Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams

Tosches is a hit or miss proposition, I believe, because the places he goes, the corners, the shadows, are too big, too crushing for even a great mind like his. At his worst, he is like the Dennis Hopper character in "Apocalypse Now," a professional who has gone too far up river, seen too much and been made a babbling fool. Other times, though, he is Kurz, speaking the darkest truths that leave the rational shuddering and praying to God in their beds at night. Liston, Jerry Lee Lewis, and, here, Dino. Black, black hearts all. In Tosches' world, virtue is a sucker's game, unless, as in "Hellfire" it is the Jekyll to sin's Hyde. Mobsters inhabit the "shadowlands" and do most of the getting across here, not glorified but certainly portrayed as the best players in all the various rackets. And don't kid yourself, existence is the big racket and everything else is a racket subset. For all we know, Tosches is right. I haven't seen this written anywhere, but I think "Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams" is the great Tosches manifesto on existence. His portrait of Dean Martin, enormously talented, driven to sing but never work too hard, the great interest in nothing, the inpenetrability, the lovelessness, the booze, the pills, the disconnect, could be considered sad, but that sadness would be a projection of the reader, not the author. Tosches tells Martin like it is. When Sinatra calls, why the hell should he pick up the phone? He doesn't need anybody. Nothing means anything. Dean finds himself in a fantastic scene, late in the game, on the set of a forgotten Western holding a toy gun. He had more money than anybody; what the hell was he doing there? And, indeed, what the hell is anybody doing anywhere? Love is a racket, fame is a racket, power and money, rackets. Marilyn Monroe, John Kennedy, Sinatra, all sorts of mobsters, they all drift through, banging this one, sucking up to that one, getting bumped off for talking about stuff from the "shadowlands." Jerry Lewis is "the monkey." Dean looks at all this, puffs the cigarette, drinks the drink, plays the golf, watches the Western, pops the chickie, checks out. For Martin, Tosches says it was a conscious disengagement: He just didn't want to do any more than he did, if that. But Dean Martin was extremely productive across his many decades. Still, he half-heartedly participated in his own life. Tosches says it's because Dean thought it, everything, was all just crap. You get the sense a lot of the time Tosches thinks the same thing, but instead of just checking out himself, he delves into the void. He finds the troubled subjects in the lights but still in the margins and teases the existential grist right out of them. This book is a helluva read and it's got laughs and it's got wonder and it's got stories and it's not afraid to quicken the blade through the garbage. But as much garbage as Dean produced, he was really good -- he could sing and act, he had incredible looks and charm, his comic

Many Dino want-a-be "experts" have told us over and over that Dino was "unknowable." To some extent that may be true, but Nick Tosches in depth bio of our man Dean is a treasure chest full of hip, cool, and randy info on Dino. Some fans of Dean's have whined about much of the language and content of this volume, but that's just because they don't want Dean to be Dean. I return to this stellar volume on Dino often to groove on Dino, the coolest dude to ever walk the face of this planet. "Dino" is indeed full of pure reading pleasure.

He was by all accounts a kind, gracious and modest man. Possessed of a free flowing natural off-the-wall sense of humor. These were the characteristics that drew people to him and at the same time kept them away, disappointed when they couldn't "reach" him. He learned at an early age the card sharks tricks. Play it close to the vest and don't telegraph anything. These early lessons served him well all his life, perhaps too well. Let it be said that no one has been able to crack the enigma that was Dean Martin. Not his wife of 20 years Jeanne, not the two siblings who have written of their lives with him, those who worked with him and not Nick Tosches. Tosches comes as close as anyone is likely too however. His try, though it has it's flaws is a noble effort. Tosches accurately portrays Martins rise throught the mob owned and influenced night life of the 40's and 50's. Some readers have misunderstood Tosches stream of consciousness writing style as unfairly portraying Dean as a somewhat foulmouthed uncaring persona. This is a mistake. What Tosches portrays is a man of the period. A time of postwar revelry, mob influence and a need to be street smart. Dean mastered it all. He was tough but not uncaring. The uncaring attitude was the armour he used to protect himself from the mob bosses and those who would manipulate him. He not only refused to kowtow to them, he won them over with his toughness and yes, his integrity. They complained as did his supposedly best buddy Frank Sinatra, that they couldn't control him, he did as he pleased. It did cost him. He was unable to communicate well his true feelings and held it all inside. He suffered ulcers, headaches and when his son Dean Paul died piloting a National Guard jet in 1986, it all came home to roost. He was devasted beyond comprehension. He had been on a comeback of sorts during the early 80's. Kicking his dependence on prescription drugs, making peace with Jeanne and successful performances in London and Paris with more frequent TV appearances had him on an upswing by 1985. It came to a peremptory halt with his sons passing. He went through the motions for 5 more years but it was only because those concerned about him, Mort Viner his manager and confidant, Sinatra and family members pushed him. He finally said enough in 1991 and retired gracefully. His health deteriorating, he lived quietly alone with visits from Jeanne and the family and weeknight forays to his favorite 2 or 3 reataurants. He appeared content. Jeanne said he was, "...always content in a void, he's content right now...". Of all the "Rat Pack" stars, the TV stars of the 60's and 70's, he remains the most interesting, in demand and emulated. He alone seems to reach new adults who were toddlers when he left the stage. His records still sell and his TV variety performances are selling well on CD. He is doing in memorium what he always did in life; wearing well and and doing it his own way.

In the world of show business, Dean Martin remains a fascinating enigma. Nick Tosches certainly knew this when writing "Dino," a perceptive and revealing 1992 biography that depicts the singer-actor as a man who gave a damn about very little - letting the riches fall where they may. It's all here: the Martin and Lewis partnership, the Rat Pack, the Mafia, the Kennedys, etc. However, "Dino" is more than a traditional show-biz biography. Tosches writes with the wisdom of a scholar and a poet. The author documents Martin's rise to stardom and inevitable breakup with Jerry Lewis, his remarkable solo success in the 1960s, and his emotional reclusiveness - which became more pronounced after his son was killed in a 1987 jet crash. Though published three years before Martin's death at age 78, Tosches concludes his book with the telling image of Dino in retirement as he watches old Westerns on television. Even in his final years, Martin did exactly what he wanted with no apologies or regrets.

Dean Martin was perhaps the ultimate Nick Tosches subject, a man whose private self in death as in life defies penetration. The author thrives on the ultimate unknowability of his subjects, which is why readers in search of straight stories, verdicts of good or bad, a beginning middle and end wrapping up a life or an era in an easily digestible package will retreat from his writing unsatisfied. Tosches is first and foremost a stylist, to my mind a great one, and "Dino" is perhaps, along with his Sidney Korshak piece for Vanity Fair, his most beautifully told work yet. There is a lot of fascinating detail, particularly about his Steubenville upbringing, his relationship with Lewis and their astonishing success and earnings. As for the inner Dean, I learned about as much as I had hoped for, which wasn't a lot - after all, Pallie, what did you expect?