The most striking feature of Frank Sinatra’s face were his clear blue eyes, alive eyes that in the space of a second could turn cold with anger or affection shine or reflect a vague recollection that his friends kept quiet and distance. This was described fifty years ago the New York journalist Gay Talese in his famous report Frank Sinatra has a cold .
In this article published by the journal Esquire April 1966, Talese showed the inside of the artist “as a continuous struggle between aggression or uncontrolled anger, and his kindness and humility”, as quoted by the Spanish journalist Lourdes Abad.
Indeed, as wrote Talese own, on the one hand there was the cordial man and on the other, who waved and bowed his head to his closest compatriots, and Sinatra able to explode in less than an hour in a fit of rage if anything made by his countrymen did not have his approval.
Tired of all the publicity that had surrounded his encounters with Mia Farrow, then a twentysomething girl, Sinatra was at that time rather than angry about the recent television documentary about her life that had made the CBS, where he got his private life and even speculated on his possible friendship with Mafia bosses. And very uneasy about his starring role in a show that would record for NBC.
In this context, Talese was commissioned to Esquire to go to Los Angeles and interview Sinatra , custom organized by its chief editor and publisher of the singer. “But after checking into the Beverly Wilshire hotel, rent a car and digest a lot of information about Sinatra, I received a call from his office saying that the interview scheduled that afternoon would not take place,” he recalls today, half a century after that adventure, veteran journalist. “Mr. Sinatra is really upset by the latest headlines about his alleged mob connections, the spokesman said, adding that Mr. Sinatra also suffered a cold treatment which also forced him to postpone the recording studio where I was hoping to see the singer live work. Perhaps when Mr. Sinatra feel better call me back, and maybe, if so wished I could reapply for an interview at his office and this would reagendada “says Talese, who said he was very sorry for the state of Sinatra health and news about his relationship with the mafia, and asked if it was possible to call his office at the end of this week, if his health had improved and the gods granted the opportunity of a hearing if only briefly. “I could call, said the representative, but I could not promise anything,” adds Talese.
The rest of the week following comment Harold Hayes (the editor of Esquire ), Talese arranged a few interviews with actors and musicians, studio executives and record producers, restaurant owners and friends of Sinatra who had known him in one way or another over the years. “From each of them, got little pearls of information here, a little color there, small parts for a large mosaic that reflects expected the man who had attracted attention all outbreaks for decades and spread a long shadow over the capricious industry Entertainment and the American conscience, “says Talese.
Talese, as he always did in his interviews, rarely, if ever, took the pen out of his pockets, nor had in mind to use your recorder . That way, he says, does not inhibit spontaneity and openness of those people, nor allow the climate of trust and proximity altered. “I thought it would be more stimulating my apparent lack of investigative zeal and the promise that, whatever they trust me retentive, confirm any attribution or quotation that would make me before checking with the power to confirm or clarify” he said.
After trying for two weeks to reschedule his interview with Sinatra in Los Angeles’ I kept saying that the singer continued resfriado-, Talese continued doing interviews with people who in one way or another had been employed at one of the many businesses and related Sinatra companies, their record label or film producer, its real estate operations, company missile parts or hangar your aircraft, and met with people who were more connected personally with the singer, as He overshadowed his son, his favorite Beverly Hills haberdasher, one of his bodyguards and a shorty, graying lady Sinatra traveled around the country in their tours, carrying a suitcase sixty wigs. “In all, I spent three weeks and I spent some nearby allowances to $ 5,000, inviting people every day for lunch or dinner. I returned to New York and took six weeks to organize and write an article of 55 pages that came mostly from the chronicle of two hundred pages which included more than a hundred interviews and described Sinatra in places like a bar in Beverly Hills (where he got into a fight), a casino in Las Vegas (where he lost a small fortune at the blackjack) and the NBC Studios in Burbank (where, after recovering from a cold, he returned to record a show and sang divinely), “explains Talese.
For the veteran journalist, the fact of not having had the opportunity to sit and talk alone with Frank Sinatra, is in all probability one of the strengths his story. “What could or could have said (being one of the most protected public figures) that would reveal better than a careful writer watching him in action, seeing him in stressful situations, listening and persisting through the margins of his life?” Talese wonders now. “This methodology persist and listen carefully and describe scenes featuring a perception of character and individual personality of a character-a methodology that has come to be called New journalism, it was, in the best case, actually strengthened by principles Old Journalism tireless legwork and fidelity to factual accuracy. And, with consequent costs time and money, was that investigation which marked my story on Sinatra and dozens of other items that I published during the decade of the sixties, “says the journalist, who has signed in his New York bunker each of 5000 numbered copies of Frank Sinatra Has a Cold , the seal Taschen just published to mark the birth centenary of The Voice , editing images including the legendary photographer Phil Stern, who alone had access to Sinatra for three decades -between 1940 and 1970, as well as some iconic photographs of the 60 made by photojournalists as John Bryson, John Dominis or Terry O’Neill.
Talese was with the difficulty of not being able to interview the protagonist, difficulty saved by interviewing people in the entourage of Frank Sinatra that were offered. “That which at first might seem a difficulty to prepare the profile, then turned into a positive situation, as it facilitated an innovative point of view, a twist to the story. Adverse situations in life the most creative and groundbreaking ideas arise. In this case, Talese could present a story featuring a profile of a character through the eyes of its people closest. Moreover, the author includes in his relationship with Sinatra them. Descriptions of Brad Dexter, Jim Mahoney (Sinatra’s press agent), his daughter Nancy, his father Martin Sinatra, her mother Dolly Sinatra, Frank Sinatra Jr., his second ex-wife Ava Gardner and George Jacobs (personal assistant) appear , which achieves the desired effect and makes an excellent description of the personality of the singer, “in which Sinatra, Abad added,” is defined as a person of extremes: ‘all or nothing’, forcing the author to antithesis to the text, “featuring Sinatra as an old and young man:” It does not feel old. Makes old men feel young “; and on the other side. “Her swollen knuckles and fingers so stiff from arthritis that bent with difficulty”
Abad review Sinatra appears that while, as a strong guy, of great character and I always wanted to grow ambitious in life; but also fear of loneliness. And this is what the author on his second marriage: “Ava loved Frank, but not as much as he wanted. He needs lots of love. We want twenty-four hours a day; You need people around him. Frank is so. ” And for that reason preserved to the same group of friends: “When Sinatra sits to dinner, his faithful friends are nearby; and wherever you are, no matter how elegant the place it always comes out something about the neighborhood because Sinatra, although it has come so far, remains the neighborhood kid, “said Talese in his great chronicle. “A complex character, enigmatic, full of contrasts, which all want to be close, yet distant, said Abad, who notes that the report is made at the time that the artist seems to wane, and yet the story ends with happy ending: “The rest of the month was clear and mild. The recording session was magnificent; the film was finished and television shows were over. ” And is that despite the time it seemed that young people flooded all protesting and demanding, Frank Sinatra, concludes Abad, survives as a national phenomenon, a product that endures over time, in the words of the author, who concludes that perhaps it was not even a blip, but simply a cold: “He was the victim of an evil so common that most people would have found insignificant. He, however, rushed him in a state of anguish, deep depression, panic or rage. Frank Sinatra had a cold. “
No comments:
Post a Comment