating in demonstrations, and Tom Mooney and Warren K. Billings, the so-called bombing of the "Preparedness Day Parade." And then during the Depression, people were getting evicted, ten a day. We used to come along and break the lock and put the furniture back in again. We would storm the Home Relief Centers [what the Welfare offices were called then--Ed.], that or this person didn't get a check for eight dollars or something, and get hit on the head.

In the demonstrations back in those days were there ever problems with the police? Did they try to attack people?

Did you just come to this country? (Laughs) What are you talking about? The police are here to protect property. They're not here to protect the public! So, what the fuck are you asking me? Of course! Name me a period when the police....(laughs)

So these demonstrations for Tom Mooney, and labor demonstrations....

Warren K. Billings, organizing the CIO, and District 65, and the UE, and NMU. All that was going on and the police were there to see that you didn't do it. And if they could get away with it, they'd beat the shit out of you.

And people would resist?

Well obviously. And unions were created. We used to have a saying: "If you don't get the asses of the masses out in the street, forget it." And you get enough of them out there, the ruling class gets scared. That's the only thing they're afraid of, is numbers. Numbers! See, one thing you have to understand. There's very few people understand, especially people who deal in outlaw newspapers and magazines. The ruling class is smarter than you, and they're more creative. And if you forget that lesson, you go down the drain. Because if they weren't, they wouldn't be around as long as they have been and as strong as they have been. It's not an accident. Not an accident. Never underestimate your opponent. They'll tell you that if you're a fighter. Never underestimate. You can poke fun at 'em, you can do satire, but they work 24 hours a day. It's like Lord Acton said: "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely." I say that power works 24 hours to remain in power. Throughout history. Go back to kings, feudal times. The same thing. While you and I, here we're bullshitting, and then we go out: "Tompkins Square, blah, blah, blah..." Their fucking machine works 24 hours a day, man. It grinds, it grinds. Otherwise they don't stay in power, they topple.

So what do you think people can do in response to that power? What do you think we have to do?

First of all, (laughs) you have to agree that these people shouldn't have the power. Go on Eighth Avenue and 35th Street and ask what the junkies do. They're looking for a fix. What do they do? You see, a junkie once told me an unanswerable question. He said: "I take this junk so the shit that's in front of me and the shit that I smell disappears. What are you gonna replace it with?" What do you replace it with? A tract? "Jesus loves you?" What? "Socialism is your answer?" The guy's looking for $15 to hit you and I on the head with a lead pipe to meet the man to get the fix. I have no answer for that. He has to find that answer. I can deal with somebody who's not in that kind of position and try to talk, and I do the best I can. You see, the thing is, and I don't mean this in a denigrating way, but you're "Johnny-Come-Latelies." Like in the Sixties, there was a thousand underground papers. I read them all. I used to have them all sent to me in California. Everybody in this society wants the quick fix, like the junkie that we just talked about. So do the radicals, whatever you want to call them, a bumper sticker. Put it on your car. "I'm a radical," "I'm a lefty," "I'm a progressive," "I'm left of center." It's all bullshit. I learned a long time ago -- I've been in the struggle over seventy years -- it doesn't bother me I may not win.

So what keeps you going?

What keeps me going? My belief! (Laughs) You see, what happens with you "Johnny-Come-Latelies" -- and I'm not personalizing -- is like you take people of the Sixties. After five or ten years, they didn't get the victory, "Oh, fuck it, man, I'll take this job down on Wall Street and make the fuckin' money. I didn't get the immediate fix." See, the junkie is better off than them. He gets the fix. As long as he's got the bread, he gets the fix. "We didn't win!" America only knows the "win."

But what do you think about the people of the Sixties who didn't go along with that but made money and used it for good purposes?

I haven't found that species. (Laughs)

There are some interesting characters, like the George Soros types....

Ah, bullshit. Everything he gives away is tax deductible. I'm too fuckin' old for that shit, man! That's like Ted Turner giving away a billion dollars. You know how much he winds up giving away? About a hundred million dollars. All the rest he deducts from his taxes. You know who gives it away? You and I are giving it away. Otherwise, we'd be taking his tax money.

What's your formula for changing the world, for improving things?

I don't know what that means; that's all bullshit. Life is specific. Even if you're not political, that's political! You can't shoot buckshot. You wanna be a millionaire? Fine! Put on the blinders, like a fucking horse. If you shoot buckshot, you gotta go for the target.

Let's say we're talking about specific issues: police torturing people in police precincts, or people being evicted from housing, or gardens on the Lower East Side being bulldozed and replaced by condominiums. We put out a newspaper to try and convince people that things like that are not in their interest. Do you think the alternative press is a valuable counterweight to the mainstream press?

Everything is viable. But don't expect results.

Maybe we're being naive, but maybe we serve some purpose....

There's nothing wrong with being naive. But, after doing x amount of time or years, don't throw your hands up in the air, because, you see, everybody wants the "the win," they want it today. It doesn't happen. The struggle goes on. The victory is in the struggle, for me. And I accepted that a long time ago. You write about police brutality. Go back to 1909, you'll see about police brutality (laughs), it's not something new. People don't really understand their role in society. I'll take this where your newspaper goes: the destruction of the gardens. And they're gonna be destroyed, there's no question about it. The powers that be have so convinced the mass of people -- "Fuck the gardens, those fucking freaky people carrying that horse shit and fertilizer. A building is more beautiful than a fuckin' flower" -- you have to say the mass of people are bought. The day that they attempt to bulldoze the first garden, if ten thousand people are standing there, the garden will never be bulldozed. You have to understand, the power structure and the errand boys, the guys who carry the bedpans for the power structure, the politicians, councilmen, congressmen, senators, whatever, they only understand one thing: numbers. It's numbers of voters. You get fifty people out, "Fuck 'em. Get the local precinct, hit 'em on the fucking head." Get ten thousand people out? God, that's four hundred cameras, it's all over European television. Scary. Numbers are scary. Your problem is to get ten thousand people out on the street the first time they go to bulldoze that garden. And you won't. But that's not a defeat. Because all you can do, all I can do, is, I do a show, I influence those people. Hopefully they'll carry that message forward. That's all I can do. I don't own a newspaper, I don't own a radio station. That's it. I don't feel bad about that. I understand the limitations. I fight against them, I stretch 'em out. I'm not out to save the world.

So you're doing what you can....

Yeah! To make things better for people. I've said, these politicians that switched to [NYC Mayor Rudolph] Giuliani, they're all gonna get paid off. Read American history, Tammany Hall, Boss Tweed. You can't be stupid about where you live! I'm for everyone having the opportunity to accept a $150,000 bribe. That's what I'm fighting for! Why should they be the only guys getting that money?

So, what do you think of this [mayoral] election between Giuliani and [Ruth] Messinger?

Four more years of Benito Giuliani.

Why do you think they elect people like Giuliani?

Hey, you're the guy whose got the newspaper. You tell me. I'll tell you why: 'cause you haven't convinced enough people. How do you like that? Ya wanna carry that rock on your head?

How many people read the SHADOW? How many people act on what they read or do something positive as a result?

If they don't, that's your problem. America gets the politicians they deserve. That's it. And you keep struggling. He'll win big. No question. We'll get four more years of this shit, and it'll get worse.

Are there any good politicians that you've run into recently?

In the cemetary? H.L. Mencken said: "Looking for an honest politician is like looking for an ethical burglar."

In the 1950's, in the early days of television, did you ever have any problems with the McCarthyites? The Blacklist?

If I did, I certainly wouldn't have known of it. They didn't advertise it. See, it was strongest in film, and in that period I didn't work in film. Big studios, that's where it took its heaviest toll. In radio, only on a few biggies. But I did hundreds of radio shows and I was just a voice. I was not identified. I was not a "biggie." You knock off a biggie, you set an example, so everybody else will run scared.

So during that period you continued to go to demonstrations and all that and you were not prevented from working?

Yeah, oh yeah, I don't give a fuck. And if I was [blacklisted], how would I know? The guy didn't send me a mail that said "We're not hiring you for this because you were at a demonstration." What did I lose? A job? So big fucking deal. I'd get another job. (Laughs) What's the big deal? What are they offering me? Life? I'm signing a contract, I'm gonna live 300 years? I don't have an ego. All I wanted to do was to be able to work. I didn't want to become famous or wealthy. Those are byproducts. I never thought in that direction.

Were there any particular roles or shows that motivated you more than others?

I've turned down a few roles. I've never taken a role that demeans people. I just don't do it. What do you lose? A job? Big fucking deal! Whatever you see me in, I'm not responsible for the script. I'm only responsible for what I do. That's it. I got the wagon home on time. That's it. I don't get involved in it. I'm an actor. That's it.

Everything I've seen you in has been in good taste, well-rounded....

You can say that or you can say I did it in good taste. (Laughs) Look, you only go around once. You give it your best shot. You guys, who knows what you'll be doing five years, not even ten years from now? Chances are, in ten years that paper [the SHADOW] won't exist. There's a long history of underground outlaw papers -- the Berkeley Barb, the RAT here, which was very popular in the Sixties. They lost their audience. Ten years is a long time for an outlaw newspaper. As long as you gave it your best shot, even if in the opinion of others "you failed," you didn't fail.

What did you think as a middle-aged man about the youth and free love culture popping up in the Sixties?

I went to all the Love-Ins. I took my kids. I enjoyed myself.

That was around the time that you were doing the Munsters, wasn't it? So people recognized you as Grandpa Munster.

Sure, absolutely. In Califiornia in that period, the estimate was that there were at least half a million runaways from the age of eight on, drifting to California. Every Friday I used to have about fifty, sixty kids who would wait for me on Sunset Boulevard and I'd take them all to dinner. All runaways. That's how I met Charlie Manson. He wanted to be in the music business. He babysat my three kids. He didn't chop no heads off, he was very nice with me. I met him in front the Whiskey-A-Go-Go on Sunset Boulevard. He sat for four or five hours, he amused the kids, he brought the guitar and he played, no big deal, no sweat.

Did you know any Sixties musicians, performers or anyone like that?

Did I go out of my way to meet any performers? I'm more important to me than any body you can mention. Do you know that? Yeah, I met the Beatles, you name them, ain't no big fuckin' deal. They couldn't get a hotel to put them up, so Universal studios was encased with a wall, with their own police and firemen. We stayed in a bungalow, and one of them stayed in mine. I met Bobby Darin, you name them. Naturally, I'm in the business!

So after a lot of years in California, you decided to come back to New York?

I came back to New York to do a film in Toronto, my wife was doing a show in Massachusetts. I had a couple of ideas and opened up a restaurant on Bleecker Street, a comedy club on Staten Island -- still there seven, eight years. [Both establishments named "Grandpa's" --Ed.]

It seems like you don't mind using that tag [Grandpa]....

Why would I mind? It pays my mortgage. And if I did mind, what could I do about it? I created a character. You see, I'm a lot smarter than the people who interview me. I'm very serious now. I created a character that people love. You follow me around and you will see total strangers greet me. Junkies, Wall Street types. That was not my aim. I played a cantankerous persnickity old man who enjoys screwing everybody up, and people love that. That's how it turned out.

How much of Grandpa Munster was Al Lewis and how much of Al Lewis was Grandpa Munster?

Everything. There's a part of me in everything. Car 54's Schnauzer is a part of me. I can't do you. It's a composite, a collage of my whole life. It's Al Lewis. I always say, "You hire Al Lewis, you get the whole Al Lewis." He's loud, he's opinionated, he smokes terrible cigars, that's it. I can't be and I'm not going to attempt to be what someone thinks I should be. That's the road to hell. Like they used to say uptown, "Don't sing that song, I don't know the lyrics."

What do you think about the idea of squatting?

I think people need housing. And there's empty buildings, I think people should live in there. If you want to call them squatters, trespassers, hey, I call Wall Street thieves! Oscar Wilde said the rich and the poor are equal -- they can both sleep under the bridge. Right? (Laughs). Do they have a right? You're damn right they have a right! And the police, because they are hired by the property owners, have the right to hit them on the head and throw 'em out. That's the society, that's how it's organized. You and I might not like it, but that's what they're here for. They're not here to prevent the city or the owner of the building to throw them out, they're there to hit the guys on the head and throw them out. [Playing a cop] "Hey, I'm doing a job, man, I've got a family, you know, my kids gotta go to camp." I get one or two cops who call me on the show [on WBAI-FM] and I discuss with them and there's many points that we can agree on. And the more points you can agree on, the points that day you disagree on, they may not a week from now. That's the lesson you learn.

Of course, you played Schnauzer, a police man. What do you think of that role, playing a policeman?

I never thought about it, I just did it. Cops love it. I've played so many going away parties and retirement parties. I used to do a yearly show at the Trenton War Memorial Auditorium for the New Jersey State police, and the next time they would see me on a picket line. [Playing a cop] "Hey, what are you doing there?"

What's your secret for success, for a long, healthy, happy life?

My secret for success? I don't know what the hell success means. (Laughs) I'll tell you what my secret is. It took me a long time to find this out. Find something that you absolutely love to do. Not you like it, or it's pleasant, something that you absolutely love to do. And along the way, if you're lucky, get to love the way you do it. Then you're home free. And you're looking at a man right now. I got a spine made out of stainless steel. Nothing shrinks it, nothing, nothing. Because I know who I am. I don't have to brag. I know what I contributed. I know what I did. You think you can do it better? Hey, go right ahead. The stage is yours. But find something that you absolutely love doing. And then get to love the way you do it. That's the uniqueness of all of us. That's it. Albert Einstein, one of my favorites, said: "Imagination is more important than knowledge." And if that cat say it, it's good enough for me.

So, getting back to your show business career, when did you first act in a Broadway play?

In the '30's, Olson and Johnson, Helzapoppin, I forget exactly the year. The last thing I did on Broadway was a musical called Do Re Mi at the St. James Theater from 1960 to 1962 with Phil Silvers, Nancy Walker, George Matthews. I have an old brain but a terrific memory.

So have you played any roles recently?

I just did a film in Toronto a few months ago. I do mostly now memorabilia shows, autograph shows, and if the guy comes through with the money, I'll do a film out in California. I learned this from my mother: you have to know what you're worth. I don't work cheap. Everybody has a worth. I don't ask for what a piece of shit like Tom Cruise gets. A piece of shit who can't act his way in or out of a paper bag. Somebody wants to pay him that, it's no skin off my fuckin' ass. But what I'm saying is, know what you're worth. Know what you contribute. If you don't know that, you're in fuckin' trouble, man. And the one thing I learned from my mother is: never sell yourself short. My mother used to say, in broken English: "This is a big world. When you go out, there's millions of people ready to kick you in the ass. Don't bend down to accomodate them." That's peasant humor. Even biggies in Hollywood don't understand that. They'll bend down to take the kick, but they'll get two million for the picture. Not Al Lewis, not my mother's favorite son. No, no, no.