Darin died during his last comeback in a career wracked with as many changes and frustrations as his personal life and medical history. He has just received his release from Motown Records, and another friend and manger, Steve Blauner, was talking to producer Richard Perry about cutting a new album. Darin had also signed a $2 million deal with MGM's new Grand Hotel in Las Vegas,said Blauner,for 27 weeks of work over three years.
Born Walden Robert Cassotto, Darin left Hunter College after a semester and a half to try show business.On March 10th, 1956, he got spot on the Dorsey brothers TV show. A year later he signed with Atco, where he was luckless until in 1958 president Ahmet Ertegen decided to produce him. Overnight, Darin wrote and recorded Splish Splash followed by Queen of The Hop.
But Darin,at age 23, older than most of the reigning teen idols of the late fifties, wanted something more.He made the albumThat's All,which included Mack The Knife and Beyond the Sea. Both became hits and he won a Grammy award for Best New Artist of 1959.He quickly moved into the Las Vegas circuit and in 1960 began an acting career as well, winning an Academy award nomination and the French Film Critics Award for Best Actor in Captain Newman MD. He married Sandra Dee, his first leading lady in 1960, and his native brashness began to get him some publicity he would soon regret.
"Bobby made great copy", said Blauner. "Shana Alexander did a story on him in Life Magazine, and he made this remark about wanting to be a legend at age 25. It was tongue in cheek, definitely.But they pulled that out as the banner line over the story.
"Then , after the Grammy, Vernon Scott (of UPI) asked him, 'Do you want to be as big as Sinatra?' and Bobby said something like,'No, I want to be the biggest Bobby Darin I can be, the best Bobby Darin in the world.'" He was then reported, according to Blauner,to have said "I hope to be the biggest in the world, bigger than Sinatra."
As part of a the effort to reach a larger, general audience, Darin left Atco records for Capitol. His hits continued as he he moved from pop and rock to country and folk stylings.Things and You're The Reason I'm Living were among his hits. In 1965, he returned to Atlantic , where he again cut a wide range of material , including an album produced by
Charles Koppleman- Don Rubin,( the team associated with the Lovin Spoonful and Tim Hardin.)Here, Darin did Randy Newman's I think It's Going To Rain Today, a number of fine songs of his own and Hardin's If I Were A Carpenter , a 1966 hit. That year he was divorced from Miss Dee.
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