The singer Frank Sinatra refused to speak to for four years
While Frank Sinatra may have been one of the most popular artists of his generation, popularity as an artist doesn’t necessarily always equate to popularity as an individual.
On a human level, there was undoubtedly something terrifying about Sinatra, a domineering figure who seemed as though his tolerance for fools was paper-thin. He may well have seemed to exude charisma on stage, but this was all part of his artistic persona, and in reality, he was considerably harder to get on the right side of as a result of his belligerence.
His connections to the mob also didn’t help matters and gave people a good reason to be afraid of him. Having associations with New Jersey’s most dangerous men meant that if you ever stepped out of line in Sinatra’s presence, you might end up on the receiving end of the sort of threats that would have you fearing for your life. It also made him a useful person to know as well, with this giving him the power to get famous friends out of trouble, but you’d be a fool to think that misbehaving around Sinatra was a good idea.
As a man with many opinions and principles, it was probably best not to get on the wrong side of the crooner for the fear that he might end up doing something to damage your career, and he certainly had the power to do so.
It didn’t even prevent him from doing this to some of his closest allies and collaborators, and he’d even go as far as to cut off one of his most notable companions later on in his career.
Having been a close friend and collaborator of Sammy Davis Jr since the 1940s, forming the Rat Pack with him alongside fellow stage and screen star Dean Martin, you’d have thought that the two would have been inseparable after so many years spent performing together at legendary concerts and in a number of Hollywood flicks.
However, by the time the end of the 1970s had rolled around, their relationship had begun to sour significantly as a result of Davis’ spiralling addiction to drugs, and given Sinatra’s vehement anti-drug stance, he chose not just to distance himself from Davis, but completely remove him from his life altogether for a period.
Because Davis was frequently using cocaine, Sinatra ended up not talking to his former friend for approximately four years, and it took a Rat Pack reunion in 1988 for the two to find themselves even considering speaking to each other again. The tour was ultimately a failure by all accounts, and the relationships between all parties involved were still icy after having not been in each other’s lives for so long, with there being distinct moral disagreements between the three reunited members.
Martin would walk away from the 29-date tour after just six shows due to behind-the-scenes disputes between him and Sinatra, and while it may have seemed daft for Sinatra to have previously cut off Davis, one of his closest friends, for something that can so easily be talked through, it was evident at the same time that Sinatra was perhaps not the best at maintaining relationships in the first place.
