First off, you have got to know that when Sinatra flies into a city to do his thing, once he’s finished, that’s it—like a shot, he’s gone, back to New York and his suite at The Waldorf because, the Waldorf excepted and maybe, for good measure, Vegas (that is, if it’s convenient and his pals are there and the shows are ones he wants to see), he won’t stay overnight anywhere else. Truth! But Cleveland’s different, Jimmy says. “Cleveland’s not a hick town like your Chicago or L.A. or New York. Cleveland’s class.” You can take that anyway you want, probably with a grain of salt is what I’m thinking. Jimmy’s nuts. Gene agrees. But, his attitude? Not so nuts.
Anyway, Sinatra decides he’s going to overnight in Cleveland. He’s going to arrive the night before the show and stay—you got it—at Jimmy’s place: The Keg & Quarter, downtown Cleveland, a 30- to 45-minute cab ride, going to or coming back from The Coliseum.
Jimmy’s never had someone like Sinatra at his place. Well, that’s not entirely true: The Keg being so close to the “theatre district,” he’s had celebrities like Yul Brynner, Presley, guys like that. But someone like Sinatra? To hear Jimmy tell it, it’s because of Presley that Sinatra’s staying at the Keg. The grapevine, snaking back to Jimmy, tells him that Presley, at a party in Vegas, corners Sinatra and while they’re talking he finds out he’s coming to Cleveland to do a show and he tells him, “Stay at the Keg & Quarter.” Like it’s a must. Like there is no better place.
“What the hell,” worries Jimmy. “What do you do for Sinatra? It’s an honor. Right off the bat, an honor is what it is. That he picked my place, know what I mean? But I got customers. Regulars. You tell me, ‘What do you do if like me you got a restaurant?’ Do you drop everything and kiss Sinatra’s ass? Tell your regulars go fly a kite?”
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| Jimmy Swingos with Sinatra at the Keg. |
Later on, I find out from one of the employees who has seen everything that when Jimmy orders everyone out there’s this one guy—employee is very serious about this: he has never never seen anything like it—pleading with Jimmy. “He’s down on his knees,” says this guy. “When he finds out about Sinatra and how he’s gonna be here, about to be here any second, he says to Jimmy, ‘I’ve got 1,500 bucks for you if you let me shake his hand. Just shake his hand is all. 1,500 dollars. Here. Look. Take it. I will do anything.’ Can you believe it? This guy takes out a wad of what I’ve gotta believe is nothing but C-notes—he’s still down on his knees—and peels off 15. He says to Jimmy, ‘Here, for you: my gift to you for bringing Frank Sinatra to Cleveland.’ Forget about it, Jimmy tells him. Nobody gives me nothing, he says. Jimmy tells him how sorry he is, but he’s got to understand.”
By now, Jimmy is as ready as he can be for Sinatra. He’s even blocked out a floor in the hotel for Sinatra and his retinue which, it turns out, numbers 12—maybe more, maybe less. Bodyguards, you think? I ask Jimmy. “Maybe,” he says. “I don’t know. Bodyguards, pals, whatever; does it matter? All’s I know is that he’s bringing a bunch of people here with him, so I am gonna make sure we take care of them—but for a buck, right?—all on the same floor. What’s so hard? I clear out a section. This is a very big deal. You gotta know that. I know that, for Crissake. Who is it that doesn’t?”
At about 2 a.m., Sinatra and his group take over the restaurant. Jimmy has already decided he’ll select the menu and the wines. Whatever he serves? Comp. If Sinatra says something like “thank you very much, but I’d rather order from the menu,” then what? “Then,” says Jimmy, “it is what it is. I’m just trying to be a good host.”
I ask Jimmy if he’s got any idea what it is Sinatra likes to eat?
“I ask around. I phone all over to places where I know he has been—Miami Beach, L.A., Vegas, New York. What’s he eat? I ask. What’s he like? What is it you served Sinatra the last time he was with you? No matter who it is that I ask, I get the same answer. ‘It is always steak,’ they say. ‘Always.’ Someone else—Vegas, I think—says, ‘Steak, but also fresh apple fritters. Make sure you got apple fritters. Fresh. He loves ’em. Give him apple fritters with his dinner; and don’t forget to stock his room with plenty of root beer and Tootsie Rolls. He loves that.’ Anything else? ‘He’s got simple tastes,’ Miami Beach tells me. ‘The rest of the time he is with you, there’s a valet—a toady, the kind of guy that does everything for Frank he can’t do himself or, correction, won’t or doesn’t want to do himself. The toady’ll let you know what you gotta do. No sweat. Oh yah, one more thing. I almost forgot,’ says Miami Beach. ‘He loves hot peppers. The hotter, the better.’”
Hours before Sinatra arrives and armed with the hot-pepper tip, Jimmy chases down a buddy—a hot-pepper nut, a know-it-all of hot peppers. “Don’t worry, Jimmy,” says the hot-pepper guy. “If what it is you want is hot peppers, then hot peppers it is you will get.”
Comes now time to serve dinner. Jimmy sees to it that at Sinatra’s place, where the salad dish usually goes, there goes instead hot peppers. “They are so hot,” Jimmy tells me, “I can see heat rising from them like steam from a plate of spaghetti. Know what I mean? All of a sudden my whole life is flashing before my eyes. I’m thinking—and all of this only in the time it takes Sinatra to get one or two peppers from dish to mouth—I’m thinking, ‘What if they are too hot? He will kill me. What if they are so hot, he will not be able to sing? Then what? My life is flashing before me.’ It is the longest moment ever in my life. If they are too hot, what am I going to do?’
“They are,” says Jimmy, “too hot.” To hear Jimmy tell it, Sinatra blinks back tears, slams his fist on the table, and at the top of his lungs, words singed with dragon fire, he scorches the air: “Damn, these mothers are hot.” Then, a pause. “But, Jeeeezus, they are good.”
And the fritters? Then come the fritters, coming with some kind of steak. Jimmy doesn’t remember what kind of steak. Or the doneness? Or the doneness. The waiter approaches Sinatra. “Would you like some fresh apple fritters?” he asks. Sinatra’s eye smile. “How the hell did you know?” The waiter says nothing, backs off, spins and moves through swinging doors into the kitchen where the chef, up half the night making fresh apple fritters, piles them high on a plate. Jimmy says, “I’m thinking that Sinatra’s thinking that this crazy joint’s got everything and that the crazy son of a bitch who runs this crazy joint knows everything and that is exactly what I want him to think.”
And that’s it? “Kind of. Oh, we have a few laughs with the band, take some pictures, drink a few drinks—but, yah, for the restaurant, that’s about it.” Did he sing? “We asked, but he said, ‘no thanks, got to save the voice.’”
Sinatra and the group thank Jimmy profusely. He shows them to their rooms. Jimmy, himself, he checks into a vacant room. “No way do you think I am going home while he is here. What if he needs something? If he needs something, I am here. If he doesn’t, what’s the harm?”
At 4 p.m., Saturday afternoon, five hours before the concert, Sinatra’s valet scares up Jimmy. “It’s time for breakfast,” he says. “Do as I tell you,” says the valet.
Back to the kitchen go Jimmy and the valet where Jimmy does what the valet tells him to do. “Trim a potato,” he says, “and dice it up small.” Jimmy trims and dices. “Good,” says valet. “Now, fry the pieces in olive oil until they are crisp.” Jimmy fries until they’re crisp. “Now whip up four eggs and put them over the potatoes.” Scrambled or what? Jimmy asks. “Scrambled,” says valet. What else? asks Jimmy. Anything else? “That’s it,” says valet. “Around 7 o’clock, Mr. Sinatra will have some chicken soup.” Of course.
“Hell,” says Jimmy, who has three hours to think about it, “what’s to making chicken soup? The fritters I got right, the peppers they were hot enough, the wine, perfect, the place just right. I’m thinking breakfast will be OK. What’s to chicken soup? Know what I mean?”
Jimmy is right. Chicken soup is chicken soup. In the kitchen, Jimmy and the chef prepare fresh chicken stock. Says Jimmy, “Know why fresh chicken stock? Because this is not going to be your powder-add-water-bring-to-a-boil-then-serve chicken soup. This chicken soup is going to be the best chicken soup Sinatra’s ever had.” Jimmy tastes. The chef tastes. The chicken soup, they say, is great chicken soup. Great chicken soup for Sinatra. Room service, yet. Up four floors to Frank Sinatra’s room goes what . . . a bowl of chicken soup on a roomservice tray? You’ve got to be kidding. “What I got,” says Jimmy, “was one of our sterling silver tureens—the big ones like punch bowls we use for weddings and affairs like that and I fill it to the brim with chicken soup; made-for- Sinatra chicken soup. There was at least a gallon of soup in there. At least. Know something? It is empty when the tureen comes back.”
An hour later, word gets out Sinatra is about to leave The Keg for The Coliseum. The lobby’s jammed. Every time the elevator door opens, the crowd shuts up thinking that Sinatra’s in there and is about to step out. Jimmy, who has taken in stride everything about Sinatra’s visit, is now just a little bit worried. He takes the elevator up to Sinatra’s floor, and in his suite tells him about the crowd in the lobby and how when you leave the best way is to go out by way of the garage where “There’s a coupla limos waiting for you and everybody else to go to The Coliseum. Know what I mean?”
“Nothing doing,” says Sinatra. “It is from the lobby we go.”
At 8:30, the elevator carrying Sinatra and his pals drops to the lobby. The doors slide open, Sinatra gets out. Last. As he steps into the lobby, the crowd freezes, draws in its breath. Sinatra walks over to a little girl who, arms outstretched, is holding two long-stemmed roses, one in each hand. She hands them to Sinatra. He kisses her on both cheeks. She curtsies. Sinatra takes one of the roses and hands it to Jimmy, whispers something, shakes his hand, draws Jimmy into him and kisses him once on the right cheek, once on the left. He walks out the front door to the waiting limo. He gets in. Limo number one drives off. The crowd exhales.
So? “So, he told me he had a great time,” Jimmy tells me.
That’s it, I tell Presti: that’s it about Sinatra and Jimmy at the Keg. What do you think?
“Here is what I think,” says Gene who has waited forever for me to finish my story. “Let me tell you something,” he says. “You know that part at the beginning where Swingos asks you what you’d do if you owned the Keg and Sinatra comes to visit? Remember that part? I can remember at my restaurant, after a jazz concert at the college, Louis Prima walks in, has a couple, three beers and a pizza. Wanna know how I know Prima has a couple, three beers and a pizza? My bartender tells me. Same thing with Woody Herman. He drops by after a concert, eats—you know where? At the bar he sits and eats is where. What does he have? How the hell should I know? I’m busy in the dining room, moving from table to table, guest to guest. Making small talk. I’m supposed to shut down my place for a lousy entertainer? Listen, I got my regulars to think about. Know what I mean?”
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