HollywoodOn Productions: Janet Donovan & Brendan Kownacki
Photo credit: Brendan Kownacki
Growing up in Beverly Hills was “kind of like the Brady Bunch, it was quite something,” Deana Martin told Hollywood on the Potomac while in town for the National Italian American’s Foundation’s 41st Gala weekend at the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel in Washington, DC. She took us back to her earliest childhood memories and walked us through her life’s path to becoming a singer, actor, author, performer and talked about her 2005 book Memories Are Made of This and her just released album Swing Street.
She remembered living at 551 South Beverly Glenn in Beverly Hills with her Mom Betty McDonald and her three siblings, while her dad Dean Martin and her step mom Jeanne lived just around the corner. She remembers walking down to her dad’s house – remembers the driveway, remembers everything about it, walking up the stairs: “It was beautiful. It was glamorous. I remember my grandmother talking to my grandfather – that’s the earliest memory I have, but then of course it was a wild and crazy first few years.”
Deana Martin
We asked her about The Rat Pack: “Dean, Frank and Sammy – they were unbelievable. They would sing together and they respected each other. They would also joke with each other. They were all at the top of their game. They could sing, dance and they were funny. They gave each other their space and it was amazing to watch them. That’s how they were at our home. It was just fun. Who they were on stage that’s who they were off stage. The friendship lasted for many years. ” Her favorite among the Rat Pack? “Frank Sinatra, absolutely. He was so kind to me and he was interested in what I had to say.”
And Jerry Lewis: “They were, for 10 years, the biggest, greatest comedy team ever. I remember growing up watching the Telethon, you know, with Dad and Jerry. Jerry’s a very dear friend of mine. Of course we stayed friends through the years. He wrote the forward to my book. We went and I interviewed him because I couldn’t write a book about Dean Martin without having Jerry Lewis in it. He’s going to be in the documentary, so it’s pretty exciting.”
Deana started her own career at sixteen when she signed her first contract with Columbia. She is now being represented and produced by her husband John Griffeth who she met on a blind date, on Valentine’s Day no less. “I did not want to go, he did not want to go. But that was it….. when you meet someone and it was just meant to be. We are very different. He is very precise and nice with detail. He is amazing. I can hear a phone ring and I won’t answer it. We are different and yet we are so much the same.” Also, we might add having been around them for many years, they both have a great sense of humor. “Yeah, you know, it’s important, it’s important for us. Our work is important, our kids are important, everything … you know we just do it and we laugh, and that’s the thing, we can joke with each other.”
Deana Martin and John Griffeth
Looking ahead: “We’re looking forward to 2017. We’re doing a fabulous documentary on my dad because that would be his centennial. He was born June 7, 1917. We’re going to be putting together the shows, the documentary, and my book that’s going to be made into the movie, so I’m very excited about that. John and I just take a day at a time. When we get into LA we get to see our kids because they live in Burbank. Our little granddaughter is going to be a big star. She’s a little singer, dancer, gorgeous little thing. It’s tough, keeping in touch with everybody and working, but I love being on stage, I love singing, I love going into the recording studio.” And then there’s the Friar’s Club in New York where they’ll be doing a big centennial for Dean Martin.
Tell us one thing that you haven’t told anyone else: “I think I’ve been asked just about everything. I don’t know if people know that my dad didn’t like elevators. He would always have, at the MGM Grand, his room on the second floor so he could walk up the stairs. He really didn’t like elevators, didn’t like small spaces and his dressing room had a curtain put up just off the side of the stage when performing. He didn’t need a big room for people to come in and meet and hang out – he was quiet that way – so he’d go into his little dressing room and just walk right out on stage and be unbelievable. Maybe that’s something that no one knew.”
One on One with Deana Martin:
