The life and times of the last great American hipster Sammy Davis, Jr. (1925-90) rose from childhood stardom on the vaudeville stage to become one of the most famous African American entertainers of the 1950s and '60s (and the only black member of Frank Sinatra's Rat Pack). At the same time, he spent most of his career surrounded by controversy and ridicule--over his affairs with white film stars like Kim Novak and Jean Seberg; his 1960 marriage to Swedish actress May Britt; his conversion to Judaism; his closeness to the Kennedys and, later, Richard Nixon; and his problems with alcohol and drugs. Davis comes alive in this collection of writings about him, including a 1966 Playboy interview by Alex Haley; an excerpt from the 1983 autobiography of porn star Linda Lovelace; profiles from The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, and The Saturday Evening Post; and articles from many prominent African American periodicals. The Sammy Davis, Jr. Reader is a composite portrait of a complex, self-conscious man and the society that treated him, for more than forty years, with passionate ambivalence.

The Sammy Davis, Jr. Reader

Davis Jr., Sammy

Humor & Entertainment

Farrar. Straus and Giroux

Yes I Can: The Story of Sammy Davis, Jr.

When Sammy Davis, Jr. published his autobiography in 1965, it was an immediate long-running bestseller as well as a revelation. Yes I Can describes Sammy Davis's personal conviction, the view of success that both propelled him to stardom from ghetto obscurity and served as his armor against racism.

Biographies & Memoirs

Boyar, Burt

Boyar, Jane

Eddie Murphy

Arts & Literature

Farrar. Straus & Giroux

Sammy Davis, Jr. (1925-90) rose from childhood stardom on the vaudeville stage to become one of the most famous African American entertainers of the 1950s and '60s (and the only black member of Frank Sinatra's Rat Pack). At the same time, he spent most of his career surrounded by controversy and ridicule--over his affairs with white film stars, his 1960 marriage to Swedish actress May Britt, his conversion to Judaism, his closeness to the Kennedys (and later Richard Nixon), and his problems with alcohol and drugs. When Davis published his first memoir, Yes, I Can, in 1965, it was a critical and popular success--acclaimed for a candor and thoughtfulness rare in celebrity autobiographies and for its painful evocation of life as a black peformer in segregated America. Davis's 1980 memoir, Why Me?, laid bare Davis's troubled relationship to the Kennedys, his ambivalence toward the Black Pride movement, the end of his marriage to Britt (and his complex open marriage with Altovise Davis), and his flamboyant, self-loathing misbehavior, from ruinous extravagance to flirtations with Satanism. Davis's co-writer Burt Boyar has revised Davis's memoirs, incorporating material from unpublished interviews, and has added a new introduction and epilogue. The result is a testament to an unacknowledged--often uncomfortable--leader in the struggle for racial equality.

Sammy: The Autobiography of Sammy Davis, Jr.

Why Me? is the self-portrait of one of the extraordinary men of our time, who became a figure of controversy because he dared to live his life not as a Negro but as a man. "I've got to be a star like another man has to breathe," write Sammy Davis. "I've got to get so big, so powerful, so famous that the day will come when they'll look at me and see a man, and then somewhere along the way they'll notice he's a Negro."

Why Me?

Random House Value Publishing

Why Me? is the self-portrait of one of the extraordinary men of our time, who became a figure of controversy because he dared to live his life not as a Negro but as a man. "I've got to be a star like another man has to breathe," write Sammy Davis. "I've got to get so big, so powerful, so famous that the day will come when they'll look at me and see a man, and then somewhere along the way they'll notice he's a Negro."

Why Me? (Sequel to YES I CAN)

Boyar, Jane and Burt

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

YES I CAN is the self-portrait of one of the extraordinary men of our time, who became a figure of controversy because he dared to live his life not as a Negro but as a man. "I've got to be a star like another man has to breathe," write Sammy Davis. "I've got to get so big, so powerful, so famous that the day will come when they'll look at me and see a man, and then somewhere along the way they'll notice he's a Negro." YES I CAN is: ..".one of the most candid, engrossing and important American autobiographies of our time," wrote the N.Y. Herald Tribune Book Editor and Critic Maurice Dolbier. "One of the really great autobiographies ever written." Brother Judd . Audible.com

Yes I Can: The Story of Sammy Davis Jr.

Rare Bird Books, A Barnacle Book

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