The unlikely star Frank Sinatra called one of the “finest” singers he ever met
If there was one thing that Frank Sinatra never lost throughout his life, it was the commanding power of stardom.
His own career had already proven that by the bucketload; that the true chalice of fame was found in being the all-round entertainer, where not one aspect of singing, dancing, acting, or looks was less important than the other. Immediately, when one of those traits faltered, the whole Sinatra machine came to a grounding halt.
That was the trouble with the path that he pursued: that you couldn’t mask ageing or failing bodies, because it was absolutely plain for all the world to see. Of course, that’s a difficult enough pressure to carry alone, but when you also see it wreaking havoc on any number of your friends, it was always bound to send him into a spiral.
It was especially the case when it came to someone like Sammy Davis Jr, whose place in the Chairman of the Board’s inner circle was always absolutely steadfast, as true brothers more than they ever were colleagues. There was, of course, also the rest of the Rat Pack, but Sinatra and Davis shared something unbeatable and unbreakable, with only life itself able to tear them apart.
As such, when Davis died at the age of 64 in 1990, from throat cancer, he refused to have treated so as not to lose his voice, it was not only a devastating and premature loss to all those who most closely surrounded him, but also to the world at large in being stripped of one of its most transcendent stars far too early. In short, the grief hit Sinatra like a ton of bricks.
The weight of that sadness was proven in its starkest form in the immediate days after the entertainer’s passing, when Sinatra was approached by reporters and simply looked completely bereft and adrift. When asked just what Davis meant to him, he replied: “Well, from my standpoint, he should be remembered as one of the finest human beings I ever knew in my life.”
It was the highest praise indeed, but only because this was a man who had stood by Sinatra through every ebb and flow of their careers, and in a lot of ways, he didn’t know what he was going to do without his oldest friend. He also knew the magnitude of the star power that had suddenly vanished from the world.
Calling Davis “multi-talented, and a wonderful, wonderful boy”, the depth of Sinatra’s pain in this moment was clear for all to see. But how would this loss affect the rest of the world going forward? “I don’t know, I just don’t know. Not yet, we don’t know.” With the strength of that grief still gripping him in its tightest snares, that’s really all there was to say.
Of course, it would sadly only be another eight years on from this point that the tables would turn on Sinatra and he would be the one drawing his last ever breath. With that, the world had lost two of its finest entertainers, but somewhere far away from here, the two old friends were back reunited, absolutely lighting up the boards.
