Sinatra Vegas Quotes

With a home out in the Springs he could leave his wife, their daughter Nancy (born 8 June 1940), son Frank Junior (10 January 1944) and Christina (10 June 1948) and take off for his Sunset Towers apartment in town and often the arms of actress Lana Turner or those of many other lovers. Marian Collier, who died in 2021, worked as a showgirl in Las Vegas before moving on to movies in Hollywood working with names like Marilyn Monroe. She was forthright about Sinatra’s need never to spend a night alone and told us: ‘For many years I rarely met another woman who hadn’t fucked Frank Sinatra. For most of us it wasn’t romantic, more of a tick on the to-do list. I certainly got on better with him after I slept with him but he could be a moody son of a bitch. Vindictive.’ And jealous. His antics brought attention and his friends didn’t like the spotlight; his future was cemented with the Mob; he’d laid his foundations.

Jimmy Fratianno did worry and rightly so, for he suffered for Sinatra’s behaviour being hassled by the Vegas cops – until he had a word that someone might get much more than hassled unless the aggravation against him ceased. The Mob thought Sinatra stupid for his behaviour. It was not the place or time. Nevertheless, in those fledging days at the Desert Inn, with seven different law agencies monitoring operations, Sinatra also spent even more time with Johnny Rosselli, who was the perfect mobster for Las Vegas. He could be anything anybody wanted him to be. He was attractive to women (by now lovers included Betty Hutton, Lana Turner and Donna ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ Reed) and Sinatra found him fun, good company and a generous all-around guy. He was a facilitator. He could arrange the murder of ‘Russian Louis’ Strauss who tried to blackmail his friend Benny Binion the owner of the Horseshoe Casino. He could get a girl a date with Frank Sinatra and vice versa. He met with Howard Hughes, who had a jealousy-inspired (Marilyn Monroe and Ava Gardner) lifetime hatred for Sinatra, and acted as Hughes’s go-between with Meyer Lansky and Moe Dalitz. They said George Raft was a great dancer, yet Johnny Rosselli could expertly waltz to anybody’s tune.

As were his Mafia connections. As he played the Desert Inn on the Vegas Strip his hoodlum pals were on display at the government hearings being held across America and in Los Angeles which had been his home since 1944. Organised crime had gone corporate, and the Mob’s national consigliere Sidney Korshak had established an influential network along with his closest friend Lew Wasserman, a Sinatra mentor and supporter and arguably the most powerful show-business tycoon – and major Presidential fixer – in America until his death in 2002. Their funny business was conducted in plush offices not street corners.

Brian Wecht was born in New Jersey to an interfaith couple. His father ran an army-navy store and enjoyed going to Vegas to see Elvis and Sinatra. Brian loved school, especially math and science, but also loved jazz saxophone and piano. “A large part of my identity came from being a fat kid who was bullied through most of my childhood,” he said. “I remember just not having many friends.” Brian double majored in math and music and chose graduate school in jazz composition. But when his girlfriend moved to San Diego, he quit and enrolled in a theoretical physics program at UC San Diego. Six months later the relationship failed; six years later he earned a PhD. When he solved a longstanding open problem in string theory (“the exact superconformal R-symmetry of any 4d SCFT”), Brian became an international star and earned fellowships at MIT, Harvard, and the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He secured an unimaginable job: a lifetime professorship in particle physics in London. He was set. Except. Brian never lost his interest in music. He met his wife while playing for an improv troupe. He started a comedic band with his friend Dan called Ninja Sex Party. “I was always afraid it was going to bite me in the ass during faculty interviews because I dressed up like a ninja and sang about dicks and boning.” By the time Brian got to London, the band’s videos were viral sensations. He cried on the phone with Dan: Should they try to turn their side gig into a living? Brian and his wife had a daughter by this point. The choice seemed absurd. “You can’t quit,” his physics adviser said. “You’re the only one of my students who got a job.” His wife was supportive but said she couldn’t decide for him. If I take the leap and it fails, he thought, I may be fucking up my entire future for this weird YouTube career. He also thought, If I don’t jump, I’ll look back when I’m seventy and say, “Fuck, I should have tried.” Finally, he decided: “I’d rather live with fear and failure than safety and regret.” Brian and his family moved to Los Angeles. When the band’s next album was released, Ninja Sex Party was featured on Conan, profiled in the Washington Post, and reached the top twenty-five on the Billboard charts. They went on a sold-out tour across the country, including the Brooklyn Bowl in Las Vegas.