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Rat Pack tribute show feels like coming home
By John Benson
David DeCosta never lived in Northeast Ohio; however, the Frank Sinatra cover singer can’t help but feel as though he’s returning home.
“My dad [Ronald Shandor] is from Youngstown, and when I was a child we used to visit,” said DeCosta, calling from Las Vegas. “My dad had a great childhood. It was a nice family-oriented blue-collar town.
“My dad was also a singer, and he was a big fan of the Rat Pack. He got his musical training in Youngstown. He moved to Chicago at 16 and started performing. Unfortunately, he lost his voice at 35. He was a great singer. He still plays guitar.”
Today, DeCosta is keeping the family craft – his brothers are also musicians – alive as part of the widely popular tribute act The Rat Pack is Back!, which comes to Warren on Saturday for a show at Packard Music Hall.
As far as joining the ring-a-ding-ding! outfit, DeCosta’s journey began more than a decade ago when he was asked to sing at a Chicago bar previously owned by Sinatra’s best friend and bodyguard, Jilly Rizzo.
“I really have to say it comes pretty natural to me,” DeCosta said. “I think the hardest part is mimicking his voice. Nobody quite had a voice like Sinatra. He had such a rich, warm, fat, thick tone. And that’s what people expect to hear. That’s the most important part to me.”
For four years, DeCosta sang hits by Ol’ Blue Eyes before he went to Miami performing at the Fountainebleau Hotel, which the Rat Pack frequented in the ’50s.
“I ran into a producer who came to hear me perform,” DeCosta said. “Basically, he handed me a script and asked if I could start the following week. That was a lot of work because I never did any acting. That was 11 years ago. Now The Rat Pack is Back! is the longest-running show in Las Vegas.”
When not on tour, the outfit – DeCosta, Drew Anthony (Dean Martin) and Kyle Diamond (Sammy Davis Jr.) – regularly appears at Sin City hotel The Tuscany, taking audiences back to the golden era of The Sands. The 75-minute tribute show includes jokes, skits and career-spanning songs such as “Volare,” “New York, New York,” “My Way,” “That’s Amore,” “Old Black Magic,” “Fly Me To The Moon,” “Candy Man,” “Got A Lot of Living To Do” and “Memories Are Made of This.”
“Our show is basically being on stage having a party, with the audience invited to join us,” DeCosta said. “We consider them the fourth Rat Pack member. So we break down the wall right away. We try to give them a taste of everything. The comedy is tasteful, written well. It’s a little edgy, but it’s done in good taste. But you have to understand these guys were edgy. It was 1960 when they were performing.”
Though there are tribute shows galore these days, DeCosta said The Rat Pack is Back! transcends the, well, pack.
“I have to tell you, throughout the years I worked with many Rat Packs,” DeCosta said. “I’ve done shows around the world, and I’d say this team of guys is the closest you’re going to get to seeing the Rat Pack ever again.”