Liberace day with his gimmicky act, his showy but careful piano playing, his non-stop promotions, and his gaudy display of success, but he remained largely unaffected, as preserved by the famous quotation, first recorded in a letter to a critic, "Thank you for your very amusing review. After reading it, in fact, my brother George and I laughed all the way to the bank." He used a similar response to subsequent poor reviews, famously modifying it to "I cried all the way to the bank." In an appearance on "The Tonight Show" some years later, Liberace reran the anecdote to Johnny
The Day the Clown Cried that it takes to face the risk,". "I'm not going to get greatness unless I have to go at it with fear and uncertainty." In a 2013 interview with Lewis, Chris Nashawaty of "Entertainment Weekly" wrote, 'When asked about all the speculation surrounding the film, he (Lewis) said, "I think it's like bad advertising. Still, Lewis seemed to relish being the keeper of one of Hollywood's biggest mysteries. "The more I hear about it, the more I enjoy it." Apart from "The Diary of Anne Frank" (1959) and "The Pawnbroker" (1964), "The Day The Clown Cried" was the earliest attempt