THE IDOLMAKER, about starmaking, should have made one of Ray Sharkey, who arcs a high voltage current of galvanizing energy, passion and desperate bravado into the title character, a rock ‘n’ roll songwriter & promoter in the pony tail days. Edward di Lorenzo’s script was loosely based on Bob Marcucci, (1930-2011) who suggested the/his story to producer Gene Kirkwood (Gorky Park, The Pope Of Greenwich Village) and served as technical advisor on the shoot, Taylor Hackford’s feature debut as a director.  Time and again, as the screenplay presents and history proves, show biz glory can exact an inglorious toll. *

Brooklyn, 1959. At twenty-seven, ‘Vincent Vacarie’ (Sharkey, 27), restaurant waiter and aspiring songwriter, sees a way out of the dinner rush when he swallows pride and takes a loan from his dad to start up a record company and promote saxophone player ‘Tomaso DeLorusso’ (Paul Land, 24, debut) as pop singer ‘Tommy Dee’. The new face is a smug punk but has stage charisma and teenagers, especially girls, go bananas over him. Vinnie schmoozes “Teen Scene” magazine editor ‘Brenda Roberts’ (Tovah Feldshuh) into helping out, then success spawns imitation when he plucks another young guy out of obscurity and turns shy teenage busboy ‘Guido Bevaloqua’ (Peter Gallegher’, 24, feature debut) into the “sensation” known as ‘Caesare’. Burning drive may turn clay into gold, but  it can inflate egos, sunder relationships and, as anyone who ever owned a 45 rpm record knows, the flip side wasn’t the one you bought it for. Now read all that back aloud in a ‘bada bing’ Italian-American accent. Capisce? Heyyy…

In the wake of the popular retro-band Sha Na Na, and the cherished instant-classic American Graffiti (and its silly TV ripoff Happy Days), the pessimistic 70s and 80s were awash with nostalgic revisits to the 50s and 60s (The Buddy Holly Story, La Bamba, Grease, American Hot Wax, The Wanderers, Diner, The Outsiders, Back To The Future, Dirty Dancing, Stand By Me, 1969, Peggy Sue Got Married, The Lords Of Flatbush) and The Idolmaker waded into the lineup late in 1980. Regrettably, the well-reviewed, excellently acted $7,000,000+ production was poorly marketed by United Artists; their poster ads were garish and misleading and the box office only tallied $2,627,000, 127th on the charts. Tragically, drug addiction and disease would take Sharkey’s career, his marriages, eventually his life.

Sharkey gives it his all as a version of Marcucci. The inference is the Tommy Dee character was a swipe at Frankie Avalon, Marcucci’s breakout ‘find’ and Ceasare is a stand-in for Fabian. Feldshuh’s role was based on Rona Barrett (yeesh!). Accuracy isn’t a strong suit, but all of the actors are very good. Gallegher does his own singing (on Broadway he’d been in Hair and had played ‘Danny in Grease) while Land is dubbed by Jesse Frederick. The riotous bopper reaction isn’t far from the mark, but the overtly suggestive body posturing during the stage and TV gigs is more keyed to a later generation than anything that was mainstreamed when Ike & JFK were in office: even Elvis and Jackie Wilson didn’t thrust & grind like Tommy Dee and Caesare. Veteran hitmaker Jeff Barry whipped up a couple of pretty good tunes. **

117 minutes, with Joe Pantoliano (28, debut, riffing Marcucci’s partner Phil DeAngelis), Mario Vaccari, Maureen McCormick, John Aprea, Richard Bright (showing considerably more emotion than usual), Olympia Dukakis, Darlene Love (lead singer of The Crystals), Deney Terrio (choreographing the grinds) and Nino Tempo (on instrumental duty). Plus some boss ’61 T-bird convertibles!

* Be-Bop-Be-Careful—-Fabian, 37, when it came out, was not pleased: he sued for sixty-four million bucks, charging defamation of character and invasion of privacy. His quote: “Yes, and won. They settled out of court. I made them apologize to my wife and family in the Hollywood Reporter and Variety. Also Bob Marcucci owned seven and a half per cent of that film. Now I own it.”    Avalon, 40 at the time, also disputed the veracity of the picture. Marcucci may have been as driven as Vinnie, but Frankie and Fabian were decent young guys, and as industry icons and survivors they had reason to be upset with the flick. Ray Sharkey’s real life self-demolition was awful; his fans will appreciate his intensity in this flashy movie, and be reminded of his stellar turn as ‘Sonny Steelgrave’ in the first season of TVs Wiseguy. 

** Though the songs and how they’re performed are anachronistic they do have some brush of the authentic: Jeff Barry co-wrote “Do Wah Diddy Diddy”, “Da Doo Run Run”, “Be My Baby”, “Chapel Of Love”, “Tell Laura I Love Her”, “Then He Kiss Me”, “Leader Of The Pack” and “Sugar, Sugar”, among others. You had to be there, daddy-o, and not make like a ‘square’. Face the music: Rock and Roll Is Here to Stay.