Frank_ The Voice - James Kaplan [155]
It was a perfect relationship for both men.
By the time Frank got to the Capitol in November 1947, he had established a tradition. “Frank Sinatra,” Will Mastin explained to the two Sammys after the fateful telegram came, “always has a colored act on the bill with him.”
Even if George Evans had nothing but public relations in mind when he pushed his star client to accept all those tolerance awards, that didn’t make Sinatra a phony liberal. And his sentiments about working with black entertainers ran deep: artistically speaking, he knew where his bread was buttered. He simply understood too much about the roots of American popular music to imagine that he didn’t owe an important debt to the geniuses of Fifty-second Street, Billie Holiday first among them.
But aside from that, Frank genuinely liked black people. And, understanding this, most black people—who, by the fact of their existence in America, possessed an intricate radar for racism—liked him back.3 He clearly understood what it was like to be discriminated against. He had great style. And that voice of his told the truth, no matter what color your ears were.
So he hired colored acts. Sinatra, in addition to being color-blind, was generous—and, once he had decided to help someone, tenacious. MGM could squawk all it wanted about taking on those unknowns Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne, but if they didn’t, they didn’t get Sinatra. The Capitol Theater could remind Frank until they were blue in the face that if he wanted a colored act, he could easily get the more famous Moke and Poke, or the Berry Brothers, or the Nicholas Brothers, who were even in a movie, for God’s sake. Frank shook his head obstinately. “There’s a kid who comes to my radio show when he’s in town, he works with his family, his name is Sam something. Use him.”
“All right, Frank, if you want ’em you got ’em. How much do you want to give them?”
“Make it $1,250.”
“We can get the Nicholas Brothers for that kind of money and … they’re hot.”
“$1,250. That’s it. I don’t want the Nicholas Brothers. I want Sam and his family.”
And once the Will Mastin Trio (which up to this point had been making $350 in a good week) was onstage at the Capitol, Frank would stroll out and throw his arm around Sammy’s shoulder—in an era when such a gesture from a white man to a black man was a very rare sight indeed—and personally introduce him to the crowd.
Even if the crowd, especially by the second week, was no longer quite the size the crowds had been so very recently.
During all this disappointment, Frank kept recording as though his life depended on it—which, in a very real way, it did. In October alone, he cut an amazing twenty sides at Liederkranz Hall, more than he had done in all of 1943. Committing to shellac such great standards as “All of Me,” “Laura,” “The Song Is You,” and “What’ll I Do?” was a kind of atonement for all the mediocre material he was being forced to sing on Your Hit Parade. On Friday, October 31—having spent the previous afternoon grinning through a cold rain as Hoboken celebrated Frank Sinatra Day—he recorded three beautiful songs, “Mean to Me,” “Spring Is Here,” and “Fools Rush In,” and he sang them beautifully.
The only problem was, the public wasn’t buying.
Dolly had stood close by Frank’s side as the mayor of Hoboken presented him with a giant wooden key to the city. Wearing a big feathered hat and the mink stole Frank had bought her, she threw her head back as the photographers snapped away, a rapturous smile creasing her chubby cheeks. Rain or no rain, her moment in the sun had come at last. Frank Sinatra Day, Dolly Sinatra Day—same thing. At his son’s other shoulder stood Marty, looking grim in his old-fashioned fire captain’s uniform with its two rows of brass buttons. Firemen marched in parades; they didn’t lead them.
Just out of