Tina Sinatra recently said of her father, “Dad had no interest in writing a memoir: “What good would that do?” he’d say. “My life and music are the whole of me.” Of course, he was right. Film was the only way to go. His music transcends time and intensifies what the screenplay reveals in words.”Tina was referring to the 1992 mini-series, “Sinatra,” in which she served as executive producer and had the blessing of ‘Ol Blue Eyes himself.
As a series of Sinatra films and CDs are reissued to commemorate the tenth anniversary of his death, Warner Brothers has released Sinatra – The 2-Disc Collector’s Edition. With no autobiography or truly authorized biography available, Sinatra stands as the most definitive portrait of Frank Sinatra from the Sinatra family that the public is likely to get.


Sinatra stars Philip Casnoff in the title role, and covers the singer’s life from his childhood in Hoboken, New Jersey up through his triumphant return from retirement in 1974. Frank came from a pretty hardscrabble background. His Parents, Dolly (Olympia Dukakis) and Marty Sinatra (Joe Santos) ran a saloon during prohibition and Frank was expected to be tough. While he stole cigarettes and did mischievous things like the other boys in the neighborhood, he wanted to be a famous singer from an early age.
Frank met his first wife, Nancy Barbato (Gina Gershon) and went to work for her father while secretly taking voice lessons in the city. After falling asleep on the job, Sinatra decides to quit and pursue singing full time. After quitting the job, Barbato’s father forbade Frank from seeing his daughter. Still, the couple saw each other secretly and eventually married. Barbato married Sinatra even though he admitted being unfaithful to her on more than one occasion, even before they had exchanged vows. Nancy must have really loved Frank, because she bore all his children–Nancy born in 1940, Frank Jr. born in 1944, and Christina “Tina” Sinatra in 1948–she stayed married to Frank and only sought a separation after his relationship with actress Ava Gardner became too serious to ignore. Frank and Nancy Sr. were divorced on October 29, 1951.
Sinatra got his first big break in June of 1939, when Harry James signed him to a one year contract as the orchestra’s singer. Nancy traveled with Frank on tour, but was forced to leave the road when she became pregnant with the couple’s first child. The James gig was to be short lived, as Harry let Frank out of his contract to join Tommy Dorsey’s orchestra. It was during his time with Dorsey that Sinatra would develop the singing style that would get him dubbed simply, “the voice.” In late 1942, Sinatra left Dorsey to launch a solo career that would be rivaled by no others in that era.
However, as impossible as it seemed just a couple of years before, by 1950, Sinatra’s career was on the skids. His very public affair with Ava Gardner (Marcia Gay Harden) had turned much of the public against him and cost him his first marriage. Only days after his divorce from Nancy, Frank married Ava. Their marriage was very tempestuous and destined to end in divorce. While his popularity was in decline, her career was on the rise. To make matters worse, during a show at the Copacabana Sinatra lost his voice because of vocal cord hemorrhaging.
It is largely believed that Frank Sinatra was able to finagle an audition for the role of Angelo Maggio in From Here to Eternity because of Ava Gardner’s popularity. The role won Sinatra an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor and marked the rebirth of his singing career as well. However, his personal life was in shambles. Sinatra and Gardner separated in 1953 and divorced in 1957.
After the Gardner marriage, Sinatra begins to run out of steam. Trying to fit a life as jam packed as Sinatra’s into a four hour tele-pic would seem to be an impossible task and it seems like the filmmakers felt the pressure. His years at Capitol Records are reduced to a montage and his relationship with the “Rat Pack” is only slightly explored. We do get a glimpse at them, but we never see them perform one of their famous Las Vegas routines. (David Raynr does a passable Sammy Davis Jr. but Danny Gans misses the mark as Dean Martin.)
Sinatra’s brief marriage to a much younger Mia Farrow (Nina Siemaszko) is the funniest part of Sinatra. Given Farrow’s peace-nik 60’s flower child ways and Sinatra’s decidedly more conservative views, what made him think what marriage would ever work? When Farrow wouldn’t leave Rosemary’s Baby to shoot a film with her husband, the marriage was over.
The film ends with Sinatra singing “My Way” at his comeback concert in Madison Square Garden in 1974. Though Sinatra feels rushed toward the end, the film is a remarkably honest portrait of a truly legendary career. Surprisingly, despite the fact that Tina Sinatra played a big part in the making of Sinatra, her father comes across as a man with a lot of flaws who was probably hard to like at times. That honesty, is what makes Sinatra worth viewing.
Sinatra – The 2 Disc Collector’s Edition is presented in the standard format. The audio is in Dolby Digital 5.1 and the DVD has no special features.