Kevin Spacey on Becoming Bobby Darin

DATE December 24, 2004 ACCOUNT NUMBER N/A
TIME 12:00 Noon-1:00 PM AUDIENCE N/A
NETWORK NPR
PROGRAM Fresh Air

Interview: Kevin Spacey talks about his new movie "Beyond the Sea"
DAVE DAVIES, host:

This is FRESH AIR. I'm Dave Davies, senior writer for the Philadelphia Daily
News sitting in for Terry Gross.

With the release of Kevin Spacey's new movie about Bobby Darin, plus a new CD
and DVD featuring some Darin rarities, this is a good time to listen to
Darin's music. He was one of the most sophisticated and jazz-inspired pop
stars of the 1960s. His hits included "Dream Lover," "Mack the Knife,"
"Beyond the Sea" and "If I Were a Carpenter." A little later we'll hear an
interview with the late Nick Venet, who was Darin's friend and producer.

First, Kevin Spacey talks about his new movie "Beyond the Sea." A movie about
Darin's life had been in the works for years. Spacey auditioned for the role
of Darin in 1999 when he was 40, but was told he was too old for the part. He
was already three years older than Darin was when he died of heart failure in
1973. Spacey wanted to portray Darin so badly that he ended up buying the
film rights to his story, then producing, directing, and starring in the film.
He even did the singing himself. Here's his version of one of Darin's biggest
hits.

(Soundbite of "Beyond the Sea")

Mr. KEVIN SPACEY: (Singing) Somewhere, beyond the sea, somewhere waiting for
me. My lover stands on golden sands and watches the ships that go sailing.
Somewhere beyond the sea, she's there watching for me. If I could fly like
birds on high, then straight to her arms I'd go sailing.

DAVIES: Kevin Spacey from the soundtrack of "Beyond the Sea." He's performing
Darin tunes in a series of nightclub performances leading up to the opening of
the film. Shortly before the start of the tour, he spoke with Terry. He told
her that to prepare for the role, he worked with music producer Phil Ramone,
studying Darin's TV shows and records in an attempt to replicate his voice and
movements.

Mr. SPACEY: Now at a certain point, I stopped all that because I really
didn't want to feel saddled by doing a out-and-out imitation of him. But I
had to have his energy and his style and his attack and the rest of it had to
come from me or both Ramone and Kellaway and myself felt that it probably
would end up being hollow. So, you know, Ramone talks about a moment in the
process, and I don't know when this was, where he says, `You stopped trying to
do an imitation of Bobby Darin,' and that I started to use my own instincts as
a performer and yet I had, you know, accumulated so much of Bobby. I'd
watched so much of him that it was almost under my skin and so it was a
version of Bobby.

And I want to make it very clear to anyone who goes and sees the film or gets
the album, you know, to misquote Senator Benson, `I'm no Bobby Darin.' The
truth is, is that this was a remarkable artist for whom nobody gets that
close, you know, we've tried to honor him. We've tried to do the best job
that we could, but if people haven't had a chance to see Bobby Darin, I
encourage them to go out and get his work.

TERRY GROSS, host:

And what was your introduction to his music?

Mr. SPACEY: My mother. My mother was absolutely crazy about Bobby Darin and
I grew up in a house where his records were playing all the time. Sinatra,
Ella Fitzgerald, the great Big Bands, so I just grew up with that kind of
brassy sound and so by the time I was in my teen-age years, I thought he was
the greatest thing that, you know, every walked the face of the Earth.

GROSS: What are some of the things you learned about your voice by talking to
everybody who'd worked with Darin, who is still around, and by studying him
and then, you know, recording his songs for your movie?

Mr. SPACEY: Well, a lot of it, you know, when you go into a studio like
Abbey Road and you got--we had 12 days to lay down all the tracks that we did
and there's a lot of tracks that we laid down that didn't end up in the film
or on the album, so there could be a follow-up. I think it--an enormous
amount of it is the energy and the breath control that it takes to get through
some of these numbers and a lot of it's pitch, you know, you--sometimes you
hear it in your own head in a slightly different way than it comes out. And I
learned a great deal from Phil Ramone about what he used to like to call,
`getting in the pocket of the music and getting in the pocket with the band.'

You know, we recorded all these live with the band. I didn't do my vocals
later, we did them together. You know, I felt I was tested. It's very tough
to go through 12 days where you're--you know, doing two sessions a day and
you're laying down three or four songs or, in some cases, five songs a
session. That's a lot of singing to do every single day and, you know,
although the tour is going to test me as well, I at least don't have a lot of
multiple nights. I'm going to get some down time because I've never done it
and I think that's one of the things you always have to think about, is when
do you sing this song? When do you throw in a ballad? When do you give
yourself a little, you know, talk to rest your voice? This is what singers,
who do this for a living are always concentrating and focusing on.

And I think, the other big thing that I learned was, if you don't hear
yourself back, if you don't have a good enough sound system, good enough
wedges, an ability to hear how you sound with that band, you can go off-key
and off pitch very easily. It's sort of a remarkable thing, both for actors
and singers, is this sense of being able to actually hear yourself so you know
how much energy you have to give.

GROSS: I want to play a song that you sing on the soundtrack and in the movie
this happens, this is sung towards the very end of the film. It's called,
"The Curtain Falls," and it's a song that I think, even a lot of Bobby Darin
fans wouldn't know. His recording of it is featured on a new CD/DVD which is
called, "Aces Back to Back." Tell me how you became familiar with this song
and about learning how to sing it? I think you do it well.

Mr. SPACEY: Well thank you. It's a song that Bobby recorded actually on a
live album at the Flamingo and I think it was taped in 1962 and it was written
specially for Bobby, the lyrics were changed. It used to be an old--perhaps a
Bob Dehope(ph) number, which is what I refer to it as in the film. And Bobby
was leaving nightclubs for awhile, you know, he and Sandy had a baby, and I
think he was going to take time off from going on the road as much as he was
during that period. And it was his, sort of, swan song to nightclubs after
having lived in them for many, many years. And I just think it's a great--one
of the great show business songs and it also just speaks enormously of Bobby
personally.

GROSS: OK. So this is Kevin Spacey from the soundtrack of "Beyond the Sea,"
Kevin Spacey's new movie about Bobby Darin.

(Soundbite from "Beyond the Sea")

Mr. SPACEY: (Singing) Off comes the makeup, off comes the clowns in
disguise, the curtain's falling, the music softly dies. But I hope you're
smiling, as you're filing out the door. As they say in this business, that's
all there is, there isn't anymore. We've shared the moment...

GROSS: That's Bobby--that's Kevin Spacey.

Mr. SPACEY: See, that's exactly what I like, you know?

GROSS: Yeah. That's Kevin Spacey from his soundtrack of his new movie
"Beyond the Sea," in which he stars as Bobby Darin. And Spacey not only stars
in it, he co-wrote, directed it and co-produced it as well. OK. So here's
one of the ironies, you tried to get the part starring as Bobby Darin back in
the late '80s. You don't get the part, you're not well-known then and by the
time you buy the rights and actually make the movie, you're older than Bobby
Darin was when he died. And...

Mr. SPACEY: Yeah?

GROSS: ...and this is a movie that spans his life. I mean, obviously you'd
never be playing the child Bobby Darin but, you know, you do look old for the
young Bobby Darin who's starting his career. So, you want to talk about how
you get around that in the movie?

Mr. SPACEY: Well, I was never setting out to tell a linear bio-pic and I
always knew that and I always thought that the issue of age was a minor one.
But I began to read commentaries...

GROSS: Why would you think it was a minor one? For a lot of people it would
be a major one?

Mr. SPACEY: Because I wasn't--because I'm warping time in this film.

GROSS: Mm-hmm.

Mr. SPACEY: Because I'm not trying to play Bobby Darin when he was 17 years
old and because ultimately, you know, the movie is a fantasy, it's not a
straight bio-pic. And I felt like that if I could address the issue, as I do
in the beginning of the film, you know, maybe all those people that have, you
know, hung their hat on that particular piece of criticism would relax because
they'd realize that I know it too. But we're going to break all the rules.
And maybe it's brash but that's what Bobby Darin was.

GROSS: So the way you get around it--the framing devices that Bobby Darin is
making a movie about his life and people are saying, `Bobby, you're too old to
play yourself.' And...

Mr. SPACEY: Well, I wrote a scene with a reporter, actually saying that...

GROSS: ...Mm-hmm.

Mr. SPACEY: ...you know, he's too old to play this part. Because sometimes
the best way to, you know, sort of knock something out is to just identify the
elephant in the room and I'm pleased that that seems to be what's happening.

GROSS: So once you bought the rights to the movie, you started meeting with
the people who knew Bobby Darin well, including his son Dodd Darin, who
probably didn't know Bobby Darin as well as he would have liked and part
because Darin, you know, died at the age of 37. What are some of the most
interesting things that you learned that you didn't already know about--by
talking to people who knew him well?

Mr. SPACEY: I think I have probably come away with an admiration for how
determined Bobby was to give the best performance that he could give on any
given night, no matter how sick he was. Bobby contracted rheumatic fever when
he was eight and it ravaged him until he was 12 and he really wasn't supposed
to live past the age of 15, but he had a remarkable family around him who
supported him, who nurtured him and took care of him. And I think his will to
live was stronger than the disease for, you know, 37 years.

GROSS: There are scenes in the movie where you're performing but offstage
there is oxygen waiting for you...

Mr. SPACEY: Well, and that's absolutely accurate.

GROSS: ...because of the heart trouble. Yeah.

Mr. SPACEY: Yeah. That's absolutely accurate to what Bobby's experience
was. I mean, when I would--you know, I'll look at performances of Bobby, for
example his last television special and, you know, watch it, it's just
incredible, you wouldn't know the guy had a hangnail. And then you hear the
stories of what was actually happening that day where he was lying backstage
for an hour and a half trying to get his energy back, taking oxygen. You see
him in performances shaking his hands and you think, `Oh he's just doing a
kind of rhythm thing,' but in fact, he was trying to get the blood flowing
into his arms.

That continually stuns me that he pushed himself to such a degree, where he
probably could have had an easier life knowing what he was facing but he chose
to walk on the edge and obviously he felt that that's where life really was.

GROSS: Bobby Darin sometimes did impressions and...

Mr. SPACEY: Yes, he did.

GROSS: ...and you're very good at that yourself. So, is that something that
you particularly like about him? And...

Mr. SPACEY: Well, I'm going to do a little bit of that on the road. He did
really great impressions and, in fact, he did impressions nobody else did. He
did Jimmy Stewart and Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin and Cagney, a whole bunch of
the greats. But he did Robert Mitchum's face and it's one of the funniest
things you've ever seen because he literally becomes Robert Mitchum. But he
can't do Robert Mitchum's voice, so it's the funniest impression because he
just looks like him. He gets applause and then he says, `Well, Robert doesn't
have too much to say.' He couldn't do the impression. He did great voices.
You know, there's a terrific--I just spent a couple of weeks with Steve Brown
and putting together for the Museum of Television and Radio, 75 minutes of our
favorite moments of Bobby Darin on television and there's a tremendous number
of skits that he did with, you know, Bob Hope, Jimmy Durante, he actually
imitates Jimmy Durante with Jimmy Durante, it's an absolutely hysterical
piece. And people, by the way, can go and see this because the Museum of
Television and Radio in New York and Los Angeles are running this for the next
couple of months.

And I just--looking at it and I just remarked, you know, it's like, I hadn't
watched it in awhile and I just forgot how funny he was, he had incredible
timing. And he was one of those kids who could pick up voices very quickly
and I just happened to be the same. I grew up kind of making funny voices and
loving to imitate people and now, of course, I love being able to do it when I
work with people and, you know, you sort of try and get them down when you're
working with them.

GROSS: So when you're--going to be on stage in your club act, doing
impressions, will you be doing your impressions of Jimmy Durante or whoever,
or will you be doing your impression of Bobby Darin doing an impression of...

Mr. SPACEY: I'll be doing impressions...

GROSS: ...Jimmy Durante?

Mr. SPACEY: ...as a way to talk about the way Bobby did impressions and I'll
do a few of the ones that he did but I'll do more of the ones that I do
because I can't do Bobby's act. I have to do my own. So, but it has the same
sort of, flavor and I'm actually going to do a number that Bobby used to do
and he did a lot of impressions in this number. So, I'm sort of updating it
and adapting it for now.

GROSS: What song is that?

Mr. SPACEY: It's "One for the Road."

GROSS: Gee, I wouldn't think of a ballad like that as being a place...

Mr. SPACEY: It's hysterical.

GROSS: ...for impressions.

Mr. SPACEY: It really is a very, very funny piece.

GROSS: Who are you going to do in it?

Mr. SPACEY: I'll do a lot of people in it, you know, I'll do some of his,
you know, Jimmy Stewart and Jerry Lewis. But I'll throw in a Walken and, you
know, a Carson...

GROSS: Oh, that's great.

Mr. SPACEY: ...and just have a good time with it.

GROSS: That's great. Well, I want to thank you so much for talking with us.

Mr. SPACEY: I'm delighted to be here. Thank you so much.

DAVIES: Kevin Spacey speaking to Terry Gross. He plays Bobby Darin in the
new film, "Beyond the Sea," which hits theaters around the country next week.
More about Bobby Darin after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite or music)

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Interview: Nick Venet talks about his relationship with Bobby Darin
DAVE DAVIES, host:

Today we're celebrating the music of Bobby Darin. The new film about Darin,
"Beyond the Sea," opens next week. And the new CD and DVD collection of rare
performances called "Aces Back to Back" has just been released. Nick Venet
was one of Darin's closest friends and musical collaborators. They met as
teen-agers when they were first trying to make it in the music business.
Venet produced many of Darin's records.

The list of other performers, Venet discovered or produced, includes, he Beach
Boys, Linda Ronstadt, Gene Vincent, Glen Campbell and Sam Cooke. Venet died
in 1998. Two years earlier, Terry spoke with him after Venet had co-produced
a Bobby Darin boxed set. They started with Darin's first big hit "Splish
Splash," recorded in 1958.

(Soundbite from "Splish Splash")

Mr. BOBBY DARIN: (Singing) Splish splash I was taking a bath, long about a
Saturday night. Rub-dub just relaxin' in the tub, thinkin' everything was all
right. Well, I stepped out of the tub, put my feet on the floor, I wrapped a
towel around me and I opened the door and then a--splish splash I jumped back
in the bath. Well, how was I to know there was a party going on. I was
a-splishing and a-splashing, reeling with...

TERRY GROSS, host:

Nick Venet, welcome to FRESH AIR.

Mr. NICK VENET (Record Producer): Well, thank you.

GROSS: Do you know the story behind why and how Bobby Darin recorded this
song?

Mr. VENET: Well, Bobby wanted to be a crooner. He wanted to be a
pop-singer, but he knew he had to do certain things to get on the charts and
sell records and this was his way of taking a shot at it to at least get some
fame going. So he could move into where he eventually made it. And this has
worked out. He knew what he was doing when he made this record.

GROSS: You know, it's--I'd be lying if I said it's a favorite of mine. I
think his rhythm in it is really great but it's really a dumb song and I was
thinking--when I was listening back to it, who forced this song on him when I
realized he wrote it.

Mr. VENET: He wrote it. He was inspired by a title that a disc-jockey's
mother gave him and he always said he wrote the song in 10 minutes but he was
saying that because the song shouldn't have taken more than 10 minutes. He
worked very hard on this song. He just put everything in it he thought would
make it a hit.

GROSS: How did you meet Bobby Darin?

Mr. VENET: We were both in our teens, I guess, and we were working at the
Brill Building in New York. The Brill Building was the music mecca of pop
music, I guess at that time. And it was centrally located and we met a lot of
people like Burt Bacharach had an office there. Louie Bringstola(ph) had an
office there.

Darin and I rented a broom closet and converted it into an office. And we
just wanted a place to put our names on the door. And he wrote songs and I
tried to put records together. The word producer was not being used at that
time. And, we actually met in the elevator at the Brill Building--several
times and we ate at the same restaurant around the corner and we just became
friends, a group of us really. And we started hanging out using the broom
closet as a place to meet and we kept a piano in there and a place to write
and play demos.

GROSS: Now I want to play the demo of another early hit that he had, "Dream
Lover," and--wow, this demo's great. His singing on it is so good and it's
much more stripped down. It's very stripped down, so it's different from the
very produced hit recording of this song. Now, tell me the story behind this
demo.

Mr. VENET: Well, he felt that if the song didn't make it with people, if
they really didn't get the message with just him and the guitar--by the way,
the guitarist is Fred Neil. At that time, Fred had written a song called
"Candy Man" for Roy Orbison, and he also wrote "Everybody's Talking" for the
Schlesinger film "Midnight Cowboy." He wanted to try something which wasn't
being done at that time. Everything was very--in that period of time
everything was cute and pretty, and he wanted to do something that was not
cute, not pretty but worked on another level. And he tried it with just the
guitar to see how it would affect people, and it affected everyone and he knew
he had a song that would possible transcend a certain amount of time. And he
made the demo at the session with just Fred playing the guitar. Then later
on, everybody asked him to add more, add more, and he did, and he went on, and
of course, it was a hit. Either version will make it for me, too, but that
version's real special because it's just Bobby and the guitar, and he sings it
as well as he sang anything else.

(Soundbite of "Dream Lover")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) Every night I hope and pray, a dream lover will come my
way. A girl to hold in my arms and know the magic of her charms, because I
need a girl to call my own. I want a dream lover so I don't have to dream
alone.

DAVIES: Bobby Darin, recorded in 1959.

You're listening to Terry's 1996 conversation with the late Nick Venet. We'll
hear more about Darin in the second half of the show. I'm Dave Davies, and
this is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of "Dream Lover")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) ...and feel you near as I grow old, because I need a a
girl to call my own. I want a dream lover so I don't have to dream alone.
Some day, I don't know how...

(Credits)

DAVIES: Coming up, we continue Terry's conversation with Bobby Darin's close
friend and produce Nick Venet. A new movie about Bobby Darin starring Kevin
Spacey premiers next week.

Here's Spacey from the soundtrack.

(Soundbite of "Beyond the Sea")

Mr. SPACEY: (Singing) Hello young lovers whoever you are. I hope your
troubles are few. All my good wishes go with you tonight. I've been in love
like you. You be brave young lovers and follow your star. Brave and faithful
and true and cling very close to each other tonight. I've been in love like
you. And I know how it feels to have wings on your heels and to fly down the
streets in a trance. You fly down that street on the chance that you'll meet
and you meet not by chance. Don't cry young overs whatever you do. Say don't
cry because I'm alone. All my good wishes go with you tonight. I've had a
love of my own. And I know how it feels to have wings on your heels and you
fly down the street in a trance. You winged down that street on a chance that
you'll meet and you meet not by chance. Don't cry young lovers whatever you
do. Say don't cry because I'm alone. All of my memories...

DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. I'm Dave Davies in for Terry Gross.

Today we're listening to the music of Bobby Darin. The film about Darin,
"Beyond the Sea," hits theaters around the country next week and "Aces Back to
Back," a CD and DVD collection of rare performances, has just been released.
Here's a track from the CD, of Darin performing the song "Moon River."

(Soundbite of song "Moon River")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) Moon River, wider than a mile, you know I'm crossing
you in style some day. You dream maker, you heart breaker, wherever you're
going, I'm going your way. Two drifters off to see the world. There is such
a lot of world to see. We're after the same rainbow's end, waiting 'round the
bend, my Huckleberry friend...

DAVIES: Let's get back to Terry's 1996 interview with Bobby Darin's friend
and producer Nick Venet. They met as teen-agers and remained close friends
until Darin's death in 1973 at the age of 37. Venet died of cancer in 1998 at
the age of 61. When we left off, Venet was talking about the years they
worked in the Brill Building in New York City, trying to make it in the music
business. Terry asked Venet what aspirations Bobby Darin had for his career.

Mr. VENET: Darin always wanted to be nothing other than a songwriter and
sometimes performer, and songwriting was his main goal at that time. I think
that's because being a star or a hit artist probably was too much of a
fantasy. Sometimes you have a dream that's too heavy to carry, but being a
songwriter was more realistic and he wanted to be a songwriter, and that was
very important to him.

GROSS: How much faith did he have in his singing?

Mr. VENET: He had more faith in his songwriting than his singing, but
as--the first couple of records he made, of course you know, did not sell very
well; they were bombs--but as he progressed, he felt stronger about his
singing, and at some point he decided that he's going to have to do it with
his songs, because he just felt that he had the interpretation he couldn't
give to other people when he just wrote them.

GROSS: Although he started off with rock 'n' roll hits, he seemed to know
early on that he wanted to sing standards and probably end up in Vegas. Now a
lot of rock 'n' rollers in the late '50s and early '60s were groomed to play
Vegas, but often against their will. The feeling was rock 'n' roll was a fad
and unless you learned how to play Vegas, you'll be out of a career by the
time you're in your 20s. Was he...

Mr. VENET: Well, you're correct, but...

GROSS: Yeah. Go ahead.

Mr. VENET: In that particular time period, you know, we were still coming
out of the late '40s. The influence in the '50s was from the adults in the
late '40s. And singing was legitimate, legit singing, and you had to play in
a club and you had to play Vegas and those venues or you weren't a success.
And if you didn't learn to play those places, you would end up doing
one-nighters with 20 other acts that had one hit on various disc jockey shows
in small towns. And a lot of the rock 'n' rollers could not do the pop
situation and a lot of them could, and the transition was tough for some.
There was Paul Anka who made the transition. There was very few of them
really, and Darin made the great transition.

GROSS: For a lot of people in rock 'n' roll, listeners and performers, Vegas
symbolized everything that was square and unsavory about show business. Why
did Bobby Darin want that?

Mr. VENET: Well, Darin thought that he could actually bridge the gap and
bring his audience--and the word teen-agers is the word they used--people
under the age of 25, he could actually bring them up to where they, too, would
appreciate Sinatra. They'd appreciate Tony Bennett. They'd appreciate pop
music and he tried to cross it. He tried to keep the rhythm and the tempo for
dancing situations and for the excitement. And later on, when you get into
"Mack the Knife," you'll see he did it.

GROSS: Well, we should hear "Mack the Knife." Now he recorded this when he
was 23.

Mr. VENET: Twenty-three.

GROSS: And I know when I heard it when I was young, you know, it was catchy,
I don't know. And then in college I was introduced to "The Threepenny Opera"
and I thought, `Boy, that Bobby Darin, he really ruined "Mack the Knife." He
made it into a show biz anthem; how horrible of him.' And when I listen to it
now I think, `What a great recording.' What incredible rhythm he has in this.
I mean, he transforms the song.

Mr. VENET: Yes.

GROSS: But he does something really interesting with it.

Mr. VENET: And I must say that's his concept. It was his idea and everyone
thought he had lost it.

GROSS: That he was crazy?

Mr. VENET: That he was crazy. They thought--they just couldn't believe that
he was going to do that and he did.

GROSS: Well, why did he choose this song? What did he hear in it?

Mr. VENET: He...

GROSS: What did he hear in it to swing it? I mean, it's not a song that you
think of swinging.

Mr. VENET: Well, we're dealing with a guy that could go back to the '20s.
He knew Frank Teschmacher and Johnny Dodds and the early Dixieland musicians.
He was steeped in the music business history and various forms of music and he
loved, personally, Dixieland. Had he had his druthers, born 20 years earlier,
he would have been a Dixieland--he would have had a Dixieland band. And what
he did is he loved these tunes, the Kurt Weill tunes, he just loved them,
because they were German oompah tunes, you know. They were kind of done in
that old style for the show, of course. And he just loved the whole theory of
the way the song was written, the mysterious lyrics, you know, their various
levels, and he thought he could get away with it and he did. And he was just
brilliant.

GROSS: Well, let's hear "Mack the Knife" as recorded by Bobby Darin in late
1958.

(Soundbite of song "Mack the Knife")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) Oh, the shark, babe, has such teeth, dear, and he shows
them pearly white. Just a jacknife has old MacHeath, babe, and he keeps it
out of sight. You know when that shark bites with his teeth, babe, scarlet
billows start to spread. Fancy gloves, though, wears old MacHeath, babe, so
there's never, never a trace of red. Now on the sidewalk, ha, ha, ooh, sunny
morning, uh-huh, lies a body just oozing life. Eeek! And someone's sneaking
'round the corner. Could that someone be Mack the Knife? There's a tugboat,
ha, ha, aha, down by the river, don't you know, where a cement bag's just
a-drooping on down. Oh, that cement is just--it's there for the weight, dear.
Five'll get you ten old Macky's back in town. Now did you hear about Louie
Miller? He disappeared, babe, after drawing out all his hard-earned cash.
And now MacHeath spends just like a sailor. Could it be our boy's done
something rash? Now Jenny Diver, yeah, Sukey Tawdry, ooh, Miss Lotte Lenya
and old Lucy Brown. Oh, the line forms on the right, babe, now that Macky's
back in town. I said Jenny Diver, whoa, Sukey Tawdry, look out to Miss Lotte
Lenya and old Lucy Brown. Yes, that line forms on the right, babe, now that
Macky's back in town. Look out, old Macky's back.

DAVIES: "Mack the Knife" recorded in 1958. We're listening to a 1996
interview with the late Nick Venet, who was Bobby Darin's close friend and
producer. A movie about Darin, "Beyond the Sea," opens December 29th. More
after a break. This is FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

DAVIES: Let's get back to Terry's conversation about Bobby Darin with Darin's
close friend and producer Nick Venet. It was recorded in 1996, two years
before Venet's death. Venet had just co-produced a Bobby Darin box set.

GROSS: Now he was supposed to record "Danke Schoen" after "Mack the Knife."

Mr. VENET: Yes, he was.

GROSS: But instead he gave the song to Wayne Newton and, of course, the rest
is history.

Mr. VENET: Darin was producing Wayne. Darin had signed Wayne Newton. Wayne
was brought to Bobby by Dick Clark, believe it or not, in New York. And we
went down to see him playing in a lounge and he was just terrific, and Bobby
signed him as his first act on his Capitol production deal. Bobby was banking
for the future. He wanted to produce and he wanted to publish and he wanted
to run a record company and slowly over the years taper off from performing,
which at that time was becoming more difficult for him physically. And he
just didn't want to make it public, so he started getting more involved in
production. As you know, Darin didn't have a lot of years.

GROSS: Well, I'm going to skip playing Wayne Newton's "Danke Schoen" because
I want to save as much time as we can to play Bobby Darin's music.

Mr. VENET: I don't blame you. Cut that part out, but I don't blame you.

GROSS: So how did Bobby Darin actually make it to Vegas?

Mr. VENET: Well, Steve Blauner, his manager, introduced him to George Burns,
and George Burns just--you've got to understand, Darin, when he walked in the
room, he had that presence, that great spirit. Very few people have it but
when they have it, you know it. They walk in a room and everybody stops.
They may not be facing the door but they stop. And George Burns met Darin and
he just felt that thing that Darin had, that this kid is going to be a star.
And Darin had already had a couple of records on the charts, and Blauner told
Burns that `If you take him to Vegas, you won't be disappointed.' And he did.
And Darin just lit up Vegas. You know, he was one of the highest-paid
performers ever in his 20s in Las Vegas.

GROSS: Oh, really? I didn't know that.

Mr. VENET: Yeah. He packed it in. Darin was truly a phenomenon in Las
Vegas. It was unbelievable.

GROSS: Were you in Vegas, too, at that time?

Mr. VENET: Oh, we used to go up there all the time. Remember we were two
kids, two poor kids from the city. I'm from Baltimore and he's from New York
and this was dog heaven for us. We were raised that you're successful, you
drive Cadillacs, you wear a gold link bracelet on your left hand to tell you
who you are and you wear one on your right hand to tell you who you were. And
we did it all. We were foolish like that but it was worth it and Vegas to us
was just the cat's meow. I can't tell you. We didn't even think it was
gaudy. We thought it was neat. We're in our 20s, you know, and it was very
exciting because we came from very good people but very simple neighborhoods.

GROSS: Well, you know, in his Vegas period, he recorded a lot of jazz
standards, and I want to play one of my favorites which you happened to
co-produce, and it's "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square." I think it's a
wonderful recording and shows how good his jazz singing is. You were at the
session. You co-produced it.

Mr. VENET: Yes, I did.

GROSS: Why don't you tell us about it.

Mr. VENET: Darin had a great ear and a great respect for other writers. A
lot of writers do not listen to other writers, nor do they care about other
writers' works. And a lot of artists who write don't listen to other writers
and their works. Darin had one of those great feelings about other talent and
he was just always just excited about great writers and a lot of writers, and
a lot of the great songs. And this particular song is one that he felt he
could never, ever write a song like this and the next best thing would be to
sing it, he loved it so much. And he did.

GROSS: So this was recorded in 1962, and Billy May(ph) is the arranger and
conductor on this. And, of course, he did a lot of work with Frank Sinatra...

Mr. VENET: Yeah.

GROSS: ...and many other singers as well. So why don't we hear "A
Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square"?

(Soundbite of song "A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) That certain night, the night we met, there was magic
abroad in the air. There were angels dining at the Ritz and a nightingale
sang in Berkeley Square. I may be right, I may be wrong, but I'm perfectly
willing to swear that when you turned and smiled at me, a nightingale sang in
Berkeley Square. The moon that lingered over London town, poor puzzled moon,
he wore a frown. How could he know we two were so in love the whole darned
world seemed upside down? The streets of town were paved with stars...

GROSS: Did Vegas change Bobby Darin's personality and did success change him?

Mr. VENET: Success never changed Darin. Vegas never changed Darin.
Politics changed Darin. That's what changed Bobby Darin, his political
awareness and growth and his involvement in politics. He went from being a
kid raised in the center to a kid that practically became a bomb-throwing
leftist politically. And meeting the Kennedys also altered his life and it
altered his ability to play Vegas under certain conditions. Number one, he
wanted Vegas to integrate more. He wanted to see more black Americans working
at the tables, working in the orchestras, working at the various other jobs,
other than the jobs where you didn't see anyone; those faceless jobs in the
back. And he became a civil rights worker, quietly.

GROSS: Did this political awakening lead to the folk part of his career?

Mr. VENET: Yes. He wanted to stay with the audience that started with him
and he wanted to make the transition with them. For instance, it was OK for
you and I to--I don't know how old you are, sorry; I don't know if you were
there. He wanted--if I could take and start wearing Levi's and let my hair
grow long and started campaigning for Kennedy, he thought he could do that,
too, and he didn't understand why people would say he's trying to become a
folkie. They didn't say Dylan's trying to become a folkie. They didn't say I
was becoming a folk producer.

GROSS: But they thought it was phony that somebody with a Vegas pedigree at
this point...

Mr. VENET: Yes.

GROSS: ...was growing their hair long...

Mr. VENET: Yes.

GROSS: ...and singing folk songs.

Mr. VENET: And it's an interesting thing. He was willing to lose half his
audience for his political conviction, but there was a point there when he
lost almost all his audience because one group didn't like him going that far
to the left and the other group on the left didn't want him coming over
because they didn't trust him. He was between a rock and a hard place.

GROSS: Let me actually play one of his folk songs, one of the songs that he
wrote, and that he used to close his show with. And it's called "Simple Song
of Freedom." Now we're going to hear a demo version of it, I believe
previously unreleased, that's featured on this box set, and you were there
when he recorded the demo. In fact, I think the tape machine was on your lap.

Mr. VENET: Yes.

GROSS: Tell us about this.

Mr. VENET: Darin had been working on the song and what he wanted to write
was a "This Land Is Your Land." He wanted to write a song that people could
take with them, they could sing with him, and he worked very hard to simplify
this. And it's a statement of the time. I get very emotional when I think of
it, but he finished it that morning and he put it on the tape recorder. I
held the tape recorder on my lap and held the mike up and that was the final
version. In fact, there's a mistake in it but he kept going. And he said,
`That's my anthem.' And he closed his shows forever after that with that song.

GROSS: Why don't we pause here and listen to Bobby Darin's demo of his song,
"Simple Song of Freedom"?

(Soundbite of song "Simple Song of Freedom")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) Come and sing a simple song of freedom. Sing it like
you've never sung before. Let it fill the air. Tell the people everywhere
we, the people here, don't want a war. Hey, there, mister black man, can you
hear me? I won't dig your diamonds or hunt your game. I just want to be
someone known to you as me and I will bet my life you want the same. So come
and sing a simple song of freedom...

GROSS: You know, the song that we heard a demo of, "Simple Song of Freedom,"
his actual studio version of that wasn't released until after his death.

Mr. VENET: Yes. Yes.

GROSS: And there's--yeah, go ahead.

Mr. VENET: No, it's just that there are a lot of things on tape that weren't
released during his lifetime. He just felt sometimes there was--he wasn't
ready to release it and he had so much he wanted to do, he was afraid to
release of a lot of things that might hurt his schedule. And he was a man
racing against time, I promise you.

DAVIES: We're listening to Terry's 1996 interview with the late Nick Venet,
who was Bobby Darin's close friend and producer. More after a break. This is
FRESH AIR.

(Soundbite of music)

DAVIES: Let's get back to Terry's interview with Bobby Darin's close friend
and producer Nick Venet. It was recorded in 1996, two years before Venet's
death. When they spoke, Venet had just co-produced a Bobby Darin box set.
"Beyond the Sea," the film about Bobby Darin starring Kevin Spacey, opens
December 29th.

GROSS: He died of a heart condition. How long was he aware that he had a
heart condition? Did he always know that?

Mr. VENET: Yes, he did. He knew that from when he was a small kid. When he
was eight or nine years old, he understood that. He also understood he wasn't
going to make it to 21 and then the new diagnosis said 30 was the exact age,
and he passed away at 36, 37. He outlived the sentences they gave him of how
long he was going to live, but he also knew that he had pressed his luck. We
did a lot of gambling. We loved Las Vegas. And he used to say, `I'm playing
it like it lays.' Towards the end there he used to say, `Boy, I'm pressing my
luck, but I'm going to double up,' and that was his phrase all the time. He
said, `We're going to the studio. I'm going to double up and see if I can do
an album while I still have the energy.' He was wearing down towards the end.

GROSS: You co-produced the new box set of Bobby Darin's work, which is
divided into his rock work, his pop work and his folk and country. What was
it like for you to sit down and listen back through all of this?

Mr. VENET: It was tough. It was tough. The mistakes were bigger. The best
parts were better, and it's always tough going back. Darin--we shared a lot
of philosophy. I know that Darin never grew old, not because he died young.
If he was alive today, he still would not be old. Darin was not an old
person. He never--he would have--he was young. He would have been young now.
And going back over these things, you see the amount of time in years and the
places. It's very difficult to do a box set. I worked with other box sets on
people I've worked with, but this one was the toughest because we had put so
much time and space between all the songs. We were everywhere: New York,
Nashville, Chicago, LA, Las Vegas, Miami. It was one of those times when this
country was on the move. TV was not the king that it is today. There was
more entertainment out there.

GROSS: I'd like to close with a song and I'm going to let you pick this one.
I'd like you to pick and to introduce a song that you particularly love or
that has special significance for you.

Mr. VENET: I'd like to play "Beyond the Sea."

GROSS: And why do you want to choose this?

Mr. VENET: Darin would go up to Pfeiffer Beach all the time and Big Sur, and
that's where he did his best thinking towards the end and he would whistle
"Beyond the Sea" on the beach and I'd walk, oh, a quarter of a mile behind him
because he'd want me to see how the sound sounded when the wind brought it
back. He was still planning on recording a new version of "Beyond the Sea" at
Pfeiffer Beach. It just means a lot.

(Soundbite of song "Beyond the Sea")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) Somewhere beyond the sea, somewhere waiting for me, my
lover stands on golden sands and watches the ships that go sailing. Somewhere
beyond the sea, she's there watching for me. If I could fly like birds on
high, then straight to her arms I'd go sailing. It's far beyond the stars,
it's near beyond the moon. I know beyond a doubt my heart will lead me there
soon. We'll meet beyond the shore. We'll kiss just as before. Happy we'll
be beyond the sea and never again I'll go sailing.

DAVIES: Bobby Darin, recorded on Christmas Eve 1958, 46 years ago today. Our
interview with the late Nick Venet was recorded in 1996. The film about
Darin, "Beyond the Sea," hits theaters around the country next week.

(Credits)

DAVIES: Happy holidays from all of us at FRESH AIR. For Terry Gross, I'm
Dave Davies.

(Soundbite of "Beyond the Sea")

Mr. DARIN: (Singing) I know beyond a doubt my heart will lead me there soon.
We'll meet, I know we'll meet beyond the shore...
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