Sinatra show Raw heading for Sunderland's Fire Station

Sinatra: Raw depicts Old Blue Eyes at The Purple Room, Palm Springs in 1971, his last pre-retirement show. It arrives at The Fire Station on Sunday, November 5.

It was written by its star Richard Shelton, “internationally acclaimed as one of the world’s best interpreters of Frank Sinatra’s music”.

Richard is known for his two-year stint as the murderous Dr Adam Forsythe in Emmerdale. He has portrayed Sinatra in Rat Pack Confidential on the London stage and is known to TV audiences in the US for roles in Jane The Virgin and House of Lies.

He has recorded albums at Abbey Road and at Capitol Studios in LA, performed at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, Catalina Jazz Club, Vibrato and Vitello’s Jazz in LA and with the Royal Philharmonic and the BBC Concert Orchestra.

The play, performed as a cabaret, debuted at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2018 after the idea came to Richard when he was actually performing in The Purple Lounge.

He said: “The guy who runs the Lounge told me how Frank Sinatra had stood on this stage at this tiny supper club in Palm Springs and performed In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning. That was a very dark period of his life because he’d split from Ava Gardner and he was morose.

“He said, in this room, when Sinatra was singing from this album, it was all so dark and depressing. Dean Martin was in the audience and shouted out ‘for god’s sake, lighten up, pally’ and Sinatra said something back and the room relaxed, it was the actual beginning of that act.

“It just sparked something for me and I just thought this is a way to examine how Frank Sinatra must have felt when he got into his mid-fifties and decided to retire.

“The show starts with a very laid-back intimate vibe in the room in which he played but then of course as he drinks, he reminisces more and he starts to, in his own mind, answer questions that have been raised and levelled against him.”

To book tickets, visit www.sunderlandculture.org.uk.