Rat Pack
Confidential, non-fiction by Shawn Levy, Doubleday, 1998,
344 pages, hard cover 0385487517
If nothing else, you can say that Shawn Levy's timing was
incredible. The publication date for Levy's new book
Rat Pack Confidential, fell almost on the eve
of senior rat packer Frank Sinatra's death. This and the
fact that the current North American martini craze has
thrust all things rat pack practically into the mainstream
should ensure Rat Pack Confidential isn't
overlooked at the bookseller's. That's a good thing, because
as far as over-the-shoulder looks go, Rat Pack
Confidential is an excellent one: modern history with
a touch of show biz and dark side. It's pretty interesting
stuff.
Author Shawn Levy is no newcomer to this material. In fact
his biography of Jerry Lewis, King of Comedy: The
Life and Art of Jerry Lewis was widely acclaimed and
no doubt provided the first important research steps for
Rat Pack Confidential.
Rat Pack is a portrait of not only the five
members of the group of men who were dubbed by that name,
but also of the youthful Las Vegas that seemed to grow
almost in their shadow. It's not always a pretty picture.
You can't, after all, have an epoch of debauchery without
messing up some toes: life is funny that way. And the toes
that were stepped on were occasionally pretty well shod. It
was a story waiting to be told.
It's tempting, in retrospect, to tell the whole thing
as if it is was Frank's idea: that Frank knew what he was
doing when he mixed these men as his brothers; that he
consciously tried to bring the mob into the White House and
drag the president into the shadows; that he didn't think of
himself as merely a source of income and amusement for
Giancana and of sex and laughs for Kennedy; that he thought
he'd united these two earthly potentates out of the sheer
force of his will and personality just as he had Sammy and
Joey and Peter and Dean.
In Rat Pack Confidential we meet stars
and starlets, mobsters and politicos at a pivotal time in
history. It's an intimate glimpse. The Rat Pack were, of
course, five showbiz types who defined their era: Frank
Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford and
Joey Bishop. At the time of writing, only Bishop --
considered by some to be the least important of the group --
is still living.
And while the story of necessity includes many others --
Lauren Bacall, for example, who we learn the guys called
"den mother" and who gave the Rat Pack their name -- it is
the five uneasy stars that command center stage of Rat
Pack Confidential. The portraits Levy paints contain
some surprises. Frank Sinatra's charisma and charm are well
known and his underworld connections widely suspected, but
Sinatra comes across as -- basically -- a fairly unpleasant
person. Driven, talented and charm-laden: yes. But also
arrogant, somewhat twisted and a-moral.
On the other hand, the ever-cheery and smiling Davis
experienced almost unthinkable racism at the hands of the
casino owners and impresarios that employed him. Imagine, if
you will, this headlining star denied off-stage access to
the Las Vegas he played to. And worse.
Back then, even the biggest black stars got shafted in
Las Vegas. It was a Jim Crow town, plain and simple, and all
the more awful for being not some Deep South backwater but a
major entertainment center and a vacation spot for people
whose opinions mattered so much in showbiz. Black showpeople
got used to ill treatment as they traveled throughout the
country, but they had never experienced Vegas' strange
combination of big-time facilities and salaries and
Mississippi backwater segregation.
Rat Pack Confidential is the sort of
tell-all-carefully tale currently in vogue in American
biography. There's lots of inside stuff you might not have
heard before, but nothing so scandalous or risqué you
might not see it on one of the better-researched episodes of
A&E's Biography. The book is
Biography -like in tone, as well and it is
perhaps that easy ramble that contributes to making
Rat Pack Confidential a very comfortable and
entertaining read.
