Yes I Can: The Story of Sammy Davis, Jr. (45 page)

Jule nodded approval. “There’s a very bright fellow who works with me, his name is George Gilbert. He’ll be my co-producer. You’ll like him, he’s young too, but he’s very astute, he has great taste, he’s creative and clever.”

“Crazy. Jule, what about my father and Will Mastin? Do you think there’ll be anything in it for them?”

“No. Not a chance. When you first come to Broadway you have to overcome the image of a nightclub guy—not that it isn’t great, I’m not putting it down—but when you walk onto a stage in a show, you want the audience to be able to accept you as the character you’ll be playing. I know you’ll be great and within five minutes we’ll have no problems, but anything that would remind them of you as a nightclub performer would be disastrous to the illusion of the show. If you came in with your father and your uncle … oh God, I can see Walter Kerr now: ‘Sammy Davis, Jr. arrived on Broadway with everything except the scotch-and-soda and cigar smoke.’ It would be terrible. He’d kill us with things like, ‘A funny thing happened to me on the way to the theater last night. I wound up at the Copacabana.’ Do you see what I mean?”

“Well … I guess so.”

“Fine. I’m doing a musical for Judy Holliday so I have to leave for New York on Tuesday. As soon as I get there I’ll sign the writers and get things in motion.”

Will strode up and down the living room. “Sammy, who’s the manager of this Trio?”

“Oh come on, Massey, don’t play games with me. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Only that the Morris office called me about some story in
The New York Times
that you’re planning to go on Broadway, that’s all. And I didn’t enjoy sounding like a fool telling ‘em I don’t know anything about it.”

“Massey, I’m sorry. I really am. I didn’t mention it to you because I didn’t know if it was just talk or not. I’m sorry that it was in the papers before you knew about it, but that wasn’t my fault.”

“You telling me it’s true?”

“Well, yes, now that I see he’s serious. Massey, will you please stop shaking your head until I explain it?” He sat down and folded his arms. “Now try to forget that I’m the kid you brought up and used to bathe in the sink. I’m Sammy Davis, Jr., I’m twenty-nine years old and after all these years I’ve got to know
something
about this business. Now it’s wonderful that we’re a hit in clubs and that we’re making big money ‘cause nobody needs it more than I do. But we need dimension, prestige, and there’s
nothing
that can give us that prestige like a Broadway musical….”

“Prestige is how much money you’ve got in the bank.”

“Fine. But I’m talking about something that’ll only be better for us in the long run.”

“This
is
the long run. We’ve gotta make it now while we can.”

“That’s true. But, statistically an act has a three-year life expectancy, and if we let ourselves stay in the category of ‘nightclub guys’ the heat
will
come out of us, but being on Broadway would not only help us build to even bigger than we are now but it would keep us there.”

He was shaking his head again. “Variety is variety, and acting is acting, and I don’t see why you think you can act all of a sudden.”

“When I stand on a stage and I sound like Cagney and Brando, I’m not doing it with mirrors. Massey, I’m not saying there isn’t a whole world of acting I don’t begin to know anything about—but I learned to dance by dancing, I learned to sing by singing, and I’ll learn to act by acting.”

He stood up. “Sammy, you can talk ‘til tomorrow and I’ll listen if you want but I’m dead against it. It’ll break up the act.”

We both stiffened at the sound of the words. His mouth moved soundlessly, as though he were trying to recapture them, but they had been said and their meaning hung revealingly, irrevocably, in the air. He sat down, letting his body sink into the chair, accepting at least the relief which accompanied the pain of an admission he hadn’t intended to make, probably even to himself.

All the illogical statements from a logical man, his inability to see the obvious, his refusal to help me get into pictures and dramatic television—everything was explained. How could any argument make sense to a man who had to interpret it as “Let’s start changing everything you waited all these years to have, because I want more.” It wasn’t as simple as “Take a year off, we’ll still split the money, relax, enjoy a vacation.” No matter how beautifully it was painted, to Will it would mean the beginning of the end.

I turned around. “Massey?” He brought his head up, facing me, his eyes coming up last. “Massey, why should it have to break up the act? I’m going to play a performer. The script isn’t written yet. Why can’t he have a father and an uncle?”

His face began brightening. “Well … it
would
be kinda nice to be in the legit.” He smiled. “You think I’m too old to go to acting school? Of course a thing like this presents a lot of problems.”

“Sure it does but we can beat them. Look, Jule’s still in town. Supposing I get him over here tomorrow? We can sit down and talk
it over. Nothing has to be decided. It’ll be strictly a preliminary talk.”

Twenty minutes later Jule was in my room. “What’s wrong?”

“No problems. It’s just that I was sitting here thinking about the character we discussed, and he’s great. To tell you the truth I’m really thrilled with the whole thing.”

Jule beamed. “I’m very excited about it myself.”

“And, what I was thinking is … it would be sensational, I mean it would be a great natural tie-in, I mean as far as identification goes and all that jazz … well, if we wanted to make the kid really come to life it occurred to me he should have a father and an uncle.”

Jule soared out of his chair. “That’s the
worst
idea I ever heard! It’s terrible. Out of the question. Forget it—”

“Jule, cool it. We’re in trouble.”

He was pacing the floor. “It’d be hokey and horrible. Impossible. We discussed it, I explained why it would be no good, I thought we agreed …” He stopped walking and looked at me. “What do you mean we’re in trouble?”

“Baby, you agreed and I agreed, but
they
didn’t. Now it happens that I’ve got a contract with The Will Mastin Trio and if they ain’t in the show, then legally I ain’t in the show. But even more important, I can’t walk out on my father and uncle just because I want to do a play.” He groaned and sat down. “I’m sorry to lay it on you like this but in all the excitement I just didn’t think it out.”

“There’s no way out?”

“None.”

He sat on the couch, holding his head. “Well, we’ll just have to work it out then, that’s all.” He stood up. “I’ll have the writers send up a father and an uncle.”

“Now you’re talking.”

“As a matter of fact maybe it’s not such a bad idea after all.” He did a little walking, hands behind his back, nodding, thinking, nodding, until he was almost excited. “The more I think about it the better I like it.” He looked at me. “It’s great.” I watched him, amused that he, like me, was turning it, accepting the inevitable, then urging himself to enthusiasm so that he could live with it.

I sat back in a corner of the room and watched the action. Will asked, “Mr. Styne, assuming we can work things out so we can do this show, how’s the billing going to be?”

“Don’t worry about a thing, Mr. Mastin. Sammy’s name’ll be over the title of the show.”

Will smiled. “The name of this act is The Will Mastin Trio, featuring Sammy Davis, Jr.’ Then comes the name of the show.”

Jule leaped out of his chair for about the third time in half an hour. “It’s impossible. Out of the question. There isn’t enough room on the marquee …”

Will gave Jule a half-yawn and the sweetest smile in his repertoire. “Then either you get a bigger marquee or have a smaller cast.”

Jule collected himself and tried another approach. “Mr. Mastin, you must understand that the more space we can give Sammy’s name on the signs and in the ads, the better chance we have to sell tickets. If we were to do it the way you suggest …”

“I’m not suggesting. I’m stating it plain.”

“But, then in order to make Sammy’s name big enough we’d have to make everything else bigger in proportion and we wouldn’t have enough room left for the name of the show.”

“That’ll be okay ‘cause there won’t be no show to have a name for.”

I stepped between them. “Look, guys, it’s not important. All that really counts is that we’re doing the show, we’ll be on Broadway—personally, I don’t care where my name is.”

Jule was out of his chair again. “Well
I
do! It’s Sammy Davis, Jr. that’ll sell tickets.” He seemed suddenly to remember that Will was there. “I’m sorry, Mr. Mastin. I apologize. But I’m sure you’ll agree that it’s Sammy’s name that’s widely known from the records and the accident.”

“Mr. Styne, I think you should come by the New Frontier tonight around seven-thirty and look at the line of people waiting to get tables to see ‘The Will Mastin Trio Featuring Sammy Davis, Jr.’ Incidentally, how much do you figure we can make out of this show?”

Jule leaned back in his chair, smiling with renewed confidence. “We’ll work out a minimum weekly guarantee against 10 per cent of the gross.”

“How much do you figure this show can gross?”

“Well, we’ll get the biggest musical house available, which means we can plan on about $60,000 a week.” He beamed at us both, pleased.

Will nodded. “I see. In other words if we have a hit show that sells out every night then our cut is six thousand a week?”

“That’s right.”

I got very busy retying my shoelace.

“Mr. Styne, we can make that in any dinky little club.”

“But Mr. Mastin, I’m giving you the best deal possible. The Morris office’ll tell you that. You’ll be getting the same kind of a contract as Ethel Merman or Mary Martin.”

“Can they make $25,000 a week here, and average $15,000 a week in clubs across the country fifty-two weeks a year?”

Jule Styne against Will Mastin was like sending in a tiger to fight a sphinx. And as every minute passed the sphinx was getting less choked up about being on Broadway. I moved between them again. “Massey, I know we can’t make much actual money out of it …”

“Hold on, Sammy,” he smiled sagely, “the way you call it ‘actual money’ you make it sound like there’s two kinds.”

“Massey, haven’t we been through all this? We can’t just keep playing nightclubs forever. We’re past that now.”

“You mean we’re too big to make money any more?”

“I mean we need the respect and recognition we can get only from a legit show. Being in legit is—oh, come on, Massey, you know what it is. You wanted it all your life, didn’t you?”

“But I never figured on leaving $25,000 a week in clubs to try for it.”

Jule stood up. “Perhaps you’d prefer to discuss it by yourselves.”

Will said, “I’m not saying we shouldn’t do the show, Mr. Styne, but I think we’ve got to look into it some more. I’ll talk it over with the Morris office when we get to L.A. I’m glad to have met you and I’m glad we had this preliminary conversation.”

Jule looked at him with the kind of respect the challenger has as he pulls himself up off the floor and looks at the champ, and tried valiantly for a smile.

“Sammy, are you willing to pay half a million dollars in order to do a Broadway show?” The man behind the desk at the Morris office said, “The difference between what you can make in a play and in clubs comes to exactly $518,000 in one year.”

“How do you arrive at that?”

He picked up a sheet of paper. “Assuming you sell out on Broadway for every single performance, the most you can earn is $6,000 a
week. That’s $312,000 in twelve months. Thus, you are trading a
sure
$830,000 in firm nightclub contracts for a possible $312,000. At best, you sacrifice half a million dollars.” He dropped the paper on his desk. “You can see that it’s out of the question.”

Will spoke gently. “Sammy, they’ve looked into it carefully but it’s like I was afraid of.”

The Morris guy said, “It’s a monstrous financial loss. You can’t possibly afford it.”

“Forgetting the money for a minute, do you agree that it’s important for us in terms of career?”

“No question about it. If the play is successful it will give you substantial longevity elsewhere.”

“Then the fact is that at this stage of our careers, the prestige of a hit show could be considered more important than immediate money.” I turned to Will. “How about if we compromise? Supposing we limit our run to one year?”

He answered quietly. “Can’t you see that the prestige we’d get isn’t worth what we’d have to pay for it?”

“Massey, I’m not looking for prestige just to have prestige. I want to invest one year to grow, to build something.”

“That’s fine. But you can’t afford to spend $500,000 to do it.”

The Morris guy nodded. “He’s right. You can’t forget that you’re over $100,000 in debt, and you have to keep earning big money if you’re ever going to get out of the hole.”

“Okay, that’s
my
problem. But what about you, Massey? You don’t think you could live on a third of $300,000? I mean, do you live that good that you can’t swing it on a hundred thousand a year?”

“Let’s forget about me. Let’s figure how you’re going to get free and clear of what you owe. It can’t happen from being on Broadway. Now, I’m manager of this act, I’ve always decided what’s best for us and I’m deciding on this, too. I’m sorry to say it, but it’s out. I won’t go along with it.”

“That’s it, huh?”

“That’s it.”

“In other words, I’m the junior partner, right? My ideas, my opinions, maybe what I want—that means nothing?”

“When you’re wrong you’re wrong and you oughta be glad I’m here looking after your interests.”

“You’re not willing to lose a little money this year to make sure
we’ll be making it five years from now? You won’t gamble that this’ll pay off in the long run?”

“I don’t gamble. I put my money on sure things and it’s a sure thing that we’ve got over $800,000 coming to us in clubs this year.”

I stood up. “Well, then I guess there’s nothing more to discuss. I guess it was just another of my silly ideas. You’re the boss, Massey, but you’ll excuse me if I don’t hang around here. You don’t need me to help make your decisions where I ought to play, so good day, gentlemen.”