pantomist Reginald Gardiner was the originator of the “record act,” in which comedians would mime onstage to popular records. Jerry Lewis, Alan King and Dick Van Dyke were all inspired by this man’s 1930s presentation house act.
The scene in The Errand Boy in which Jerry Lewis conducts to the sounds of a Count Basie song is essentially the same as this Gardiner scene in the film Born to Dance (1936)