Today’s word of the day, thanks to Merriam-Webster (https://www.merriam-webster.com/word-of-the-day), is sui generis, although it looks more like it should be words of the day or perhaps phrase of the day. It’s pronounced / ˈsʊ ɪ ˈgɛ nɛ rɪs /, / ˈsu aɪ ˈdʒɛn ər ɪs /, or / ˈsu i ˈdʒɛn ər ɪs / (https://www.dictionary.com/browse/sui%20generis). The first pronunciation is more like the Classical Latin, with the hard g (/ g /) and the pre-Great-Vowel-Shift vowels. The second and third pronunciations are more Anglicized, with the soft g (/ dʒ /), but I have to admit that I have never heard anyone use the second of the given pronunciations, the one with / ‘su aɪ /, what in grammar school we called the long i sound. I have heard the third pronunciation most often, though it is not a word (or phrase) that people use frequently.

Sui generis is an adjective that means “constituting a class alone, unique, peculiar” (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sui%20generis). M-W goes on to explain, “Many English words ultimately trace back to the Latin forms gener- or genus (which are variously translated as ‘birth,’ ‘race,’ ‘kind,’ and ‘class’). Offspring of those roots include general, generate, generous, generic, and gender. But sui generis is truly a one-of-a-kind genus descendant that English speakers have used to describe singular things since the late 1600s. Its earliest uses were in scientific contexts, but where it once mostly characterized substances, principles, diseases, and even rocks thought to be the only representative of their class or group, its use expanded by the early 1900s, and it is now used more generally for anything that stands alone” (ibid.).

But Etymonline.com says that it does not appear in English until “1787, Latin, literally ‘of one’s own kind, peculiar.’ From sui, genitive of suus ‘his, her, its, one’s,’ from Old Latin sovos, from PIE root *swe-, pronoun of the third person (see idiom). And genitive of genus ‘race, stock, kind; family, birth, descent, origin’ (from suffixed form of PIE root *gene- ‘give birth, beget,’ with derivatives referring to procreation and familial and tribal groups)” (https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=sui%20generis). Genus is from earlier, from the “1550s as a term of logic, ‘kind or class of things’ (biological sense dates from c. 1600)” (ibid.).

According to On This Day, on this date in 1946 “Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis stage their first show as a comedy team at the 500 Club in Atlantic City, New Jersey” (https://www.onthisday.com/events/july/25).

Dean Martin (1917-1995; born Dino Paul Crocetti) started out as a boxer when he was a kid, but he quit that and worked in an illegal casino for a while. While doing that, he began singing with local bands, calling himself Dino Martini after an opera tenor named Nino Martini (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dean_Martin). “Martin got his break working for the Ernie McKay Orchestra. He sang in a crooning style influenced by Harry Mills of The Mills Brothers and Perry Como.[8] By late 1940, Martin had begun singing for Cleveland bandleader Sammy Watkins,[9] who suggested he change his name to Dean Martin. He stayed with Watkins until at least May 1943.[10] By fall 1943, Martin had begun performing in New York” (ibid.).

Jerry Lewis (1926-2017; born Joseph Levitch) was enough of a prankster as a kid to get kicked out of one high school before dropping out of another; he then developed a lip synching act that failed. He got a job as a soda jerk, but then an old friend of his father’s persuaded him to try again (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Lewis).

In either 1944 or 1945, depending upon which source you look at, Martin and Lewis met at a nightclub where both were performing. “Lewis suggested to the club owner that Martin would be a good replacement for the scheduled singer who was unavailable” at the 500 Club in Atlantic City, and the two of them debuted together in 1946. “The duo was not well received. The owner, Skinny D’Amato, threatened to terminate their contract if the act did not improve. Martin and Lewis disposed of pre-scripted gags and began improvising. Martin sang, and Lewis dressed as a busboy, dropping plates and making a shambles of Martin’s songs and a mockery of the club’s decorum. They performed slapstick and delivered vaudeville jokes to great fanfare. Their success at the 500 Club led to a series of well-paying engagements along the Eastern Seaboard, culminating with a run at New York’s Copacabana Club” (ibid.).

They became nationally prominent and popular, earning a radio show and gigs on television shows. They got parts in a couple of movies but then starred in 14 movies between 1950 and 1956 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerry_Lewis). They were such a popular team that the name “Martin and Lewis” is almost a synonym for team.

They broke up in 1956, and while they had a few brief appearances over the years, according to Lewis they didn’t speak for 20 years: “Lewis later commented, ‘the stupidity of that, I cannot expound on. The ignorance of that is something I hope I’ll always forget’” (ibid.). “The two men reconciled in September 1976, after Frank Sinatra orchestrated a surprise appearance by Martin on Lewis’s annual Labor Day telethon for the Muscular Dystrophy Association, saying only ‘I have a friend who loves what you do every year.’ The pair beamed and embraced, and then had a few minutes of friendly banter, during which Lewis asked Martin, ‘Uh, so, you workin’?’ According to Dean’s daughter, Deana Martin, Frank had hidden Dean in Ed McMahon’s dressing room where he was then briefly spotted by Jerry’s son, Gary Lewis. To be safe, he didn’t say anything to his father and the surprise went off without a hitch. The brief reunion was national news and, according to Lewis, the two spoke ‘every day after that’” (ibid.).

If you want to catch a little of the zaniness that was Martin and Lewis, here’s a clip of the two of them with Milton Berle: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7O3I0uww3U.

There have been lots of comedy duos over the years, and some of them might remind you of Martin and Lewis, duos like the Smothers Brothers or Rowan and Martin. And there were great comedy pairs that preceded Martin and Lewis, like Abbot and Costello or Laurel and Hardy. But there was something unique about Martin and Lewis, perhaps because of Martin’s singing and Lewis’s insanity. They were truly sui generis.

With the video, I probably don’t need to include an image, but the one I’ve included comes from an article entitled “The bitter feud between Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin” (https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/bitter-feud-jerry-lewis-dean-martin/). You might find it interesting.