Rydell's Next show --
The Army
There's something about Bobby. Everybody who knows
him says so and that includes me. He's neat.
I've known Ramblin' Rydell for going on five years as a top-ranking
record star, concert artist, movie actor, TV comedian, hilarious mimic, stage hoofer,
drummer, musician, ace swimmer, golf addict, glove trotter, spaghetti lover, girl watcher
and all-around good egg.
We've rubbed shoulders at parties, swapped stories and shot pictures
backstage 'twixt acts, dated the same dollies and had a raft of laughs. We never settled
down to do a real with-it bull session, however, so I never did learn his innermost
thoughts, ideas, ideals, hopes and dreams.
For Teen Set readers we were going to do it but before we got
to it, the army grabbed Bobby, handed him a khaki suit, shooting iron, plate of beans, and
orders to drill around for a pair of months. All I can tell you now is my impressions and
the bare facts of his life.
He wailed his first musical note on the morning of April 26, 1942,
in a hospital at South Philly, Pa., and was duly noted on the records as Robert Ridarelli,
boy.
By the age of nine, Bobby was full of musical pizzazz and
razz-ma-tazz, playing drums more than baseball. He was auditioned and hired as a steady on
Paul Whiteman's TV Teen Club show, launching his showbiz career and changing his
handle from Ridarelli to the simpler Rydell for obvious reasons.
As a mid-teener Bobby sang and drummed with a hot rock group playing
club dates in eastern cities. The act was caught one night by an artists' manager, Frankie
Day, the genii who plucked him from the combo and transformed him into a polished
performer in all the theatrical arts.
Frankie put Bobby through a grinding schedule of study, practice,
rehearsal and non-stop work. His first disk, Kissin' Time, sprung the charts an
catapulted him into orbit as a top teen songster. He took to the road where the big money
is. Early in 1962 he played the New York Copacabana ("No Minors Allowed") and
did so well with the older habitues that owner Jules Podell offered Bobby a 20-year
contract.
That same year he copped the comedy role of Hugo in the musical film
Bye,Bye Birdie, and he loved every minute of it with hip-swinging, hair-tossing,
rock-jiving Ann-Margret.
Batched of new movie scripts were sent to him after that success but
he said no to all.
"What I really look for is a good story and good role in a
grade-A picture," he told friends. "I was asked many times to appear in rock 'n
roll films but the story, or lack of one, was always the same -- a string of hit songs
thrown together without any plot whatsoever. I also didn't want to play in any shows or
pictures that glorify juvenile delinquency."
Television lures him again and again. Red Skelton is mad about the
guy and had him on the show three times in one season. Danny Thomas, George Burns, Perry
Como, Jack Benny, Ed Sullivan, Tennessee Ernie Ford and all the great TV stars put him on
more than once or signed him to future dealies.
For further experience he played summer stock with West Side
Story and Tom Sawyer. He'll do anything to learn something new. All the while
his singles and albums were causing commotion on the best-selling tallies.
In 1964, Bobby passed a couple of important milestones. He signed
with Capitol Records and he made his debut as a dramatic actor on ABC-TV's Combat.
"I feel that I have to keep growing. My ambition is to become
as well-rounded an entertainer as Sammy Davis, Jr.," he told interviewers. "some
day I may do less singing and concentrate on acting. One of my goals is to do a legitimate
play on Broadway. I'm never happier than when I'm working in front of a live audience.
Sometimes I tell myself I would rather be a hungry actor than an overfed singer."
Bobby has received and continues to receive many awards from the
recording and television industry as well as other citations and plaques from towns and
civic charity organizations across the nation.
He never says nay to a charity show and has a heart as big as a
hippo.
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