by James Kaplan
And that, by the way, I planned to write another.
To my relief, Phyllis was fine with it, Doubleday was fine with it, and almost all the readers of that first volume, Frank: The Voice, were fine with it too. There were some disgruntled Amazonians. (Where’s the rest of this?) Yet to my happy surprise, though also my discomfiture, there were many e-mails from readers who’d liked volume 1 and were on board with my scheme but who were ready for Volume 2—right away.
Of course, to a word squeezer like this writer, “right away” is a foreign concept. And I also knew that for the second book I had set myself, if possible, a far tougher task. The mid-1950s and early to mid-1960s covered the greatest period in Frank Sinatra’s career—the Capitol and the early Reprise years and also the years in which Sinatra was a major movie star, sometimes making as many as five pictures a year. He recorded groundbreaking albums and singles; he worked with Nelson Riddle and other great arrangers. This period also comprised some of the most complex times in America’s history, times in which Frank was intricately involved. There was his friendship with John F. Kennedy, his troubled and abiding attraction to the Mob, and, not irrelevantly, his troubled and abiding and formative (for both Sinatra and the town) relationship with Las Vegas. There was the fabled Rat Pack (there were two Rat Packs, actually) and, of course, there were the women—the many, many women. And, finally, there was Frank Sinatra’s impact on the world at large, his global profile. He was a great artist in these years, a world-changing artist; he was also a world-historical individual.
Writing volume 2, I knew at the outset, would be a very tall order.
I had help. Plenty of it. While I admit that to an alarming degree this was a solo project (I was unable—and, to be truthful, unwilling—to send out researchers and interviewers other than myself to cover the very many bases that needed to be covered), no biographer is an island, and I had crucial support for every day of the five years I worked on this volume.
First, I must extend profound thanks to my family, Karen, Jacob, Aaron, and Avery, for their endless and unquestioning support and for putting up with a husband and father who while mostly present, in the sense that he was on the premises, was also usually locked away in his attic office—the Man in the Ceiling—for entire days, especially during the final two years of writing. Particular thanks go to Aaron O. Kaplan for the major feats of compiling the book’s endnotes and bibliography.
To my agent, Joy Harris, who has been by my side for twenty years, putting up with me through thick and thin (and helping to make the thick thicker and the thin easier to bear), goes a gratitude that only she will properly understand.
A thousand thanks to my indispensable first reader, Peter Bogdanovich: a lifelong friend, a unique American filmmaker and writer on film, a friend of Frank Sinatra’s, and my crucial support on this project from day one of volume 1. Peter loves Sinatra and wanted to make sure I did right by him. To my humbled amazement he seemed to feel that I did. He read every word, loved almost every word, told me gently when I had wavered or omitted something, and—quite simply—kept me going every step of the way.
I miss my other indispensable first reader, my indispensable brother Peter W. Kaplan, more than I can say.
I want to give a deep bow to my editor, Gerald Howard. In Gerry, along with Phyllis Grann, I had the incomparable good fortune of having not one but two publishing legends concentrating on my work. “Concentration” is the key word. Gerry brought a fierce attention to every word of this huge volume, along with nonpareil qualities of intelligence, cultural reference, and wit. A formidable writer himself, he was a keen appreciator of what I did right; he also rescued me more than a few times from my easily tappable worst instincts.
I would like to extend particular gratitude to the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, which graced me with a fellowship that not only provided essential financial support but, just as important, gave me a rocket-like spiritual and professional lift at precisely the midpoint of the project, a time when I needed it badly.
I will repeat what I said in volume 1 about my brain trust, and mean it even more emphatically: That Will Friedwald and Michael Kraus, who both know as much about Sinatra as anyone has a right to know, gave freely of their time and steadily approved of what I was doing continues to amaze me. I will always remember their generosity and treasure their friendship. I was wildly fortunate to have these two frighteningly learned, gimlet-eyed men parsing every sentence of the book. I am also indebted, for their vast Sinatra knowledge and easy generosity, to Chuck Granata, Rob Waldman, and Rob Fentress.
The Sinatra completist Ed O’Brien knows everything Frank-related and told me as much as I was able to take in. His regular bulletins from upstate New York kept me informed and kept me honest.
The legendary Jonathan Schwartz, whom I am honored to call a friend, lent a special insight and—of course—a vast body of knowledge of Sinatra and the American Songbook to this project.
I would also like to thank Rosemary Riddle Acerra, Monty Alexander, Rick Apt, Brook Babcock, Bob Bain, Alan Bergman, Marilyn Bergman, Tony Bill, Bill Boggs, Tiffany Bolling, Fifi Booth, Howard Bragman, Chris Brochon, Dr. Richard Burg, Anita Busch, Laurie Cahn, Christopher Cerf, Dr. Stanley Coen, Kenny Colman, Jill Corey, Steve Crosby, Paulajane D’Amato, Vic Damone, Angie Dickinson, Frank DiGiacomo, Gary Ebbins, Jack Eglash, Vincent Falcone, John Farr, Michael Feinstein, Gloria Delson Franks, Mike Franks, Gary Giddins, Steve Glauber, Bob Gottlieb, Mary Edna Grantham, Peter Greenberg, Shecky Greene, Colin Hall, Betsy Duncan Hammes, Bruce Handy, Bill Harbach, Richard Havers, Lee Herschberg, Eddie Hodges, Anne Hollister, Bill Hooper, Christopher Irving, Ann Jactel, Snake Jagger, Brandon James, Bruce Jenkins, Reuben F. Johnson, Dean Jones, Jack Jones, Quincy Jones, Shirley Jones, Robert E. Kaplan, Steve Khan, Larry King, Steve Koepp, Andrew Lack, Claudia Gridley Stabile Lano, Joe Lano, Angela Lansbury, Scott Latta, Ruta Lee, Dan Levy, Jerry Lewis, Nancy Olson Livingston, Jim Mahoney, Jim Mahoney Jr., Carmel Malin, Johnny Mandel, Sid Mark, Bill Marx, Jane McCormick, Sonny Mehta, Karen Meltzer, David Michaelis, Dale Monaco, Pat Mulcahy, Phyllis Newman, Liz Nickles, Eunice Norton, Kim Novak, Marianne O’Connell, Claus Ogerman, Dan Okrent, Tony Oppedisano, Mo Ostin, Ted Panken, Anna Pearce, Pat Politis, Adam Reed, Emil Richards, Jenny Romero, Jeff Rosen, Andrew Rosenblum, Ric Ross, Gena Rowlands, Tom Santopietro, George Schlatter, Paul Shaffer, Gary Shapiro, David Simoné, Winston Simoné, Leonard Slatkin, Liz Smith, Jim Snidero, Ted Sommer, William Stadiem, Jean Stein, Robert Sullivan, Gay Talese, Jordan Taylor, Angela Thornton, Linda Thorson, Dean Torrence, Gloria Vanderbilt, Jonathan Van Meter, Robert J. Wagner, Dr. William Walsh, Ed Walters, Artie Wayne, Steven Weissman, Esq., Raquel Welch, Dr. Preston Winters, and Fred Zlotkin.
And the following, who have left us but with whom I was fortunate to spend time: Jean Bach, Polly Bergen, Jeanne Carmen, Peggy Connelly, Stan Cornyn, John Dominis, Bob Eckel, Don Hewitt, George Jacobs, Mearene Jordan, Peter Levinson, Abbey Lincoln, Mort Lindsey, Bill Miller, Mitch Miller, Mario Puzo, Frankie Randall, Mickey Rooney, Jane Russell, Mike Shore, Jo Stafford, Jerry Weintraub, Roberta Wennik-Kaplan, Bud Yorkin, and Sidney Zion.
And last (but only as a mark of distinction), an extravagant thank-you to the great team at Doubleday, from copy to design to marketing to production, and to the truly heroic Bette Alexander, Todd Doughty, John Fontana, Jeremy Medina, and Ingrid Sterner.
If I have unwittingly omitted anybody, first blushes are mine. You reside deep in my heart, safe from the uncertain clutches of my short-term memory.
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NOTES
CHAPTER 1
“He’s a dead man”: Jacobs and Stadiem, Mr. S, p. 21.
“The whole world”: Louella Parsons, International News Service, syndicated column, April 19, 1954.
“One night we went to Frank’s”: Server, Ava Gardner, p. 295.
“Wondering if there”: Ibid.
Any hint of romance: Ibid., pp. 295–96.
She had asked him to: Ibid., p. 298.
Frank not only won: Havers, Sinatra, p. 197.
“Mud was scheming”: Finstad, Natasha, p. 141.
“consumed quantities”: Ibid.
“Dad had a sadness”: Rosemary Riddle Acerra, in discussion with the author, Oct. 2012.
“After all, what else”: Friedwald, Sinatra!, p. 233.
“Most of our best”: Shaw, Sinatra, p. 27.
“I loved how Nelson”: Friedwald, Sinatra!, p. 224.
“the conservatory-trained”: Ibid.
That idea went out: Cramer, Joe DiMaggio, p. 346.
“You knew this was”: Nancy Sinatra, Frank Sinatra: My Father, p. 99.
“marked the start”: Santopietro, Sinatra in Hollywood, p. 147.
CHAPTER 2
“The Cocoanut Grove”: Hotchner, Doris Day, p. 166.
The production was overseen: Ibid., p. 167; Santopietro, Sinatra in Hollywood, p. 161.
“Of course Frank”: Hotchner, Doris Day, p. 167.
“People think that”: Wagner, Pieces of My Heart, p. 123.
“peonage”: Hotchner, Doris Day, p. 175.
“She was very touched”: Ibid., pp. 169–70.
“I have never seen”: Louella Parsons, syndicated column, July 9, 1954.
“Nancy Sinatra insists”: Erskine Johnson, In Hollywood, syndicated column, Aug. 4, 1954.
“Kramer had unwittingly”: Server, Robert Mitchum, p. 276.
“The tippling would”: Ibid., pp. 276–77.
“Why did Frank Sinatra”: Santopietro, Sinatra in Hollywood, p. 164.
“Busy, busy, busy”: Kelley, His Way, p. 223.
“A lot of drinks”: Server, Robert Mitchum, p. 279.
“he was balling”: Ibid.
“had a man keeping”: Cramer, Joe DiMaggio, pp. 372–73.
“was supposedly having”: Kelley, His Way, p. 241.
“in the arms of another man”: Bruce Weber, “Hal Schaefer, Jazz Pianist and Marilyn Monroe Friend, Dies at 87,” New York Times, Dec. 13, 2012, www.nytimes.com/2012/12/13/arts/music/hal-schaefer-jazz-pianist-and-marilyn-monroes-vocal-coach-dies.html.
“We all went back”: Server, Robert Mitchum, pp. 279–80.
“was fast asleep”: New York Times, ibid.
“For years”: Haygood, In Black and White, p. 167.
“He helped me”: Davidson, The Real and the Unreal, p. 22.
“On Fremont Street”: Jerry Lewis, in discussion with the author, June 1999.
“Sammy Davis was one”: Shecky Greene, in discussion with the author, Nov. 2012.
“I said, ‘You don’t’ ”: Haygood, In Black and White, p. 169.
“My father was”: Tina Sinatra, My Father’s Daughter, p. 160.
“Sinatra said, ‘What business’ ”: Aline Mosby, United Press, Dec. 9, 1954.
“Get out of there”: Kelley, His Way, p. 223.
“I am not”: Mosby, United Press, Dec. 9, 1954; Kelley, His Way, pp. 223–24.
“The guy comes over”: Michael Bitterman, http://www.midmod.com/newSite/bio.htm.
“I went back to Byron”: Kelley, His Way, p. 224.
“may be the only”: Friedwald, Sinatra!, p. 237.
CHAPTER 3
“Gloria Vanderbilt Stokowski”: Dorothy Kilgallen, syndicated column, Nov. 3, 1954.
“a star in the making”: Wendy Goodman, World of Gloria Vanderbilt, p. 126; New York Daily News, Dec. 28, 1954.
“You be nice”: Gloria Vanderbilt, in discussion with the author, April 2011.
“The phone can ring”: Vanderbilt, Black Knight, White Knight, pp. 308–9.
“She looks”: Wendy Goodman, World of Gloria Vanderbilt, p. 127.
“I’m seeing him again”: Ibid., pp. 310, 312.
“turned to me and said”: Ibid., p. 311.
“He was very open”: Vanderbilt, discussion.
“The list of celebrities”: Dorothy Kilgallen, syndicated column, Jan. 8, 1955.
“Here’s a song”: Recording: Frank Sinatra—New York 1: Manhattan Center, 1955 (Tommy Dorsey).
“his musical confidant”: Havers, Sinatra, p. 199.
“some intimate ladies’ apparel”: Nancy Sinatra, My Father, p. 129.
“I was devastated”: Ibid., p. 75.
“inaugurated [Frank’s] tradition”: Friedwald, Sinatra!, p. 238.
“both singer and pianist”: Ibid.
“Sinatra, a man who lived”: Jonathan Schwartz, “Swingin’ on a Century,” Vanity Fair, July 1998.
“Nelson, you’re a gas”: Levinson, September in the Rain, p. 120.
On the Waterfront’s producer: Jacobs and Stadiem, Mr. S, pp. 52–53.
“Frank Sinatra would”: Bosworth, Marlon Brando, p. 153.
“half destroyed”: Jacobs and Stadiem, Mr. S, p. 51.
Betty Grable, Jane Russell: Berg, Goldwyn, p. 471; Albert Lea (Minn.) Daily Tribune, Jan. 17, 1954; Herald Tribune News Service, Aug. 17, 1954; Harold Heffernan, syndicated column, Oct. 3, 1954.
A Hedda Hopper column: Altoona (Pa.) Mirror, May 12, 1954.
> But soon afterward: Berg, Goldwyn, p. 471.
By June, Earl Wilson: Earl Wilson, syndicated column, June 4, 1954.
“[My] agent said to me”: First Libby Zion Memorial Lecture at Yale Law School, April 15, 1986.
“In the midst of negotiations”: Berg, Goldwyn, p. 471.
“Brando’s desire to continually”: Santopietro, Sinatra in Hollywood, p. 171.
“Sinatra apparently felt”: Loesser, Most Remarkable Fella, pp. 118–19.
“Frank Sinatra…never”: Sheed, House That George Built, p. 275.
“It’s a stalemate”: Bob Thomas, syndicated column, April 7, 1955.
“I did everything”: Peggy Connelly, in discussion with the author, May 2006.
“I had been in Hollywood”: Ibid.
“And after ten minutes”: Summers and Swan, Sinatra, p. 211.
“When I wrote ‘But Beautiful’ ”: James Kaplan, “The King of Ring-a-Ding-Ding,” Movies Rock, supplement, Vanity Fair, Fall 2007.
CHAPTER 4
“Every time Jack Benny”: Cahn, I Should Care, p. 152.
“This comical dissertation”: Bosley Crowther review, New York Times, Nov. 11, 1955.
“I had a date”: Jill Corey, in discussion with the author, Nov. 2012.
“just a pal”: Dunkirk (N.Y.) Evening Observer, April 22, 1955.
“the foreign beauty”: Erskine Johnson, syndicated column, Dec. 1, 1953.
“to catch Rosemary Clooney’s”: Dorothy Manners, writing in Louella Parsons’s syndicated column, June 9, 1955.
According to Manners: Ibid.
Nancy Sinatra writes: Nancy Sinatra, My Father, p. 132.
If it came to a choice: Summers and Swan, Sinatra, p. 256.
Among his many West Coast: Server, Ava Gardner, p. 151.
FBI files state: Parker and Rashke, Capitol Hill in Black and White, p. 85; Klein, All Too Human, p. 182; Summers and Swan, Sinatra, p. 256.
Even as he started: Santopietro, Sinatra in Hollywood, p. 182.
