Dino: Living High in the Dirty Business of Dreams

Dino! Yeah, this is the biography that re-shaped the way celebrity biographies were written. It also brought Dean Martin back to the forefront, just three years before he died. This is the type of book that can polarize fans, but there is no doubt that it breaks the barriers. After this, Dino became a cult god, the Swinger of Swingers for the Generation X crowd.

I actually read this again, about 15 years after the first read-through. It still stands up, although I've read so many other Dean Martin biographies since then that some of the information is old news. But lordy, it truly rocks. In essence, Tosches tackled a subject that could not be tackled. Dino wasn't Frankie. Dino presented a mask to the outside world, so he could enjoy his show more own world. Work was work and play was play, even if 'play' constituted a night in front of the telly. Martin never wanted to be the best of anything, yet he became a giant without a whole lot of effort. Tosches has to create something out of nothing and he succeeds. Whether you like it or not doesn't make the book any less compelling.

Funny. As a kid, I always thought it was "Dean-No." I yelled that at the book whenever I found another incident not to my liking. In the long run, I ended up admiring the Deanster even more for being able to tell Hollywood, and the world, to sit on it and twirl.

Book Season = Year Round (bio classic) show less

As with Tosches' other books, Dino is about a lot more than its titular subject, though the life of Dean Martin is covered in thoroughly-researched detail. Dino is a key piece of Tosches' larger project of illuminating the darker corners of the American 20th Century, and especially its popular culture. Gamblers, mobsters, sleazy movie execs, and their various associates all play a role here, alongside the big names - Sinatra, Marilyn, the Kennedys, Reagan, John Wayne, and, of course, Jerry Lewis, who apparently granted Tosches a very open and uncensored interview.

Tosches gets great mileage out of colliding highbrow and lowbrow, the sacred and the profane, and out of these collisions produces a cracking style. An amazing portrait. Truly show more the life AND times of an (Italian-) American original. show less

Interesting, largely well researched bio about a major American pop entertainment icon. The author tells a mob soaked story, and early on posits a theory that a noteworthy portion of American organized crime denizens flow from Stubenville Ohio across the United States in a parallel trajectory to Dino Crocetti’s career. Fascinating because you get a deep dive into the mob heavies that run things, and that seems to be Tosches' primary obsession and point of interest in this bio. Mob guys. Dean Martin is sold here as the ultimate enigma of cool, but is he? What he certainly is, is a charismatic entertainer, who had a preposterous stroke of good luck riffing with a wacky comedian on off sets at the Havana Madrid and then later at the 500 show more Club. The result was that they had stepped in shit, and found themselves riding a seismic explosion of audience enthusiasm almost immediately, that took them straight to the top of the entertainment industry. Crosby and Hope repackaged as an Italian and a Jew. So that’s got to be an interesting story, and that’s probably why you are reading the book, and maybe to find out where Dino went after they broke up
I’m less enamored with Tosches as a prose stylist. I’ve read it referred to as “gonzo” and my take while reading, was that he comes across as a mashup of Jimmy Breslin and Hunter Thompson, but lacking the sense of humor of both of those guys. That’s the great irony of this bio; it’s about a subject who was almost pathological about not taking himself seriously, and all about being off the cuff and funny, but his biographer took himself very seriously and didn't have a funny bone in his body.
So, reading this today, the bio is dated and off putting, and a bit of a drag. I’m not coming away from the reading of it, contritely beating my breast for having suckled at the teat of mediocre American entertainment for the duration of my life. I never dug the Martin Lewis movies anyway. I liked them both better after they split up. If the subject matter wasn’t so interesting I’d give the book 2 stars. The author doesn’t even really tell how Martin actually died (lung cancer related emphysema) instead leaves you the impression that he just wasted away in a booze and percodan haze, at the threshold of Alzheimers. show less

Con il consueto stile irruente (di cui talvolta si compiace) e appoggiandosi a un’imponente bibliografia, Tosches narra i tempi della vita di Dean Martin partendo dall’arrivo dei genitori dall’Abruzzo e terminando con la decadenza fisica e psicologica degli ultimi giorni. Per il resto, Dino naviga il mondo cercando di coglierne il bello (il godurioso) e facendosi scivolare addosso ciò che gira intorno: decine e decine di figure secondarie provenienti in egual modo dalla malavita e dall’ambiente dello spettacolo popolano queste pagine in una coazione a ripetere gli stessi percorsi perché gli altri non interessano.
Martin gestisce bene il successo – montagne di dollaroni da cinema, canzoni, televisione, varietà – e molto show more meno i rapporti umani: all’esterno fascinoso e alla mano, Dean si rivela un anaffettivo che preferisce le donne usa-e-getta e finisce a far cozzare il proprio ego con quello dei due grandi nomi che si dividono la sua vita pubblica, ovvero Jerry Lewis e Frank Sinatra.
Entrambi comunque ne escono peggio del protagonista, per il quale l’autore dà l’impressione di provare profondo rispetto se non simpatia: tra sesso a gogò, alcool e droghe, soldi poco puliti e compagnie discutibili, Martin resta in piedi fin quasi alla fine accarezzando al contempo il pubblico televisivo di prima serata.
Forse perché a lui non importava, chissenefrega. show less