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By Root 1803 0

to record both of them. Frank preferred recording at night because he said he was in better voice then, so I took him to the office with Hank Sanicola and Ben Barton, who were his music publishing partners. I played the songs for him. ‘Frank, I think you could do great with these,’ I told him. He listened and then looked at Sanicola and Barton, who gave him this sort of blank stare. ‘I won’t do any of this crap,’ he said, and walked out. I scrambled around to salvage the date because the musicians and the chorus had to be paid. So I called Guy Mitchell, and he recorded both sides, which became instant hits: ‘The Roving Kind’ and ‘My Heart Cries for You.’ ”

Another time, Mitch Miller suggested that Frank record a novelty song entitled “Mama Will Bark” with Dagmar, the one-name singer. This time, Frank agreed.

“He had been appearing at the Paramount with Dagmar getting great laughs from the audience with her dumb-blonde routine. Jackie Gleason was the opening act. Around that time, someone came to me with a song about a girl and a guy necking in the next room; the guy wanted something more but the girl resisted, saying, ‘Mama will bark.’ I thought it was a novelty that would either be an overnight smash or do nothing at all. I called Frank and said it might be worth a crack, so we got Dagmar and the two of them made the record. Frank wasn’t embarrassed at the time, and if he had been, all he had to say was, ‘I don’t want this to come out,’ and it would never have come out. But he never voiced any objections. Four years later, he came after me claiming I had ruined his career with that song.”

For months, Henry Jaffe begged Bob Hope to feature Frank on his television show. Finally, Hope gave him a guest shot, for which Frank was very grateful. Then Jaffe got Frank a “network video package,” which included a three-year contract with CBS for a one-hour weekly television variety show (The Frank Sinatra Show) and a radio show (Meet Frank Sinatra) that guaranteed Frank $250,000 a year. But the sponsors canceled after thirteen weeks.

“After Frank’s first television show [October 7, 1950] bombed, I was called in to produce,” said Irving Mansfield, “and I lived in hell for the next eight weeks. He was impossible to work with—absolutely impossible. A real spoiled brat. He was with Ava then, and the two of them were living in Manie Sacks’s suite at the Hampshire House, and every day her life was a hell on earth because he was always accusing her of running out in the afternoon to sleep with Artie Shaw. Frank was insanely jealous of Shaw. Whenever he couldn’t get her on the phone, he’d start screaming on the set that she was having an affair with Artie. ‘I know she’s with that goddamn Artie Shaw,’ he’d yell. ‘I know she’s with that bastard. I’ll kill her. I’ll kill her. I’ll kill her.’ He was crazy on the subject.

“He was constantly surrounded by his entourage—Ben Barton, Hank Sanicola, some gorilla named Al Silvani, and a bunch of other hangers-on—and they shook and shivered every time he yelled. They talked in hushed tones and stood around him like goons protecting a gangster. I couldn’t get near him. Dumb, isn’t it, that the producer had to deal with the star through his flunkies and the three writers on the show, but that’s the way it was. I went into the deal for a dollar a week so that I would have the right to quit on one week’s notice. I knew it would be tough, but I never thought it was going to be as bad as it was … God!

“Frank was always late, sometimes two and three hours late; he hated to rehearse and refused to discuss the weekly format. Usually, he ignored the guest shots entirely. Once, he wanted to book Jackie Gleason, who was very hot at the time, but Frank would not rehearse. Even though he and Jackie were pals, Jackie refused to go on the air without a rehearsal, and we ended up having to pay him $7,500 plus expenses for being the guest star who did not do Frank’s show. Another time I came to work and was told by the goons that Brian Aherne was the guest star for the following week. ‘Frank wants to class up the