TLDR: The Dean Martin Show ran on NBC for nine seasons from 1965 to 1974, consistently landing in the Nielsen top ten despite its star refusing to attend any weekday rehearsals. Dean Martin showed up on Sundays only, read cue cards cold, and created the most relaxed variety format in television history. His drink was apple juice. His best friend was his golf game. His son’s death in a 1987 military jet crash broke him completely, and he spent his final eight years sitting alone at a restaurant table each night until lung cancer and emphysema took him on Christmas Day 1995.
To understand The Dean Martin Show you first have to understand the terms under which Dean Martin agreed to make it.
He told NBC he would accept the job on three conditions: an exceptionally high salary, he would appear at the studio only on Sundays, and he would attend no weekday rehearsals whatsoever. NBC agreed.
Martin was reportedly certain they would not. When they did, he had to make the show.
The complete absence of rehearsal became the show’s defining creative asset. Martin sight-read cue cards cold every Sunday, and his genuine lack of familiarity with the guest routines, prop placements, and comedy sketches created a spontaneous, loosely improvised atmosphere that no amount of preparation could have manufactured.
When something went wrong he simply laughed and kept going, which was exactly what thirty million viewers came to watch every week.
The Drink in the Glass
Dean Martin’s “lovable drunk” act was one of the most famous performed personas in entertainment history, and it was almost entirely fiction.
His glass contained apple juice.
Musical director Lee Hale and executive producer Greg Garrison both documented this. A backup vocalist who worked on the show for six years confirmed it.
Johnny Carson exposed it on air in August 1978, reaching across his desk and taking a sip from Martin’s glass to reveal apple juice to the studio audience.
The real picture was more nuanced. Martin was not a teetotaler.
A Saturday Evening Post interview documented his actual daily routine: one beer at 4 PM, apple juice during the first half of his stage act, one real drink midway through, two glasses of wine with dinner, and four or five drinks after his second show accompanied by a sleeping pill.
By clinical criteria this constituted heavy drinking. But it was structured, controlled, and compatible with a golf game every morning.
The wild drunk on your television screen was a character he had stolen from nightclub entertainer Joe E. Lewis and refined over decades.
The Golddiggers
The show’s most recognizable recurring act was the Golddiggers, an all-female singing and dancing ensemble formed in 1968 that toured with Bob Hope’s USO Christmas shows and launched several genuine careers, including Susan Buckner, who went on to play cheerleader Patty Simcox in Grease.
More than 75 women rotated through the group over the years, and two of them ended up in one of the stranger footnotes in UFO history entirely without their knowledge.
Why the Show Ended and What Came After
The variety show format was cancelled in 1974 due to an industry-wide ratings decline and an aging demographic.
Rather than renewing for a tenth season, NBC retooled the program’s most popular segment into The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast specials, filmed at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas.
The roasts ran with enormous success from October 1974 to December 1984.
The Last Eight Years
The death of his son Dean Paul Martin Jr. in a military jet crash in March 1987 ended Dean Martin’s career more completely than any network cancellation could have.
He withdrew from performing, retreated to his Beverly Hills home, and spent his evenings alone at a table at La Famiglia restaurant, eating pasta in the same outfit every night.
He attempted a brief return with the 1988 Together Again tour alongside Frank Sinatra and Sammy Davis Jr., but lasted five shows before leaving. He retired from all public appearances in early 1995.
On Christmas Day of that year, alone in his bedroom with only household staff present, he died of acute respiratory failure from emphysema and lung cancer. He was 78.
The Las Vegas Strip dimmed its lights in his honor.
For the story of his friendship with Sinatra and the Rat Pack, see our piece on Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra. For the story behind his most famous professional partnership, see our piece on Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis.
The Dean Martin Show: Frequently Asked Questions
Was Dean Martin really drunk on his show?
No. Dean Martin’s glass on The Dean Martin Show contained apple juice or tea, not alcohol. Musical director Lee Hale, executive producer Greg Garrison, and a backup vocalist who worked on the show for six years all documented this. Johnny Carson publicly exposed it in August 1978 by taking a sip from Martin’s glass on The Tonight Show. Martin did drink privately, but his stage persona was a carefully crafted theatrical character.
Why did The Dean Martin Show end?
The Dean Martin Show ended in 1974 after nine seasons due to an industry-wide decline in variety show ratings and an aging demographic. NBC retooled its most popular format into The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast specials, which ran successfully from 1974 to 1984 at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas.
Who were the Golddiggers on The Dean Martin Show?
The Golddiggers were an all-female singing and dancing ensemble formed in 1968 by the show’s musical director Lee Hale and executive producer Greg Garrison. Over the show’s history, more than 75 members rotated through the group. Notable alumni include Susan Buckner, who played the cheerleader Patty Simcox in the 1978 film Grease, and broadcaster Jayne Kennedy.
