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Interview with Altovise Gore Davis 26/06/2001
It has been over 10 years since Sammy’s passing. How would you recount the last decade in terms of your personal struggle in adjusting to a life without him?
My personal struggle was very hard but I think when he passed away I wanted to be with him there but then I realized that I had to survive and try to survive to keep his legacy going on.
With the estate finally settled, what plans do you have to ensure that Sammy’s legacy and image are maintained?
I would like to keep Sammy’s legacy because I have a good team now with me working with the LaRoda Group and with people near and close to me that will help keep his songs, his image and his likeness alive and that his kids could have something to look up to. There is a musical with Quincy Jones; there’s a mini series and a little children’s show that I would like to narrate.
How have your children coped with the loss of their father and are they taking an active role in maintaining their father’s legacy.
I think all the kids were very…as we saw at the funeral that very day in May of 1990 that they didn’t know what they were going to do. They would all like to participate in some kind of way and since I am the role model and the head of it they will follow my lead. They are not involved in every project only if I want them to be involved with it.
Do you have much contact with Mark, Tracey and Jeff? Tracey’s book gave an alternative insight into the man. Do you have any plans to write a memoir on your life with Sammy?
I have more contact with Mark and Jeff, not so much with Tracey. When I read the book from the back to the front first I felt that she wasn’t very honest.
I think all the children, Mark, Tracey, Jeff and Manny, of course they are his children and Tracey’s book I don’t know if she really gave an insight to the man because they really were not close as father and daughter but that was her feel for her father for the book. I think that my plans are that I would like to write a memoir on my life with Sammy because I was with him for twenty years and I think for me it would be very good and I think it would be open and honest.
When you reflect on your life with Sammy what do you remember most about him?
When we were alone and he made me laugh and when he wanted to take me to London and we went to Stella’s place and the White Elephant and we walked in the woods and he told me stories. And always after getting off the plane in London, going to the White Elephant and he always wanted a bloody Mary with his friends.
The camaraderie of Sammy, Frank and Dean always mesmerized the world. In the years after Sammy’s passing did you have much contact with them and were they as supportive as you had hoped?
Dean was supportive. He was very upset because of his son passing but he was there for me and we were just talking. So that was supportive talking. With Frank, he wanted to help me and it did not come to fruition, as everyone thinks, that he gave me the millions. No he did not but he wanted to, as I am sure. I think Sammy was a stronghold between Frank and Dean, even though he was small, but mighty.
At one point during their long friendship Sammy and Frank had a falling out. Is it true that Barbara Sinatra and yourself engineered a meeting that led to their reconciliation? If so, can you shed some light on what was said at that meeting?
Someone always called me a leveler, meaning getting people together. Barbara and I had gotten together because I knew how much love Frank had for Sammy and vice versa. We had met, Barbara and I and said lets just have diner. And so we did have diner and they came together and hugged. And that’s what got them back together before they did the show.
Sammy was one of the few celebrity friends that Elvis Presley had. What did that mean to Sammy and do you recall any anecdotes about their friendship?
In Las Vegas Sammy was down one hotel and Elvis was at another. I went to see both of them. I was at Elvis’s and Sammy came over. You know Sammy always did an impersonation of him. Sammy did Elvis and then Elvis did Sammy. We just stayed back stage for about an hour or two and it was wonderful just seeing them together. And it was more than one time.
I think their friendship meant a lot to both of them and also whilst we were living in Beverly Hills, we lived across the street from one of the gentlemen that was his security guard. I think it meant a bond to them, as men. You know men have bonds like ladies sometimes have girlfriends. I think it was a very personal bond between both of them that they could both share because they both came from very humble beginnings.
At Sammy’s funeral Gregory Hines told of the last time he saw Sammy and how he threw an imaginary ball to him to signify that he should carry on with his work. Do you think that Gregory has successfully taken up that task? Similarly do you think that there is a performer who is worthy of being labeled a present day equivalent to Sammy?
When Gregory was at the show that honored Sammy and a lot of celebrity fans and friends showed up at the auditorium for him. When he tap danced with Sammy which was his last time dancing, Gregory kissed his shoes. I think that Gregory will try and uphold it. I don’t know how yet and he and I will have to figure that out.
At that show before Sammy went up on the stage can you recall what you said to him?
"Honey, are you sure you can do it". He said "My feet work its my voice that can’t".
In his 1966 Playboy interview, Sammy was asked. "Where do you want to be professionally?"
Sammy answered: "I’d like to work my way up to the class of the Duke, or Durante; they’re so well established it doesn’t matter whether they’ve got a show on or a movie running. They’re liked, they’re accepted, they’re respected." Do you think that Sammy felt he had reached that level of success and admiration?
I think the Duke and Durante admired Sammy and he admired them. He always asked me: "Did I think he did" and I would always say "yes". Then he’d say" Well if you think I did and I think so, then I did".
A man with as much talent as Sammy and with having overcome such adversity would be a good role model for today’s youth. How do you think that future generations should be introduced to Sammy?
As much talent as he had, he always believed in school even though he never went to school. When he went to the army he was taught how to read and write and to be the best that he could be. He loved kids and as he started at the age of four. I think that it is important to have schooling. You have to have a goal and a mindset of what you want to do and what you want to try to be.
A man with such a strong public persona must have had an equally private side. What was Sammy like when you were alone with him?
He liked to fix me food. I liked fish and shrimp. He always liked to fix me something to eat and have me a cold room in a hotel.
Sammy spent so much of his time in contact with so many people both in his professional and private life. Did he ever just need time to be alone? And what did he spend his time doing?
When he was alone he would watch soap operas, He liked One Life To Live and then he would like to start cooking. He also liked telling me stories about different people. We would watch movies and he would say who is this and who is that and then he’d say "Who was the 32nd president" and I would say "I don’t know" and then he’d say "But you went to school".
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