''Sinatra'' is a 1992
CBS biographical drama
Drama is the specific Mode (literature), mode of fiction Mimesis, represented in performance: a Play (theatre), play, opera, mime, ballet, etc., performed in a theatre, or on Radio drama, radio or television.Elam (1980, 98). Considered as a g ...
miniseries about singer
Frank Sinatra, developed and executive produced by Frank's youngest daughter
Tina Sinatra
Christina Sinatra (born June 20, 1948) is an American businesswoman, film producer, Hollywood agent, and memoirist.
Early life
Christina Sinatra was born on June 20, 1948, in Los Angeles, California, the youngest child of American singer and ac ...
and approved by Frank himself.
Directed by
James Steven Sadwith, produced by Richard M. Rosenbloom, and written by
William Mastrosimone
William Mastrosimone (born August 19, 1947) is an American playwright and screenwriter from Trenton, New Jersey. He attended high school at The Pennington School and received a graduate degree in playwriting from Mason Gross School of the Arts, ...
and
Abby Mann
Abby Mann (December 1, 1927 – March 25, 2008) was an American film writer and producer.
Life and career
The son of Russian-Jewish immigrants, Mann was born as Abraham Goodman in Philadelphia. He grew up in East Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Do ...
. It stars
Philip Casnoff
Philip Casnoff (born August 3, 1949) is an American actor, known for his roles in TV series and on Broadway. He has also been a director.
Early life and education
Philip L. Casnoff was born on August 3, 1949, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. H ...
,
Olympia Dukakis
Olympia Dukakis (June 20, 1931 – May 1, 2021) was an American actress. She performed in more than 130 stage productions, more than 60 films and in 50 television series. Best known as a screen actress, she started her career in theater. Not lon ...
,
Joe Santos
Joe Santos (born Joseph John Minieri Jr.; June 9, 1931 – March 18, 2016) was an American film and television actor, best known as Sgt. Dennis Becker (later Lieutenant), the friend of James Garner's character on the NBC crime drama ''The R ...
,
Gina Gershon
Gina L. Gershon (born June 10, 1962) is an American actress. She has had roles in the films ''Cocktail'' (1988), ''Red Heat'' (1988), '' Showgirls'' (1995), '' Bound'' (1996), ''Face/Off'' (1997), '' The Insider'' (1999), '' Demonlover'' (2002) ...
,
Nina Siemaszko
Antonina Jadwiga Siemaszko (born July 14, 1970) is an American actress. Best known for her film roles in '' Little Noises'' (1992), '' The Saint of Fort Washington'' (1993), and for her role as Eleanor Bartlet in ''The West Wing'' (2001–2006).
...
,
Bob Gunton
Robert Patrick Gunton Jr. (born November 15, 1945) is an American character actor of stage and screen. He is known for playing strict authoritarian characters, including Warden Samuel Norton in the 1994 prison drama '' The Shawshank Redemption' ...
, and
Marcia Gay Harden
Marcia Gay Harden (born August 14, 1959) is an American actress. She is the recipient of accolades including an Academy Award and a Tony Award, in addition to nominations for a Critics' Choice Movie Award and three Primetime Emmy Awards.
Bor ...
, with some of Sinatra's vocals recreated by
Tom Burlinson
Tom Burlinson (born 14 February 1956) is a Canadian actor and singer.
Career
Tom Burlinson was born in Toronto, Canada, the son of Antony T. Burlinson (born 1923, in Greenwich, Middlesex) and Angela Schofield (born 1926, in Bury St Edmunds, ...
. It won two and was nominated for seven
Emmy Awards
The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...
, along with a win and two nominations for a
Golden Globe Award
The Golden Globe Awards are accolades bestowed by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association beginning in January 1944, recognizing excellence in both American and international film and television. Beginning in 2022, there are 105 members of t ...
. Released on November 8, 1992, it was re-released on a two-disc DVD Warner Home Video on May 13, 2008.
Plot
Frank Sinatra (Casnoff) emerges from
Hoboken, New Jersey
Hoboken ( ; Unami: ') is a city in Hudson County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 60,417. The Census Bureau's Population Estimates Program calculated that the city's population was 58, ...
, the son of local politician Natalie "Dolly" Sinatra (Dukakis) and fireman
Anthony "Marty" Sinatra (Santos). Beginning his career as a singer for the
Harry James
Harry Haag James (March 15, 1916 – July 5, 1983) was an American musician who is best known as a trumpet-playing band leader who led a big band from 1939 to 1946. He broke up his band for a short period in 1947 but shortly after he reorganized ...
(Posey) and
Tommy Dorsey
Thomas Francis Dorsey Jr. (November 19, 1905 – November 26, 1956) was an American jazz trombonist, composer, conductor and bandleader of the big band era. He was known as the "Sentimental Gentleman of Swing" because of his smooth-toned trombo ...
(Gunton) big bands, Sinatra struggles to keep his marriage to his teenage sweetheart Nancy Barbato (Gershon). Before long, his talent catapults him to both music and movie fame, but his personal failings place his career and marriage in danger. He endures tumultuous marriages and divorces with starlets
Ava Gardner
Ava Lavinia Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990) was an American actress. She first signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1941 and appeared mainly in small roles until she drew critics' attention in 1946 with her perform ...
(Harden) and
Mia Farrow
Maria de Lourdes Villiers "Mia" Farrow ( ; born February 9, 1945) is an American actress. She first gained notice for her role as Allison MacKenzie in the television soap opera '' Peyton Place'' and gained further recognition for her subsequen ...
(Siemaszko) while juggling his movie and singing careers and forming significant friendships with an ambitious young senator named
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
(Kelly) and powerful Chicago mob boss
Sam Giancana
Salvatore Mooney Giancana (; born Gilormo Giangana; ; May 24, 1908 – June 19, 1975) was an American mobster who was boss of the Chicago Outfit from 1957 to 1966.
Giancana was born in Chicago to Italian immigrant parents. He joined the 42 ...
(Steiger).
Cast
*
Philip Casnoff
Philip Casnoff (born August 3, 1949) is an American actor, known for his roles in TV series and on Broadway. He has also been a director.
Early life and education
Philip L. Casnoff was born on August 3, 1949, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. H ...
as
Frank Sinatra
*
Olympia Dukakis
Olympia Dukakis (June 20, 1931 – May 1, 2021) was an American actress. She performed in more than 130 stage productions, more than 60 films and in 50 television series. Best known as a screen actress, she started her career in theater. Not lon ...
as Natalie "Dolly" Sinatra
*
Joe Santos
Joe Santos (born Joseph John Minieri Jr.; June 9, 1931 – March 18, 2016) was an American film and television actor, best known as Sgt. Dennis Becker (later Lieutenant), the friend of James Garner's character on the NBC crime drama ''The R ...
as
Marty Sinatra
*
Gina Gershon
Gina L. Gershon (born June 10, 1962) is an American actress. She has had roles in the films ''Cocktail'' (1988), ''Red Heat'' (1988), '' Showgirls'' (1995), '' Bound'' (1996), ''Face/Off'' (1997), '' The Insider'' (1999), '' Demonlover'' (2002) ...
as Nancy Barbato Sinatra
*
Nina Siemaszko
Antonina Jadwiga Siemaszko (born July 14, 1970) is an American actress. Best known for her film roles in '' Little Noises'' (1992), '' The Saint of Fort Washington'' (1993), and for her role as Eleanor Bartlet in ''The West Wing'' (2001–2006).
...
as
Mia Farrow
Maria de Lourdes Villiers "Mia" Farrow ( ; born February 9, 1945) is an American actress. She first gained notice for her role as Allison MacKenzie in the television soap opera '' Peyton Place'' and gained further recognition for her subsequen ...
*
Joe Grifasi
Joseph G. Grifasi (born June 14, 1944) is an American character actor of film, stage and television.
Grifasi was born in Buffalo, New York, the son of Patricia (née Gaglione) and Joseph J. Grifasi, a skilled laborer. Grifasi graduated from B ...
as George Evans
*
Marcia Gay Harden
Marcia Gay Harden (born August 14, 1959) is an American actress. She is the recipient of accolades including an Academy Award and a Tony Award, in addition to nominations for a Critics' Choice Movie Award and three Primetime Emmy Awards.
Bor ...
as
Ava Gardner
Ava Lavinia Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990) was an American actress. She first signed a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1941 and appeared mainly in small roles until she drew critics' attention in 1946 with her perform ...
*
Bob Gunton
Robert Patrick Gunton Jr. (born November 15, 1945) is an American character actor of stage and screen. He is known for playing strict authoritarian characters, including Warden Samuel Norton in the 1994 prison drama '' The Shawshank Redemption' ...
as
Tommy Dorsey
Thomas Francis Dorsey Jr. (November 19, 1905 – November 26, 1956) was an American jazz trombonist, composer, conductor and bandleader of the big band era. He was known as the "Sentimental Gentleman of Swing" because of his smooth-toned trombo ...
* David Raynr as
Sammy Davis Jr.
Samuel George Davis Jr. (December 8, 1925 – May 16, 1990) was an American singer, dancer, actor, comedian, film producer and television director.
At age three, Davis began his career in vaudeville with his father Sammy Davis Sr. and the ...
* Ralph Seymour as Budd
*
Jeff Corey
Jeff Corey (born Arthur Zwerling; August 10, 1914 – August 16, 2002) was an American stage and screen actor who became a well-respected acting teacher after being blacklisted in the 1950s.
Life and career
Corey attended New Utrecht High ...
as Quinlin
*
Danny Gans
Danny Davies Gans (October 25, 1956 – May 1, 2009) was an American singer, comedian and vocal impressionist.
Career
Gans was a performer on the Las Vegas Strip and the surrounding area, where he was billed as "The Man of Many Voices." He h ...
as
Dean Martin
Dean Martin (born Dino Paul Crocetti; June 7, 1917 – December 25, 1995) was an American singer, actor and comedian. One of the most popular and enduring American entertainers of the mid-20th century, Martin was nicknamed "The King of Cool". M ...
*
Vincent Guastaferro as
Hank Sanicola
*
James F. Kelly
James F. Kelly is an American actor best known for playing Robert F. Kennedy (whom Kelly closely resembles). Between the years 1981 and 1997 he played RFK in seven different productions.
He also portrayed John F. Kennedy in the 1992 television m ...
as
John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination ...
* Matthew Posey as
Harry James
Harry Haag James (March 15, 1916 – July 5, 1983) was an American musician who is best known as a trumpet-playing band leader who led a big band from 1939 to 1946. He broke up his band for a short period in 1947 but shortly after he reorganized ...
*
Rod Steiger
Rodney Stephen Steiger (; April 14, 1925July 9, 2002, aged 77) was an American actor, noted for his portrayal of offbeat, often volatile and crazed characters. Cited as "one of Hollywood's most charismatic and dynamic stars," he is closely assoc ...
as
Salvatore Giancana
Salvatore Mooney Giancana (; born Gilormo Giangana; ; May 24, 1908 – June 19, 1975) was an American mobster who was boss of the Chicago Outfit from 1957 to 1966.
Giancana was born in Chicago to Italian immigrant parents. He joined the 42 ...
*
Carol Barbee as
Marilyn Maxwell
Marvel Marilyn Maxwell (August 3, 1921 – March 20, 1972) was an American actress and entertainer. In a career that spanned the 1940s and 1950s, she appeared in several films and radio programs, and entertained the troops during World War ...
* David Byrd as
Michael Romanoff
Harry F. Gerguson (born Hershel Geguzin, February 20, 1890 – September 1, 1971), known as Michael Romanoff, was a Hollywood restaurateur, con man and actor born in Lithuania. He is perhaps best remembered as the owner of the now-defunct Romanof ...
*
Paul Collins as
Westbrook Pegler
Francis James Westbrook Pegler (August 2, 1894 – June 24, 1969) was an American journalist and writer. He was a popular columnist in the 1930s and 1940s famed for his opposition to the New Deal and labor unions. Pegler aimed his pen at president ...
* Maggie Egan as
Jo Stafford
Jo Elizabeth Stafford (November 12, 1917July 16, 2008) was an American traditional pop music singer, whose career spanned five decades from the late 1930s to the early 1980s. Admired for the purity of her voice, she originally underwent classi ...
*
Brian Markinson
Brian Markinson (born September 1, 1961) is an American-Canadian actor who has appeared in a wide variety of films and television shows. Some of Markinson's best known roles include a U.S. Attorney General in ''Shooter'', an unscrupulous industr ...
as
Sonny Werblin
David Abraham "Sonny" Werblin (March 17, 1910 – November 21, 1991) was a prominent entertainment industry executive and sports impresario who was an owner of the New York Jets and chairman of Madison Square Garden, and who built and managed the ...
* Tony Simotes as
Buddy Rich
Bernard "Buddy" Rich (September 30, 1917 – April 2, 1987) was an American jazz drummer, songwriter, conductor, and bandleader. He is considered one of the most influential drummers of all time.
Rich was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York ...
*
John Wesley as
Sy Oliver
Melvin James "Sy" Oliver (December 17, 1910 – May 28, 1988) was an American jazz arranger, trumpeter, composer, singer and bandleader.
Life
Sy Oliver was born in Battle Creek, Michigan, United States. His mother was a piano teacher, and his ...
* Marc Grady Adams as
Lee Mortimer
* Tony Gaetano as
Humphrey Bogart
* Leata Galloway as
Billie Holiday
Billie Holiday (born Eleanora Fagan; April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959) was an American jazz and swing music singer. Nicknamed "Lady Day" by her friend and music partner, Lester Young, Holiday had an innovative influence on jazz music and pop s ...
* David A. Kimball as
Benny Goodman
Benjamin David Goodman (May 30, 1909 – June 13, 1986) was an American clarinetist and bandleader known as the "King of Swing".
From 1936 until the mid-1940s, Goodman led one of the most popular swing big bands in the United States. His conce ...
*
Bruce Gray
Bruce Gray (September 7, 1936 – December 13, 2017) was a Canadian actor, known for multiple roles in films and television shows for over 5 decades.
Early Years
Gray was born in Puerto Rico and lived in Toronto after 1949. He graduated from ...
as
Fred Zinneman
Alfred ''Fred'' Zinnemann (April 29, 1907 – March 14, 1997) was an Austrian Empire-born American film director. He won four Academy Awards for directing and producing films in various genres, including thrillers, westerns, film noir and pla ...
* Shelly Lipkin as
Joey Bishop
Joseph Abraham Gottlieb (February 3, 1918 – October 17, 2007), known professionally as Joey Bishop, was an American entertainer who appeared on television as early as 1948 and eventually starred in his own weekly comedy series playing a talk ...
*
Jack Betts as
Earl Wilson
*
Rena Riffel
Rena Riffel (born March 5, 1969) is an American actress, singer, dancer, model, writer, producer, and director. She is known for her supporting roles in films such as '' Showgirls'', ''Striptease'', and '' Mulholland Drive''.
''Showgirls''
Rif ...
as
May Britt
* Brad Blaisdell as
Skitch Henderson
Lyle Russel "Skitch" Henderson (January 27, 1918 – November 1, 2005) was a pianist, conductor, and composer. His nickname "Skitch" came from his ability to "re-sketch" a song in a different key. Bing Crosby suggested that he should use the ...
* Chris Weatherhead as
Mercedes McCambridge
Carlotta Mercedes Agnes McCambridge (March 16, 1916 – March 2, 2004) was an American actress of radio, stage, film, and television. Orson Welles called her "the world's greatest living radio actress." She won an Academy Award for Best Support ...
* Patricia Supancic as
Nancy at 14
*
Beverley Mitchell
Beverley Ann Mitchell is an American actress and country music singer. She portrayed Lucy Camden on the television series '' 7th Heaven''.
Early life
After graduating from Chaminade College Preparatory School in 1999, Mitchell enrolled at Loy ...
as Nancy at 7-9
* Samantha Ward as Nancy at 3
* Cameron Phillip Williams as
Frank Jr. at 10
* Jameson Rodgers as Frank Jr. at 4-6
* Jenny Regli as Tina at 6
*
Floyd Levine
Floyd Levine (born February 23, 1932) is an American film and television actor. He played Dr. Ralph Harris in the 1978 film '' Bloodbrothers''. He also played Gen. Duncan in the 1988 film '' Braddock: Missing in Action III'' and Lt. Mellin in ...
as Director
Production
Filming
Filming was shot on location in
Hoboken
Hoboken ( ; Unami: ') is a city in Hudson County in the U.S. state of New Jersey. As of the 2020 U.S. census, the city's population was 60,417. The Census Bureau's Population Estimates Program calculated that the city's population was 58,690 ...
, New Jersey and at the
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the wor ...
Union Station
A union station (also known as a union terminal, a joint station in Europe, and a joint-use station in Japan) is a railway station at which the tracks and facilities are shared by two or more separate railway companies, allowing passengers to ...
in
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...
.
Awards
Reception
The series got a mostly positive reception but was accused of whitewashing the controversial aspects of Frank Sinatira's life.
References
External links
*
{{Golden Globe Award for Best Miniseries or Television Film 1971–1999
1992 television films
1992 films
1990s biographical drama films
American biographical drama films
1990s American drama television series
American television films
1990s American television miniseries
American biographical series
Best Miniseries or Television Movie Golden Globe winners
Emmy Award-winning programs
Primetime Emmy Award-winning television series
English-language television shows
Films about Frank Sinatra
Cultural depictions of John F. Kennedy
Cultural depictions of Marilyn Monroe
Cultural depictions of Humphrey Bogart
Cultural depictions of Sammy Davis Jr.
Cultural depictions of Billie Holiday
Cultural depictions of Sam Giancana
CBS original programming
Films directed by James Steven Sadwith
1990s English-language films
1990s American films