Old blue-eyed chronicles

By Vince Guerrieri
210 west Managing Editor [send email]

Book review:
Sinatra: The Life
By Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan

"We are simultaneously the most loved, hated, feared, and respected nation on this planet. In short, we're Frank Sinatra."
--Dennis Miller

There is no entertainer whose career spanned the 20th century and who can elicit so many different feelings than Frank Sinatra.

His first recording came 60 years before his last, Duets, in the late 1990s.

He saw Las Vegas through its infancy as a party town, and came back when odds were stacked against him (no voice, no job, and a wife who got more attention than he did).

Even now, six years after his death, he continues to fascinate. Anthony Summers, who wrote biographies about Richard Nixon, Marilyn Monroe and J. Edgar Hoover, turns his sights on Sinatra and comes out with what will likely be the definitive biography of the star, who dallied with the idea of writing his memoirs a decade before he died, but never got to it.

There are more than 200 pages of footnotes and bibliographies, also detailing interviews.What comes out of all of that is a book that meticulously details the singer's early years in New Jersey, his rise to superstardom, his staggering fall and his ability to pick himself up and get back in the race.

People who want to read about Sinatra's mob ties will not be disappointed. The book portrays him as not just a baritone (his listing in Who's Who) or a saloon singer, but a kingmaker, whose friends and connections put John Kennedy into the White House, and who switched to supporting Republicans (like Ronald Reagan) at the mob's behest, because they felt that the Gallant Old Party would be more receptive to their cause.

People who want to read about Sinatra's singing talents, his undeniable charisma and his endless appeal are going to be a little disappointed. He's portrayed as a shitheel, a blustering Sicilian who holds grudges, an alcoholic and a man who had his way with many women.

But it also focuses on his immense talent, his ability to make women crazy and the appeal he had for men -- a man who acted the way he wanted and damn the consequences.

The word that has been used in this book and before to describe Sinatra is padrone, an Italian term for boss. In a way, it reflects his capriciousness and generosity, his ability to help and his need to take, everything that makes Sinatra worth remembering.

His talent covered many, if not all of his flaws, wrote Richard Gehman in "Good Housekeeping:"It does not matter how powerful or corrupt he is or may become. We can forgive him so long as he continues to enchant us solely by existing,"

And that's why people still talk about Frank Sinatra.