One cannot help but hear echoes of Gay Talese’s famous Esquire story, “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold,” in Rumpus contributor Chantel Tattoli’s recent article “Frankly Singing.” Tattoli writes:
“Two weeks ago, I told my father I’d been assigned to report Frank Sinatra, Jr.’s concert, told him I had a second press pass for a photographer. My father heard me loud and clear. He went out and bought a telescopic Nikon. It was at that point that dread began to gnaw on his daughter.”
Although Tattoli had reservations about bringing her father to the show, his presence juxtaposed with the relationship between Frank Sinatra Jr. and Sr., is what makes the article so moving. Neither Tattoli nor Talese get the face-to-face interview they originally wanted, but maybe that was for the best. In a letter to Esquire editor Harold Hayes, Talese states, “I may not get the piece we’d hoped for—the real Frank Sinatra, but perhaps, by not getting it—and by getting rejected constantly and by seeing his flunkies protecting his flanks—we will be getting close to the truth about the man.”
