Lady Blue Eyes_ My Life With Frank - Barbara Sinatra [98]
Grace was a fabulous woman who liked to surround herself with her children and her friends and make everything fun. Rainier was funny too and surprisingly down-to-earth, but it was Grace who was the playful one with a gleam in her eye. She reminded me of Dinah Shore because of her wicked sense of humor and great storytelling ability. She liked to have a drink and some laughs, yet she looked like the most elegant creature alive.
She also had great compassion and was very kind to Bobby, for which I will always be grateful. Bobby worked on the one movie his father ever made—Frankenstein’s Castle of Freaks. When Rainier discovered that the film was finished and that Bobby had even played a minor role, he insisted that he bring it to the palace for a special screening during a party he and Grace were hosting. Poor Bobby knew that was a bad idea and so did I, but Rainier could be most insistent, so my son did as he was asked. Grace assembled about thirty influential people she knew to watch the movie, whose premise was that Count Frankenstein brings a dead caveman back to life in his castle laboratory. It was described by one critic as “like a deranged Italian soap opera.” As the movie started rolling, featuring its characters Igor, Goliath, and Ook, silence descended on the room like a shroud. Bobby appeared on screen, followed by his grandmother Marge, who was so short that the sleeves of her dress scraped the ground, and finally his father, Bob, hopping in front of the camera in between duties as director.
Rainier, who’d insisted that this was a good idea in the first place, clammed up. Prince Albert fled the room, leaving Bobby to face the music. Bobby sat there sweating and wanting to run away too when Grace saved the day. Having picked up on everyone’s discomfort, she suddenly forced a laugh and cried, “Ha ha ha! Oh, Bobby, this is so funny. You never told us it was a comedy!” The ice was broken, and everyone else felt free to laugh too. What a darling she was.
In 1978, she and Rainier invited us to the wedding of their daughter Caroline to her first husband, Philippe Junot. Everybody imaginable was there, including royalty from across Europe mingling with movie stars and celebrities. The Pecks had a villa not far from Monaco and hosted several parties for us and the other wedding guests. When the paparazzi tried to climb over the fences to see in, Greg took great delight in turning the garden hose on them.
One night when Frank was cooking us all pasta, he and Greg began to nag Cary about not having a date, because he was the only one of us who was on his own. Frank asked Cary, “Isn’t there a girl in London you like?”
“Well, yes, there is one,” Cary admitted, “but every time I take her out all she talks about are her previous boyfriends.”
Frank looked at Greg and Greg looked at Frank, and the two of them nodded. “That’s it!” Frank said. “She’s the one. Call her and tell her to come.” So Frank sent his plane to collect this woman to be Cary’s date for the week. Her name was Barbara, and within a couple of years they were married. Barbara was his fifth and final wife, and was with dear Cary until the day he died.
We had a fabulous time at Princess Caroline’s wedding, but not everyone was as relaxed and happy as we were. Enjoying the setting of yet another party, this time at the villa of David Niven, I happened across Rainier standing by a tree on his own. I could tell by his face that