Bobby Darin was a musical icon of the '50s and '60s, best known for hits like "Splish Splash," "Dream Lover," "Mack the Knife," and "Beyond the Sea." Beginning his career as a songwriter for other artists and later becoming a headlining performer, he quickly gained fame for penning chart topping tunes, even earning multiple Grammy Awards.
Darin also enjoyed a thriving film career. He appeared in scores of films including Come September, which earned him a Golden Globe Award in 1961. While on set for the film, he met his wife, the actress Sandra Dee. The pair had one son, Dodd Mitchell Darin, who was reportedly the apple of their eye. Sadly, Bobby Darin died in 1973 at the age of 37 following a heart operation in Los Angeles. His son, now the spitting image of his famous father, was just 12 at the time. Today, Dodd Darin is carrying on his parents' legacy, and passing it on to the next generation. Read on to see him now.
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With two world-famous parents, it's no surprise that Dodd Darin felt the desire to share his family story with the world. In 1994, he published the biography Dream Lovers: The Magnificent Shattered Lives of Bobby Darin and Sandra Dee, which detailed the couple's whirlwind relationship and divorce, their complicated upbringings, and soaring careers.
"It was my humble attempt to make them immortal, to capture forever their contributions, their interesting lives on the written page," Dodd said in an interview with late talk show host Skip E. Lowe. "In the case of my dad, two other books had been written unauthorized, and I felt that with a film coming out about his life, someone would do this very book. I wanted to control it, and I wanted to tell it from a place of love and honesty. And so, who better to write it than myself?" he said.
Additionally, Dodd oversees his father's music catalog, and controls his late parents' names and likenesses.
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Though ultimately the book is a tribute to his parents, it also pulled back the curtain on some of their darkest secrets. The biography is unflinching in its telling of Bobby Darin's childhood illness, how the singer learned in his 30s that the woman he believed was his sister was in fact his mother, Sandra Dee's struggles with addiction, and the sexual abuse she endured as a child. "Their story, it looked glamorous, it looked perfect from the outside—but it was far from it," Dodd explained in a filmed interview while promoting a stage adaptation of his book.
Dodd says that while his mother's story accounts for some of the book's most painful moments, she too found meaning in sharing the story with the public. "An important thing to realize is that my mom contributed to the book and gave it her full blessings, and without that I don't think I could've done it," he told Lowe. "It would have been too painful. If she was not a part of it, I couldn't have written it," he added.
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Alexa and Olivia Darin, the only grandchildren of the star couple, never got to meet their grandfather. But the elder of the girls, Alexa, was named after her grandmother—the actress was born Alexandra Zuck—and fondly remembers spending time with her as a child.
"I am always learning more about my grandmother and grandfather," Alexa told the Daily Mail. "I was fortunate to have shared many good years with my Grandma before she passed. She shared many fascinating stories with me about what it was like to be a young girl growing up in the public eye. My dad also shares stories about his father's life because we weren't fortunate enough to meet him since he died when dad was only 12."
She added that her greatest wish would be to have a conversation with both of her grandparents now, so she could ask them about their lives. "My grandma and grandpa continue to inspire me every day," she said. "It was probably around the age of 15 that I truly began to understand the magnitude of their fame and how many people they touched through doing what they loved."
Though Dodd never pursued a life in the limelight, instead focusing on preserving his parents' careers, his two daughters hope to follow in their grandparents' footsteps. While speaking with Daily Mail, the pair shared that they hope to someday pursue careers in Hollywood themselves, either in acting or modeling.
"As far as the future, I am still trying to put together the pieces of my life in some way that I can find clarity in what I want for the future," said Alexa. "I know that my grandfather had a great work ethic and never say die attitude, and I hope I inherited that from him."
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