The Joker is Wild tells the tale of Lewis's fight to regain stardom after a violent brush with the Mob prevents him from singing again. Vocal cords sliced, Lewis is forced to find a route to celebrity that doesn't rely on his pipes, so he turns to comedy. Sinatra came to imitate Lewis's gentle teasing and self-deprecating manner in his live performances. Sinatra also picked up Lewis's style of ribbing his friends and acquaintances in the audience. In fact, at the concert at Caesar's Palace, Sinatra used one of the same jokes that Sinatra-as-Lewis uses in the film. Teasing an older celebrity in attendance at the show, Sinatra chortles, 'He's been dead for a week now, but we haven't had the heart to tell him!"
In the opening scene of the film, Lewis acknowledges a man in the crowd who came from a rival club. The two men signal back and forth to each other, and the visitor indicates that he'd like Lewis to perform at his club soon. During the concert at Caesar's Palace, Sinatra acknowledges and welcomes various distinguished guests in a more overt style.
Also in the opening scene of The Joker is Wild, Lewis establishes himself as an expressive performer who uses large, sweeping gestures and no microphone. Throughout the film, Lewis rarely uses a mic, perhaps because he tends to be in intimate, small clubs where amplification is not needed. Sinatra, on the other hand, was the master of the microphone.
Sinatra and Lewis both always had drinks in hand during their performances as well, although Lewis's drinking became a problem for him at various points in his career. From The Joker is Wild originates one of the most widely-quoted lines about drinking in American culture:
"I feel sorry for people who don't drink. When they wake up in the morning, that's as good as they're going to feel all day."
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