CAUSE: Silvers suffered a stroke in 1973 and his health thereafter was ‘shaky’. He died aged 74 in Century City, California, from natural causes. He was buried in Vault 1004 in the Heritage Gardens of Mount Sinai Memorial-Park, 5950 Forest Lawn Drive, Los Angeles, California 90068.
Alastair Sim, CBE
Born October 9, 1900
Died August 19, 1976
Eccentric Scot. Born in Lothian Road, Edinburgh, the youngest of four children of a tailor, Alastair George Bell Sim had various jobs when he left school before going to Edinburgh University, where he studied to become an analytical chemist. Deciding a life of academia wasn’t for him, he joined the Officers’ Training Corps but the war ended before he could be commissioned. For five years from 1925 he was an elocution teacher at New College, Edinburgh, where he founded his own drama school. He made his stage début in the Peggy Ashcroft–Paul Robeson version of Othello on May 19, 1930. He then worked at the Old Vic for two years before a back injury crippled him for a year. In 1932 he married Naomi Merlith and they had one daughter. He made his film début in The Riverside Murder (1935) as Sergeant McKay. He landed the role of Sergeant Bingham in the Inspector Hornleigh series: Inspector Hornleigh On Holiday (1939), Inspector Hornleigh (1939) and Inspector Hornleigh Goes To It (1941). In the Forties he made only rare forays into films, preferring to work on the stage. At the start of the Fifties he appeared as Charles Dickens’ anti-hero Ebenezer Scrooge in Scrooge (1951). That decade also saw one of his best-known roles, that of Miss Fitton, the headmistress of St Trinian’s, in a couple of films: The Belles Of St Trinian’s (1954) and Blue Murder At St Trinian’s (1957). His other films included: Laughter In Paradise (1951) as Deniston Russell, Innocents In Paris (1952) as Sir Norman Barker, An Inspector Calls (1954) as Inspector Poole, The Green Man (1956) as Hawkins, The Doctor’s Dilemma (1959) as Cutler Walpole, School For Scoundrels (1960) as Mr S. Potter, The Millionairess (1960) as Sagamore and Royal Flash (1975) as Mr Greig. He was very close to the actor George Cole, who was regarded as his unofficial adopted son. Sim refused the knighthood offered him by Premier Edward Heath.
CAUSE: He died in London aged 75 from cancer.
Charles Simon
Born February 4, 1909
Died May 19, 2002
Character actor with longevity. In a business where much of the profession is unemployed at any one time, Charles Simon’s career would be remarkable if for no other reason than it spanned 79 years. Born in Tettenhall Wood, Wolverhampton, the younger son of three children in an army family, which meant he had a peripatetic childhood, Charles was raised in Tuffley, Gloucestershire and left school aged 14. He enrolled in the Irving Academy of Dramatic Art in Cheltenham and while there made his professional début in a cinema, reading “Back of the bar in a solo game sat dangerous Dan McGrew” three times a day to accompany the film The Shooting Of Dan McGrew (1924). In 1926, he wrote and played all the roles in The Tutor Of Ratshorne, which was broadcast on BBC Birmingham. He joined Seymour Hick’s company but was sacked before he could get to the West End. He joined a tour of Ireland in 1930 appearing in plagiarised versions of London shows and the following year set up the Darlington Repertory Company, befriending George Bernard Shaw, a friendship that lasted until GBS’s death in 1950. During the Fifties he made more than 1,000 broadcasts for the BBC. In March 1963 he joined the cast of the popular radio serial Mrs Dale’s Diary as Dr Jim Dale when Jessie Matthews replaced the original incumbent Ellis Powell as Mary Dale and the show was renamed The Dales. The show ran in its new format until 25 April, 1969, when, at Simon’s suggestion, it was killed off. In March 1970, a play written by Simon under the pseudonym Charles Henry, At Home With The Dales, flopped after just six of the 16-week tour. He made 20 films including Shadowlands (1983) and Topsy Turvy (1999). In 1986, he played George Adams in The Singing Detective and joined the National Theatre in 1989. In 1940, he had married Nancy McDermid by whom he had two daughters. She died in 1958 and seven years later in May 1965 he married Sheila Eves, an actress 24 years his junior, by whom he had a son.
CAUSE: He died, aged 93, of pneumonia in Harrow, Middlesex.
Don Simpson
Born October 29, 1943
Died January 19, 1996
Mr Sicko. He was born in Swedish Hospital in Seattle, Washington, the son of a mechanic and a housewife. The family moved to Alaska before Simpson was two. In later years Simpson would boast to reporters of daring deeds, brushes with the law and numerous girlfriends. Pals from the time remember a shy Simpson who rarely got into trouble, came from a hard-working family and was obsessed with comics. To millions of cinema-goers world-wide, Donald Clarence Simpson was known, if his name was known at all, as the highly successful co-producer (with partner Jerry Bruckheimer) of Hollywood blockbusters such as Flashdance (1983), Top Gun (1986), Beverly Hills Cop (1984), Beverly Hills Cop 2 (1987), Bad Boys (1995) and The Rock (1996). The 5́ 7˝ Simpson was one of the founders of the ‘high concept’ movie wherein the basic premise of the film could be outlined in just a few words or, preferably, on the back of a book of matches. For example, Alien was ‘Jaws in a space ship’ and Under Siege was ‘Die Hard on a boat’. Simpson’s career really began in 1972 when he joined Warner Bros, but he failed to shine there and was sacked. He tried auditioning for acting jobs and sold one screenplay, Cannonball (1976), for $6,250. In 1976 Simpson joined Paramount Pictures and quickly began to rise up the corporate ladder. In 1977 he became Vice President of Creative Affairs and the following year Vice President of Production. Three years later, he became Senior Vice President of Worldwide Production and in 1981 was appointed president of the company. To Hollywood insiders he was known as a man who lived on the edge. Simpson could be both incredibly generous and horrifyingly abusive. He battled constantly with his weight and was obsessed with his appearance, having testosterone injections in his buttocks to increase his sex drive and wearing his black Levi’s just once before he threw them away. His drug habits often raged out of control and his appetite for prostitutes never diminished. Horror tales are told of his peccadilloes in the kiss-all book You’ll Never Make Love In This Town Again and its follow-up, Once More With Feeling. According to 5́ 11˝ call-girl Alexandra Datig (identified in the book as ‘Tiffany’), Simpson ‘auditioned’ girls for parts in his films and “by the end of each interview, each actress ended up having sex with him”. Each encounter was videoed by Simpson. On another occasion, said Datig, Simpson hired two whores and forced one, named Patricia Colombo, to penetrate the other, Afifa, anally with a 12” black dildo and another “specially designed tool”. Another girl, a pale, redheaded newcomer to prostitution, was beaten bloody by Simpson for $1,000. On another occasion another call-girl, “Michelle,” was told by Simpson to lick another girl’s urine off his body. She refused but, after he took a shower, gave him oral sex, though Simpson failed to climax, even after an hour of such personal attention. “It was all the drugs I suppose,” Michelle reflected. Simpson’s drug use was indeed phenomenal. At one time he was spending $60,000 a month on prescription drugs and heaven knows how much on non-prescription ones. In the summer of 1995 he was having daily injections of Toradol for pain, Librium for his moods, Valium, Vistaril and lorazepam four times a day and Thorazine six times a day to counter his anxiety, Ativan also four times a day for agitation, Depakote four times a day to balance his ‘acute mania’, plus tablet forms of Valium, Vicodin, diphenoxylate, diphenhydramine, Colanadine, lithium carbonate, nystatin, Narcan, haloperidol, Promethazine, Benztropine, Unisom, Atarax, Compazine, Xanax, Desyrel, Tigan and phenobarbital. He also took heroin supplied by a shady character known only as ‘Mr Brownstone’. Guns N ’ Roses wrote a song about him and the man himself believes that it was his smack that River Phoenix was taking on the night he died. Simpson and his partner were widely feared in the movie industry. Said one Hollywood insider: “Bruckheimer is the one to really watch for. He’ll stab you in the back. Simpson at least will stab you in the chest.”
CAUSE: Consideri
ng some of his sexual predilections and copious drug use, it is ironic that the overweight (14st) 52-year-old Simpson “died of heart failure caused by a massive overdose of cocaine and prescription medicines” around 1am while sitting on the toilet at his home, 685 Stone Canyon Road, Bel Air, California. Rumours that he died while reading You’ll Never Make Love In This Town Again are not true; he was engrossed in a biography of Oliver Stone. Simpson was later cremated.
FURTHER READING: High Concept: Don Simpson And The Hollywood Culture Of Excess – Charles Fleming (New York: Doubleday, 1998).
Joan Sims
Born May 9, 1930
Died June 28, 2001
‘Queen of Puddings’. Irene Joan Marion Sims was born in Laindon, Essex, the daughter of John Henry Sims, a railway station master, and Gladys Marie Ladbrooke. She became interested in show business at an early age and played in the goods sheds pretending that they were stages. After schooling at St John’s, Billericay, and Brentwood County High, she applied for RADA in 1946 with a rendition from Winnie The Pooh but failed the audition. Instead she was admitted to PARADA, the academy’s preparatory school. It was her fourth attempt before she finally succeeded and was admitted to RADA. While there she won the £10 Mabel Temperley prize for grace and charm of movement. Graduating in 1950 she made her film début two years later in Colonel March Investigates playing Marjorie Dawson. She also appeared in Sir Norman Wisdom’s film Trouble In Store (1953) as Edna, The Square Ring (1953) as Bunty, the Fairy Queen in Meet Mr Lucifer (1953), Will Any Gentleman …? (1953) as Beryl, What Every Woman Wants (1954) as Doll, a telephone operator in To Dorothy A Son (1954), The Sea Shall Not Have Them (1954) as Hilda Tebbitt, Doctor In The House (1954) as Rigor Mortis, The Belles Of St Trinian’s as Miss Dawn, an ice cream girl in Lost (1955), Doctor At Sea (1955) as Wendy, As Long As They’re Happy as Linda, Keep It Clean (1956) as Vi Tarbottom, Dry Rot (1956) as Beth, The Silken Affair (1957) as a lady barber, No Time For Tears (1957) as Sister O’Malley, The Naked Truth (1957) as Ethel Ransom, Just My Luck (1957) as Phoebe, a tea lady in Davy (1957), Carry On Admiral (1957) as Mary and Passport To Shame (1958) as Marian. It was her appearance in Doctor In The House that led to her appearance in her first Carry On… She played Nurse Stella Dawson in Carry On Nurse (1958) and went on to appear in 23 more films finishing with Carry On Emmannuelle (1978) in which she played Mrs Dangle. Fortunately, she missed out on the execrable Carry On Columbus (1992). “I don’t think it worked without us, dear. We were a unique formula.” Joanie was the longest-serving female member of the team. She appeared in Teacher (1959) as Sarah Allcock (during filming she developed thrombophlebitis and had to have her leg propped up on off-camera cushions before being hospitalised for 10 days), Constable (1960) as Policewoman Gloria Passworthy and Regardless (1961) as Lily Duveen; she took a break for four films then returned in Cleo (1964) as Calpurnia, Cowboy (1965) as Belle Armitage, Screaming! (1966) as Emily Bung, Follow That Camel (1967) as Zig Zig, Don’t Lose Your Head (1967) as Desiree Dubarry, Up The Khyber (1968) as Lady Joan Ruff-Diamond, Doctor as Chloe Gibson, Camping as Joan Fussey, Again, Doctor as Ellen Moore, Up The Jungle as Lady Evelyn Bagley, Loving (1970) as Esme Crowfoot, Henry (1971) as Queen Marie of Normandy, At Your Convenience (1971) as Chloe Moore, Matron (1972) as Mrs Tidey, Abroad (1972) as Cora Flange, Girls (1973) as Connie Philpotts, Dick (1974) as Madame Desiree, Behind (1975) as Daphne Barnes and England (1976) as Private Ffoukes Sharp. She was paid £2,500 per film, from the first to the last. Her other films included: Upstairs And Downstairs (1959) as Blodwen, Please Turn Over (1959) as Beryl, Life In Emergency Ward 10 (1959) as Mrs Pryor, The Captain’s Table (1959) as Maude Pritchett, Watch Your Stern (1960) as Ann Foster, Doctor In Love (1960) as Dawn, Mr Topaze (1961) as Colette, Twice Round The Daffodils (1962) as Harriet, The Iron Maiden (1962) as Nellie Trotter, A Pair Of Briefs (1962) as Gale Tornado, Strictly For The Birds (1963) as Peggy Blessing, Nurse On Wheels (1963) as Deborah Walcott, Doctor In Clover (1966) as Matron, Doctor In Trouble (1970) as Russian Captain, a policewoman in The Magnificent Seven Deadly Sins (1971), The Alf Garnett Saga (1972) as Gran, Not Now Darling (1973) as Miss Tipdale, Don’t Just Lie There, Say Something (1973) as Lady ‘Birdie’ Mannering-Brown, One Of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing (1975) as Emily and The Fool (1990) as Lady Daphne. She also appeared in numerous television series such as Sykes, Till Death Us Do Part, Sam And Janet, Love Among The Ruins, Born And Bred, Worzel Gummidge, Deceptions, Farrington Of The F.O., On The Up, Cluedo, As Time Goes By, Martin Chuzzlewit, Hetty Wainthropp Investigates, Only Fools And Horses, In Loving Memory and Dr Who. In 1994 while filming A Village Affair she fell off a bicycle and fractured a rib. She was replaced on the show and also lost a BBC Schools programme contract because she was unwell. The actors’ trade union, Equity, sued on her behalf but the court case took two years and the compensation she received was not enough to cover her lost earnings. In 1997 she fell at her home and fractured her spine. Her lack of self-esteem, paranoid shyness and intense loneliness turned her into an alcoholic and a depressive. “I’ve suffered from fears and nerves and painful shyness all my life. Loneliness, in itself, is one of the most terrible things to suffer from. In your heart of hearts you want friends but your body language is all wrong and you come across as unfriendly. Acting has been my only freedom. I’ve used acting as a substitute for all the joy and happiness that I’ve missed out on. That’s the time when I can laugh and cry and be happy with other people. Then you go back home and find yourself becoming a recluse. Somebody would ring me up and invite me to a function and I would say I wasn’t free but, really, it was because I was too shy to go on my own.” Despite the sauciness of some of the Carry On films she had old school opinions about what she saw as the lowering of standards of decency. “I can get quite embarrassed seeing some of the things on television. I don’t know whether things have to be quite as explicit as they are nowadays. Carry On… films were much more innocent.” Yet, she also once said, “To be a comic woman, you have to put up with quite a bit of banter. But I didn’t mind. I’ve got a dirty sense of humour and I never found those things really offensive.” She was unmarried – “I don’t think I’ve ever had anybody say the words, ‘Will you marry me?’ not even someone tight as a tick at a party” – although fellow Carry On… star Kenneth Williams did propose to her. He said, “I will give you a child if you want one but after that we wouldn’t be sleeping together.” She asked what was in it for her and he replied, “I would be frightfully amusing company and we would throw the most wonderful parties.” However, she knew marriage to the homosexual Williams would never work.
CAUSE: She died after a long illness. She was 71.
Frank Sinatra
Born December 12, 1915
Died May 14, 1998
Ol’ Blue Eyes. The Man. The Voice. The Chairman of the Board. Francis Albert Sinatra was never short of nicknames. His career spanned much of the twentieth century beginning with the dance bands, going solo and attracting the first teenage female music fans, called bobbysoxers. His management, ahead of their time when it came to hype, paid girls to scream at Sinatra. His renditions of songs such as ‘My Way’, ‘Strangers In The Night’, ‘Come Fly With Me’, ‘My Kind Of Town’, ‘(Theme From) New York, New York’ among literally thousands of others send a chill down the spine decades after they were first recorded. Sinatra was born at 415 Monroe Street, Hoboken, New Jersey, the only child of Anthony Martin ‘Marty’ Sinatra (b. Catania, Italy, 1891, d. Methodist Hospital, Houston, Texas, January 24, 1969 at 7.55pm) and Natalie Della ‘Dolly’ Garavente (b. Genoa, Italy, December 25, 1894, k. San Gorgonio Mountains, January 6, 1977). Weighing 13lb 8oz, Sinatra was a breech birth and the midwife used forceps, leaving him with scars on the left side of his face and neck, a lacerated ear and a punctured eardrum. The eardrum meant he was turned down for military service. Sinatra’s musical education began on his 15th birthday in 1930 when his maternal uncle, Domenico, bought him a ukulele and Frank began entertaining at family gatherings. On January 2
8, 1931 he entered Demarest High School where he arranged bands for school dances. To further his own ambitions, he dropped out of school but to please his mother he enrolled at Drake Business School, dropping out eleven months later. In 1932 he began offering his talents to local bands and supported himself by delivering the local rag. In 1933 he moved to New York where he sang for his supper or cigarettes. In 1935 he joined a group called The Hoboken Four and appeared on the wireless for the first time. In August 1937 after a disappointing two years he landed a job as house singer at the Rustic Cabin in Bergen County, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. On November 26, 1938 Sinatra was arrested on a morals charge following his affair with married 25-year-old brunette Antoinette Della Penta Francke. He was rearrested on December 22 and, on January 4, 1939, remanded to appear before a grand jury. On January 24 the case was dropped. It wasn’t the first time the Sinatra name had appeared before the courts. His uncle Domenico had been charged with malicious mischief; his uncle Gus had been arrested several times for running numbers; another uncle, Babe, had been jailed after being implicated in a murder; his father was once charged with receiving stolen goods while his beloved mother was an illegal abortionist who was often arrested. The charges against Sinatra were dropped after he had spent sixteen hours in jail. On February 4, 1939 he married Nancy Barbato (b. 1917) at Our Lady Of Sorrows Church, Jersey City. They had three children: Nancy Sandra (b. Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital, Jersey City, June 8, 1940), the song ‘Nancy With The Laughing Face’ was written for her by Phil Silvers; Christina (b. Cedars of Lebanon Hospital, Hollywood, June 20, 1948) and Franklin Wayne Emmanuel (b. Margaret Hague Maternity Hospital, Jersey City, January 10, 1944). In July 1939 he received his first press attention: one line in Metronome which read “The very pleasing vocals of Frank Sinatra whose easy phrasing is especially commendable.” On July 13 he recorded his first record, ‘From The Bottom Of My Heart’, with the Harry James Band. The bandleader supposedly wanted to change his vocalist’s name to Frankie Satin. 5́ 7˝ Sinatra demurred. In December 1939 he joined the much bigger Tommy Dorsey Band. Sinatra was under a two-year contract with James when he left. “We dissolved with a handshake,” reported James. “Frank’s wife was expecting a baby and he needed the extra money. But I never did get around to tearing up the contract.” Sinatra’s first appearance with Dorsey came on January 26, 1940 and his first record, ‘The Sky Fell Down’, five days later. In August 1940 Sinatra made his film début in Las Vegas Nights (1941) as a singer in Tommy Dorsey’s band. On May 20, 1941 he was named as the best Male Band Vocalist in the States by Billboard. On January 19, 1942 he recorded his first solo songs ‘The Night We Called It A Day’, ‘The Lamplighter’s Serenade’, ‘The Song Is You’ and ‘Night And Day’. Later that year, on September 19, Sinatra and Dorsey went their separate ways. A persistent rumour has Sinatra’s leaving facilitated by a mob friend, Willie Moretti, putting a gun to Dorsey’s head for his acquiescence. In fact, two heavy friends of Sinatra did visit Dorsey but he was far from intimidated by them and one had to be restrained from asking the bandleader for his autograph. By this time, Sinatra was cheating regularly on Nancy. On December 30, 1942 Sinatra made his first solo appearance and soon “Sinatramania” was at its height. He made two films playing himself, Show Business At War (1943) and Reveille With Beverly (released February 4, 1941, re-released 1943). On October 22, 1943 he underwent a medical for the military and was declared 1-A but on December 9 was again examined and declared 4-F and unfit to serve because of his punctured eardrum. His acting début came with Step Lively (1944), as Glen Russell, in which he had his first on-screen kiss (with Gloria DeHaven). On June 15, 1944 he began shooting Anchors Aweigh (1945) as Clarence Doolittle with Gene Kelly. The experience was fraught. MGM had a policy of refusing to show actors dailies but Sinatra insisted and the studio relented. However, when he turned up with six friends they were refused admission and Sinatra walked off the film for a few days. He insisted on hiring Sammy Cahn to work with Jule Styne, overriding the objections of the studio and producer Joe Pasternak. Sinatra and Kelly got on well and Kelly led the nervous Sinatra through the dance routines, often to the detriment of his own performance. On March 7, 1946 Sinatra was awarded a special Oscar for his work on the charity short The House I Live In (released on September 11, 1945). In October 1946 he was named most popular actor by Modern Screen. On February 11, 1947 he attended, possibly unaware of the nature of the proceedings, the notorious Mafia Havana Conference (which began in December 1946) to legitimise the proceedings. In attendance and paying homage to Charles ‘Lucky’ Luciano (b. Lercara Friddi, Palermo, Sicily, November 24, 1897, d. Capodichino Airport, Naples, Italy, January 26, 1962 of a heart attack) were Anthony Joseph ‘Joe Batters’ Accardo (b. Chicago, Illinois, April 28, 1906, d. May 27, 1992 of heart failure), Joe Adonis (b. Montemarano, near Naples, Italy, November 22, 1902, d. Aucona, Italy, November 26, 1971 of a heart attack), Lord High Executioner Albert ‘The Mad Hatter’ Anastasia (b. Tropea, Italy, September 26, 1902, k. Park Sheraton Hotel, Manhattan, October 25, 1957 at 10.15am), Joe ‘Bananas’ Bonanno (b. January 18, 1905, d. May 11, 2002), Prime Minister of the Underworld Frank Costello (b. Calabria, Italy, January 26, 1891, d. New York, February 18, 1973 of natural causes), Meyer Lansky (b. Grodno, Poland, August 28, 1900, d. Miami Beach, Florida, January 15, 1983 of a heart attack), 5́ 2˝ Tommy ‘Three-Finger Brown’ Lucchese (b. Palermo, Sicily, 1900, d. July 13, 1967 following surgery for a brain tumour), Carlos Marcello (b. Tunis, February 6, 1910, d. March 2, 1993), Joe Profaci (b. 1896, d. Bay Shore, New York, June 6, 1962 of cancer), Santo Trafficante (b. November 15, 1914, d. Houston, Texas, March 17, 1987 of heart failure) and many others. For the first time the press raised questions about Sinatra’s links with organised crime. However, later that year Hoboken named October 20 as Sinatra Day. The following year, he played Father Paul in The Miracle Of The Bells (1948). Later that year, he re-teamed with Gene Kelly for Take Me Out To The Ball Game (1949) in which he played Dennis Ryan. On December 8, 1949 at the New York première of the musical Gentlemen Prefer Blondes he met the woman who was to have a profound and often disturbing effect on his life, Ava Gardner. The next day his latest film, On The Town (1949) in which he portrayed Chip, opened to favourable reviews. As the influence of Ava Gardner began to bite, he spent less time with Nancy and on St Valentine’s Day 1950 she announced their separation. On July 12, 1950 he opened at the London Palladium to a tumultuous reception. On October 7 he began The Frank Sinatra Show on television, a programme that was to last two years. May 1951 was named “Frank Sinatra Record Month” by 1,500 American DJs. In Santa Monica, California, on October 30, 1951, he and Nancy were divorced. She was awarded custody of the children, their Holmby Hills home, a 1950 Cadillac, an interest in Sinatra Music Corporation, a third of his gross income up to $150,000 and 10% of monies over that up to another $150,000. Just over a week later, on November 7, Sinatra married Gardner in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The weather at the time was appalling but was nothing compared to the storms ahead for the newlyweds. At the time her career was more successful than his and Ava paid for the honeymoon. Dolly disliked her new daughter-in-law. Sinatra felt his career was over and desperately needed a new vehicle. That came with James Jones’ 850-page epic 1951 novel From Here To Eternity. Sinatra particularly identified with the character of the feisty Private Angelo Maggio. When Sinatra heard that Columbia had bought the film rights for $100,00 in March 1951 and were casting for the movie, he called everyone he knew to bombard Harry Cohn with pleas to let him play Maggio. Ava Gardner, ignoring her husband’s instructions not to use her influence, rang Cohn’s wife and finally Cohn agreed to test Sinatra. Before that could happen he and Gardner had a massive fight. He supposedly walked in on her in bed with Lana Turner. On November 7, 1952, their first wedding anniversary, they flew out to Nairobi where Ava was due to film Mogambo (1953). One day Gardner was having dinner with the one-eyed director John Ford and the British Governor of Uganda, Sir Andrew Cohan, and his wife when Ford
asked, “Ava, why don’t you tell the Governor what you see in that 120lb runt you’re married to?” “Well,” said Ava, never one to miss an opportunity to be blunt, “there’s only ten pounds of Frank but there’s one hundred and ten pounds of cock.” The Governor was amused, Ford wasn’t. On another day, Gardner and co-star Grace Kelly were out walking when they came across a line of Watusi warriors. To Grace’s shock but amusement, Gardner wandered over and pulled up the loincloth of one of the warriors. Kelly gasped. “Frank’s is bigger,” said Mrs Sinatra. While in Africa, Gardner discovered she was pregnant. On November 23, she aborted Sinatra’s baby in London. Meanwhile, he flew back to America to test for From Here To Eternity (opened August 5, 1953) and then back to Africa to celebrate Christmas with his wife. On March 2, 1953 he began filming the role that would revitalise his career and win him an Oscar. Filming wasn’t that happy an experience. Sinatra couldn’t reach Ava Gardner on the telephone, author James Jones believed that the film wasn’t true to his vision in the book and Montgomery Clift was agonising over his homosexuality. All three men would often drink themselves unconscious. His musical career also revived when he signed a seven-year contract with Capitol Records on April 2, 1953 but his personal life was far from satisfactory. He and Ava fought like cat and dog. On October 27, 1953, MGM announced their separation. His film Suddenly (1954) in which he played would-be Presidential assassin John Baron was also a hit. On January 14, 1954 at San Francisco’s City Hall one of the greatest baseball stars of all time married the most potent sex symbol of the twentieth century when ‘Joltin’ Joe’ DiMaggio took unto him the divorcée Norma Jeane Dougherty better known to the world as Marilyn Monroe. For luck DiMaggio wore the same dark suit and polka dot tie he had worn when they first met on a blind date. She wore a modest brown outfit because he had told her to keep “those low-cut things for the movies”. It was a marriage that was to last only nine months. DiMaggio was an incredibly jealous man and this jealousy led to an infamous incident that became known as “the wrong-door raid”. At 11.15pm on November 5, 1954, a month and a day after their divorce was announced, DiMaggio with his then friend Sinatra, Sinatra’s manager Hank Sanicola (d. October 10, 1974), restaurateur Patsy D’Amore, maître d’ Billy Karen and private detectives Phil Irwin and Barney Ruditsky, believing that Marilyn was inside with a lover (accounts vary as to whether it was supposed to be male or female), broke into the apartment of 50-year-old Florence Kotz at 8122 Waring Avenue on the corner of Kilkea Drive in Hollywood. Kotz sat up in bed, pulling the bedclothes around her, not surprisingly terrified as the men smashed down her door and began taking photographs. Marilyn was reportedly visiting her friends Sheila Stewart and Hal Schaefer in another apartment in the same block. Hearing the commotion the beautiful star slipped away without being seen. On June 1, 1957 Florence Kotz Ross (she had since married) filed suit against DiMaggio, Sinatra et al for $200,000. DiMaggio fled to Florida to avoid the litigation. The case was dismissed by the California Superior Court after Sinatra’s lawyer Milton ‘Mickey’ Rudin organised an out-of-court payment of $7,500. In December 1954 Sinatra was named top male singer by Billboard. Guys And Dolls (premièred November 3, 1955) in which he played Nathan Detroit was a smash although he was puzzled by Marlon Brando’s method acting. During that year he anonymously helped Bela Lugosi and Lee J. Cobb when they fell ill. Later that year he played the drug addict Frankie Machine in The Man With The Golden Arm (1955) for which he was nominated for an Oscar, losing out to Eternity co-star Ernest Borgnine and Marty (1955). In December 1955 he began filming his first Western Johnny Concho (1956) in which he took the title role and also directed. Oddly, the film opened in England four months before its American première. In March 1957 his seminal Songs For Swinging Lovers was released. He also formed the notorious, hard-living Rat Pack with friends Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr, Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop. In March 1957 he took the lead, Joey Evans, in the hit Pal Joey (1957). On July 5, 1957 in Mexico City, he and Ava Gardner were divorced. That year Sinatra also hit out at a new type of music that was sweeping the western world: “Rock and roll is phony and false and sung, written and played for the most part by cretinous goons.” On May 8, 1959 he recorded the song ‘High Hopes’ which became the campaign theme tune for Senator John F. Kennedy’s ultimately successful bid for the White House in 1960. On July 10 of that year Sinatra publicly came out in favour of the young Bostonian. On January 19, 1961 he arranged the Inaugural Gala but later fell out with JFK when the president stayed at the house of Republican Bing Crosby rather than Sinatra’s (despite Sinatra having a helipad fitted) because Kennedy was warned about the links with organised crime. (This was a tad hypocritical since rumours have long circulated that it was his father’s various deals with the mob that saw Kennedy elected in the first place.) Despite the divorce from Gardner, Sinatra had never been short of female company. These are just some of the women linked to him over the years: Judy Campbell Exner (b. Pacific Palisades, California, January 11, 1934 as Judith Eileen Katherine Immoor, d. September 24, 1999 of cancer), the mistress of mobster Sam ‘Momo’ Giancana, who broke up with Sinatra because his tastes were “too kinky” for her; Marilyn Monroe; Toni Anderson, a brunette he dated in the Sixties who left him to marry Lake Tahoe Deputy Sheriff Richard E. Anderson (when Sinatra confronted his rival on June 30, 1962 he was beaten so badly he was unable to perform at the Cal-Neva Lodge for several days. At 10.26pm on July 17, 1962 the Andersons were involved in a car accident on Highway 28 that left him dead and her badly injured. Anderson’s mother said, “My husband and I … think Frank Sinatra had something to do with Dick’s death”); Lauren Bacall whom Sinatra dated and, some say, proposed to after the death of her husband Humphrey Bogart (in her autobiography she labelled Sinatra “a shit”); Dame Elizabeth Rosamund Taylor whom Sinatra supposedly impregnated and then paid for her abortion; Jacqueline Park who dumped Sinatra to become movie mogul Jack Warner’s mistress (this was her assessment of the Chairman of the Board: “He’s a little twisted sexually. He loved call girls for orgies and he liked to see women in bed for kicks … I didn’t see him again because he wanted me to go to bed with another woman”); Judy Garland to whom Sinatra proposed and then ignored; Vanessa Brown, yet another actress to whom Sinatra proposed although she turned him down; Peggy Connelly to whom he gave a $20,000 grand piano following their break-up; Natalie Wood who had a brief fling with Sinatra before she met Robert Wagner; Joi Lansing, the blonde actress who remained friends with Ol’ Blue Eyes after the affair ended; Victoria Principal (b. Fukouka, Japan, January 3, 1946); Marilyn Maxwell (b. Clarinda, Iowa, August 3, 1921, d. Beverly Hills, California, March 20, 1972), Sinatra was an honorary pallbearer at her funeral; Juliet Prowse (b. Bombay, India, September 25, 1936, d. September 14, 1996) who became engaged to him on January 9, 1962 but who refused to become Mrs Sinatra III because he wanted her to give up her acting career; Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis (b. Southampton, New York, July 28, 1929, weighing 8lb, d. New York, New York, May 19, 1994 of cancer) whom he dated after JFK’s assassination; actress Melissa Weston; socialite Pamela Beryl Harriman (b. Farnborough, Kent, March 20, 1920 as Pamela Digby, d. February 5, 1997, the mother of Winston Churchill, MP and Bill Clinton’s Ambassador to France) was another to whom he proposed; and gossip columnist Suzy (b. El Paso, Texas, June 10 as Aileen Mehle). In April 1961 Sinatra launched his own record label, Reprise. On December 8, 1963, Sinatra’s soundalike son was kidnapped from his motel room at Harrah’s Lake Tahoe Casino and held for $239,985 (£150,000) ransom. The FBI arrested the kidnappers and Frank, Jr was safely returned on December 11. The whole event was financed by singer Jan Torrence of the duo Jan & Dean. Rumours still exist that the kidnapping was a publicity stunt. Sinatra’s film career began to include films shot with the Rat Pack: Ocean’s 11 (premièred on August 3, 1960) as Danny Ocean, Sergeants 3 (1962) as Mike Merry, 4 For Texa s (shooting began on May 23, 1963) as Zack Thomas and Robin And The 7 Hoods (shooting began on October 31, 1963; released February 1964) as Robb
o. His later films included: The Manchurian Candidate (1962) as Bennett Marco, Mark Robson’s Von Ryan’s Express (premièred June 25, 1965) as Colonel Joseph L. Ryan, Marriage On The Rocks (1965) as Dan Edwards, Assault On A Queen (location filming began on September 20, 1965, released on July 27, 1966) as Mark Brittain, Cast A Giant Shadow (1966) as Spence Talmadge, The Naked Runner (1967) as Sam Laker, Tony Rome (1967) as Tony Rome, Lady In Cement (1968) reprising his role as Tony Rome and Dirty Dingus Magee (1970) as Dingus Magee. On May 10, 1964 he was rescued from drowning by actor Brad Dexter (the one no one can remember in The Magnificent Seven). On July 19, 1966 at 5.30pm in Las Vegas, Nevada he married actress Mia Farrow, known for her role in the soap Peyton Place. Ava Gardner wasn’t impressed: “I always knew Frank would end up in bed with a boy with a cunt.” The marriage ended in divorce in Juarez, Mexico, on August 16, 1968. On September 11, Sinatra became involved in a brawl at Las Vegas Sands casino which resulted in the 250lb boss Carl Cohen punching the singer in the mouth, breaking two teeth. On December 30, Sinatra recorded the song that would be his theme tune for the rest of his life ‘My Way’. On June 14, 1971 Sinatra announced: “This is my last concert. I have retired.” It would become almost a standing joke. On July 18, 1972 he was ordered to testify before a Congressional committee on organised crime. Joe ‘The Baron’ Barboza claimed Sinatra had invested in two multi-million dollar hotels as a front for New England Mafia boss Raymond Patriarca and New York capo ‘Three-Finger Brown’ Lucchese. Sinatra claimed he had never heard of Patriarca but had met Lucchese “two or three times” although he had had no business dealings with him. When Italian police raided the home of Charles ‘Lucky’ Luciano they found a gold cigarette case inscribed “To my dear pal Lucky, from his friend, Frank Sinatra”. Sinatra had it written into his contracts that no one, no matter how famous, was to be allowed backstage or even to approach him. It therefore seemed strange that members of one of America’s most powerful Mafia family including Carlo Gambino, Jimmy ‘The Weasel’ Fratianno, ‘Big Paulie’ Castellano, Gregory De Palma, Salvatore Spatola and Joe Gambino managed to “breech” this security in 1976 to pose with the singer in his dressing room. The FBI file on Sinatra weighed a stone and Prince Charles once opined: “I was not impressed by the creeps and Mafia types he kept about him.” On October 20, 1972 Sinatra came out of retirement to appear at a fund-raiser for Richard Nixon. In 1973 his comeback was made official when he began recording again. Sinatra married for the fourth and final time on July 11, 1976 at Sunnylands, Rancho Mirage, California, to Barbara Marx (b. Glendale, California, October 16, 1930 as Barbara Jane Blakeley). It was her third marriage and despite the occasional bust-up they were still together when he died. Not everyone was enamoured of Sinatra. Marlon Brando once said: “He’s the kind of guy that when he dies he’s going up to Heaven and give God a bad time for making him bald.”
Fade to Black: A Book of Movie Obituaries Page 160
