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Thursday, July 02, 2015

Barbara Sinatra's "Lady Blue Eyes: My Life With Frank"

Barbara Sinatra was her famous husband's fourth wife. Also his last. He died in her arms in 1998. They had been married 22 years.

It wasn't always pretty, although she says she was the "luckiest woman in the world" to be his wife.

Sinatra's widow, is telling what it was like living with Ol' Blue Eyes in her aptly titled memoir Lady Blue Eyes: My Life with Frank.

If you're interested in celebrity marriages, this memoir is the predictable dip into such shallow waters. If you're not, you can at least pass the time counting the names dropped. There are thousands.

Model, Vegas showgirl, wife of Zeppo Marx, Barbara had been out and about before she met Sinatra. He quickly won her over, but their long-term affair before their marriage did not please Sinatra's feisty mother, Dolly, who asked him, "Aren't there enough whores around?"

He was attentive, polite, but best of all he had a good eye "for stone," she writes. Meaning he could pick out amazing jewelry, including a famous Cartier necklace. And then there were the flights to Paris for dinner, the expensive cars, the suites in world-class hotels around the world. She calls it all "some candy jar."

There was a price to pay for all this, however. Sinatra could be a bully, screaming at Washington Post society columnist Maxine Cheshire and pushing a man into a phone booth, punching him before sliding the door shut.

She admits he was "definitely a Jekyll and Hyde" personality, recounting numerous evenings when he was overdrinking with his buddies, making scenes from New York to Hong Kong, ripping phones from the wall and throwing them into windows.

He also wasn't the most romantic. She had to accept that fact when a prenup was delivered to her on the morning of their wedding. She signed it.

Did he ever cheat? All she'll say is that she took Palm Springs neighbor Lee Annenberg's advice: Look the other way.

As for his connections to the Mob, she only says he got frustrated with the press for always alleging it. The press was not his favorite.

If you're a Sinatra fan, you'll learn he loved grilled cheese sandwiches, unfiltered Camels and Jack Daniels, but hated women who wore too much perfume. He also hated women who couldn't hold their liquor.

Barbara Sinatra could.

Thanks to Craig Wilson

Sinatra and Me: The Very Good Years

Pulitzer Prize-nominated author Franz Douskey released a book, "Sinatra and Me: The Very Good Years" (Tantor Media).

Walter Winchell, a popular and influential 20th century newspaper and radio commentator, once wrote: "The closest person to Frank Sinatra is Tony Consiglio." Tony’s full account of his relationship with the iconic crooner has never been revealed – until now. "Sinatra and Me: The Very Good Years" is based on dozens of hours of interviews over the span of eight years, concluding with Tony’s death in 2008.

"Sinatra and Me: The Very Good Years," which features dozens of never-before-published photos of Sinatra and Consiglio, and details a period of time that spans from the 1930’s into the 1970’s. It takes an up-close and personal look into the exciting world of one of America’s greatest icons.

Douskey’s work has appeared in nearly 200 publications, including: Rolling Stone, The Nation, The New Yorker, New York Quarterly, Las Vegas Life, and the Minnesota Review. His fourth book, West of Midnight: New and Selected Poems, reached number 24 on the Amazon Best-Sellers list in 2011 and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Douskey, who taught creative writing at Yale University for five summers, served as president of IMPAC University, in Punta Gorda, FL. Douskey resides in Hamden, Connecticut.

The Crazy Story Of Frank Sinatra Playing A Club For A Week Straight Because Sam Giancana Was Mad At JFK

The Mafia detested the administration of John F. Kennedy as Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy raised the number of mob convictions from 35 in 1960 to 288 in 1963. But there may be a much deeper connection between the Kennedys and the mob, and legendary entertainer Frank Sinatra reportedly served as a key intermediary and whipping boy in one case.

According to "The Dark Side of Camelot" by Seymour Hersh, Joseph P. Kennedy, Sr. (JFK's father) set up a meeting with Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana to obtain Giancana's support for Jack Kennedy's run for the White House — thereby combining the sway of Chicago crime syndicate with that of Mayor Richard J. Daley's Democratic machine.

Hersh also reported, along with others, that Giancana also helped funnel cash to buy votes and endorsements for the West Virginia Democratic primary election in May 1960.

The book "The Kennedy Half-Century: The Presidency, Assassination, and Lasting Legacy of John F. Kennedy" by University of Virginia professor Larry Sabato highlights the connection by citing the story that Joseph Kennedy asked for Giancana's help over a dispute with another mobster, Frank Costello, and offered "the president's ear" in return.

Sabato also writes that "when JFK began having an affair with a black-haired beauty named Judith Campbell while he was still a U.S. senator, Giancana slept with her as well, reportedly so that he would eventually have a direct link to the White House."

It turns out, according to Sabato, that Sinatra introduced Senator Kennedy to Judy Campbell and also "served as the go-between for the West Virginia primary shenanigans."

After JFK reached the White House, however, the mob boss was not welcome near the president's ear. And Sinatra was the one that ultimately paid for it.

From "The Kennedy Half-Century":

When the Kennedys turned on Giancana once they were in the White House, Sinatra had to work hard to deflect the mobster's wrath at Sinatra on account of the Kennedys' unfaithfulness. In atonement, the singer played at Giancana's club, the Villa Venice, with his "Rat Pack" of fellow entertainers, for eight nights in a row.

Sabato notes that "Sinatra worked his way back into Giancana's good graces, but the Kennedys never did."

Thanks to Michael Kelly.

Johnny Carson - A revealing and incisive account of the King of Late Night at the height of his fame and power, by his lawyer, wingman, fixer, and closest confidant

From 1962 until 1992, Johnny Carson hosted The Tonight Show and permeated the American consciousness. In the ’70s and ’80s he was the country’s highest-paid entertainer and its most enigmatic. He was notoriously inscrutable, as mercurial (and sometimes cruel) off-camera as he was charming and hilarious onstage. During the apex of his reign, Carson’s longtime lawyer and best friend was Henry Bushkin, who now shows us Johnny Carson with a breathtaking clarity and depth that nobody else could.

From the moment in 1970 when Carson hired Bushkin (who was just twenty-seven) until the moment eighteen years later when they parted ways, the author witnessed and often took part in a string of escapades that still retain their power to surprise and fascinate us. One of Bushkin’s first assignments was helping Carson break into a posh Manhattan apartment to gather evidence of his wife’s infidelity. More than once, Bushkin helped his client avoid entanglements with the mob. Of course, Carson’s adventures weren’t all so sordid. He hosted Ronald Reagan’s inaugural concert as a favor to the new president, and he prevented a drunken Dean Martin from appearing onstage that evening. Carson socialized with Frank Sinatra, Jack Lemmon, Jimmy Stewart, Kirk Douglas, and dozens of other boldface names who populate this atmospheric and propulsive chronicle of the King of Late Night and his world.

But this memoir isn’t just dishy. It is a tautly rendered and remarkably nuanced portrait of Carson, revealing not only how he truly was, but why. Bushkin explains why Carson, a voracious (and very talented) womanizer, felt he always had to be married; why he loathed small talk even as he excelled at it; why he couldn’t visit his son in the hospital and wouldn’t attend his mother’s funeral; and much more. Bushkin’s account is by turns shocking, poignant, and uproarious — written with a novelist’s eye for detail, a screenwriter’s ear for dialogue, and a knack for comic timing that Carson himself would relish. Johnny Carson unveils not only the hidden Carson, but also the raucous, star-studded world he ruled.

"Sinatra with Love" #SignatureSinatra Collection Features Timeless Love Songs From His Capitol And Reprise Records Repertoire

Universal Music Enterprises (UMe) has released Sinatra, With Love, a 16-track collection of Sinatra’s romantic classics from his Capitol and Reprise catalogs. This is Universal’s second release under the newly launched “Signature Sinatra” imprint, a deal uniting Sinatra's classic Capitol and signature Reprise recordings.

Sinatra, With Love features timeless ballads and swingin' standards including Cole Porter classics “From This Moment On,” “I Love You,” and “Just One Of Those Things” . “Ol’ Blue Eyes” continues to keep the romance flowing as he puts his signature touch on the Gershwin classic “Love Is Here To Stay,” as well as “It Could Happen To You,” “Nice ‘N’ Easy,” “The Look Of Love,” “Moonlight Becomes You,” “(Love Is) A Tender Trap,” and “The Way You Look Tonight,” all arranged by the legendary Nelson Riddle. Also featured are treasured renditions of “My Foolish Heart,” “It Had To Be You (featured in When Harry Met Sally),” the Johnny Mercer- penned “Something’s Gotta Give,” with an arrangement by Billy May, and “Wave,” written by Sinatra’s long-time collaborator Antonio Carlos Jobim.

Frank Sinatra began the golden age in which American popular music became a universal language and this extraordinary creative genius is its most articulate spokesman worldwide. Throughout his 60-year career, "Ol' Blue Eyes" performed on more than 1,400 recordings, was awarded 31 gold, nine platinum, three double-platinum and one triple platinum album by the Recording Industry Association of America.  He was also awarded Lifetime Achievement Awards from the Grammys, The Screen Actors Guild, The Kennedy Center and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), as well as the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal. His contribution to our life and times extends far beyond his music, to embrace an exuberance, a zest for life, a sense of style and a glorious self-confidence that define, for all time, what it meant to be young at heart and have the world on a string. His spirit and vision continue to be defined by the wisdom and insight from the legacy of work he left behind.

Only Daughter of Meyer Lansky, Writes Tell-All-Memoir "Daughter of the King: Growing Up in Gangland"

In this tell-all memoir, the only daughter of the man who was considered the "brains of the Mob" opens the door on her glamorous—and tragic—life. Sandi Lansky Lombardo, daughter of Mob boss Meyer Lansky, was raised in New York City in upper-class Jewish splendor and spent her childhood in the undeniable glitz of Havana and Las Vegas in Lansky's heyday in the 1940s, '50s, and '60s. She dined out with her father and his associates when she was six and was introduced to Frank Sinatra when she was eleven. She knew Bugsy Siegel and Uncle Lucky Luciano and met Howard Hughes and Joseph Kennedy. She was the Paris Hilton of her day: partying until dawn at El Morocco and the Stork Club, married at sixteen, romanced by Dean Martin at nineteen. She was pampered and protected, but her life was also full of tragedy: her mother was mentally ill and her eldest brother severely handicapped, and Mob violence repeatedly invaded the world of their friends and family.

Daughter of the King: Growing Up in Gangland, Sandi recounts for the first time the grandeur—and heartbreak—of her life as the daughter of one of the most powerful mobsters in America. Sandi takes listeners back in time to tell the story of her life—one lived in a glamorous but troubled world where nothing ever turned out to be quite as it seemed.

Wednesday, July 01, 2015

MAFIA-PEDIA - The Government's Secret Files on Organized Crime

The government has opened an old treasure trove of information on some 800 gangland goons who wielded power during the Mafia's Golden Age - a virtual Social Register of the worst sociopaths to have packed a silenced pistol, wielded an ice pick or driven a getaway car in a sharkskin suit.

The dossiers, complete with black-and-white photos, chronicle the backgrounds of wiseguys ranging from mob bosses Vincent "The Chin" Gigante, Sam Giancana and "Crazy Joe" Gallo to lesser lights like Al Capone's two-bit hoodlum brothers.

The files read like single-page snapshots of the mobsters' lives - their aliases and detailed physical descriptions, from distinguishing scars, tattoos and facial tics to styles of dress, home addresses, arrest histories and family trees - and even the names of mistresses.

Also revealed are the legitimate businesses they owned and their preferred leisure haunts - racetracks, prizefights, nightclubs and favorite restaurants - as well as an overview of the criminal status each man held within the larger Mafia firmament.

The 944 pages of material - featured in the book "Mafia: The Government's Secret File on Organized Crime,"from HarperCollins - was mined from the raw intelligence gathered by agents of the U.S. Treasury Department's Bureau of Narcotics, a forerunner of today's Drug Enforcement Administration.

The cavalcade of hoods includes two men named Frank Paul Dragna, the son and nephew of one-time Los Angeles Mafia kingpin Jack Dragna.

The first Frank is known as "One Eye," the second "Two Eye," to distinguish the cousin with the glass right eye.

Entrants are listed by state, and New York, with more than 350 wiseguys, overwhelmingly leads the pack. A multitude of others resided in California, Florida, Illinois, New Jersey and Michigan. There are groupings of gangsters from Canada, France and Italy, as well.

The index cross-references each racketeer by nickname, many of them hilarious.

There's "The Old Man" (there are, actually, three), "The Bald Head," "Hunchback Harry," "Schnozzola" (he has a large nose), "Mickey Mouse" (he has large ears), "Slim," three people dubbed "Cockeyed," as well as four "Fats" and a "Fat Artie," "Fat Freddie," "Fat Sonny" and "Fat Tony" for good measure.

There's "Big Al," "Big Frank" (two), "Big Freddy," "Big John," "Big Larry," "Big Mike" (two), "Big Nose Larry," "Big Pat," "Big Phil," "Big Sam," "Big Sol," "Big Yok" - even a "Mr. Big."

Thanks to Phillip Messing

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