Here she is, sublimely out of style in 1969 (on "The Ed Sullivan Show"):
It's perfectly lovely to be square. She was adored on TikTok just this past year.
July 17, 2025
"Like the singer and songwriter Bobby Darin, with whom she was romantically involved until her father chased him off with a gun when she was in her late teens..."
"... Ms. Francis reached out beyond her teenage audience, recording material that made her a natural in Las Vegas as well as in nightclubs like the Copacabana in New York. She was also a sought-after entertainer on television variety shows. She briefly tried performing before teenage audiences, but she found that she did not care for the experience. 'I always remember receiving much more applause from teenagers when I was introduced than at any other time during the show — especially after my closing number,' she wrote in her memoir. 'After my name was announced and the squeals of delight subsided, it was downhill all the way.'"
Posts
11 comments:
I always thought she looked a bit like Angie Dickinson. She was definitely not the tenor of the times. RIP.
What an amazing voice and an amazing life. Suprising no one made a movie out of it. Some good German and Italian songs in her song list.
RIP. There was a biopic in the works, with Gloria Estefan cast to play Connie Francis. But they disagreed on writers, and parted ways unamicably.
Liked Who's Sorry Now and Mama best. But all her Italian and German songs were good.
Thanks be to God for John, Paul, George and Ringo. "Pretty Baby" was dire dreck. Unredeemable, unremarkable but mostly, unlistenable.
You can also find her performing the song on 1960 Ed Sullivan
Simpler dress and different arrangement. Song introduced by Sinatra end of WW2. I have Paul Robeson recording.
She and Frank Gorshin, the latter wearing coke bottle glasses, were an interesting couple in "Where the Boys Are."
I had a comment ready, but it was about Connie Stevens.
So I got nothing.
I've listened to her a lot on Spotify. I like her stuff now--I liked her stuff at all the other times along the way since "Lipstick on My Collar".
Her real name is Concetta Rosa Maria Franconero. To me, that's like finding out John Wayne is "Marion Morrison" or John Ford is "Sean Aloysius Feeney." Or Cary Grant is "Archie Leach."
These are all real artists. But if they kept it real, none of them would have made it. How would you like to be Mrs. Leach?
Anyway, she sold 100 million records. Big star. Not to my taste. But her life story is interesting. She was a child star, and reading her wikipedia page, the vibe I get is that she's like one of those professional athletes, brought up by her father to be a success. A lot of failures and setbacks all during her teen years.
Interesting line: Francis considered a career in medicine and was about to accept a four-year scholarship at New York University.. And then she finally had a hit record with a song she hated, and her Dad made her sing. "Who's Sorry Now?"
RIP.
Everyone should have a best of Connie Francis in their collection.
Post a Comment
Please use the comments forum to respond to the post. Don't fight with each other. Be substantive... or interesting... or funny. Comments should go up immediately... unless you're commenting on a post older than 2 days. Then you have to wait for us to moderate you through. It's also possible to get shunted into spam by the machine. We try to keep an eye on that and release the miscaught good stuff. We do delete some comments, but not for viewpoint... for bad faith.