Upon arrival at the theater and wandering around trying to locate where to enter, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I was seven seats from the front row, with a wonderful view! The hosts for the evening came on stage and informed the audience that James Darren had donated all the proceeds from his show to the Plano Symphony Orchestra, which is raising funds to build their own facility in Plano, TX. A very lovely thing for him to do, I must say.

Shortly thereafter, the Man Of The Hour took the stage. Mr. Darren looked fabulous in a dark black suit with black pin stripes down the pant legs, a dazzling white shirt and black bow tie (just the right size!). He looked relaxed, healthy, and unbelievably handsome for a man only two years younger than my Mom!

In between songs Mr. Darren entertained and delighted us with little asides such as "Bill Shatner just got married again - he doesn't mess around". He jokingly referred to the louder portions of the audience as his "mom" traveling the room. He mentioned that his little neighborhood in Philadelphia had brought forth a lot of entertainers such as Mario Lanza, Al Martino, Frankie Avalon and Fabian. He said: "I used to sit on Frankie's knee and Frankie would say 'you're going to be a great singer some day', and I'd say 'Thank you Uncle Frankie'."

James said he and his wife had traveled to Paris with Frankie Avalon and his wife, that they were "sick" the way they hung out together. He then told an old Dean Martin joke about his wife saying they had been in Paris for three days and she hadn't gone to the Louvre, and he replied: "I told her it was probably the water".

He mentioned that he was Godfather to Nancy Sinatra's oldest daughter, Angela Jennifer, adding that Nancy told him she thought her father was going to ask him and later that day "three guys showed up to the house and it was official".

Soon he was running a slide show of his past movies and tv appearances. There were scenes showing him getting run over in a phone booth on TJ Hooker and being slugged in Hawaii 5-0. The only problem was there was no sound! James said "Jimmy, what are you guys doing? Did I wake you? We're still doing silent films here". Then he said "Am I alone out here? This is getting scary". We then saw several scenes with James getting slapped by female co-stars before a man came to the edge of the stage and explained they had an equipment problem and would James like to do the slide show in the second half.

Without missing a beat, in a completely unruffled and gracious manner, James said "Sure" and sang the song which was supposed to open the second half of the show, which instead closed the first half for intermission.

When James came out to sing in the second half some folks started taking polaroids of him. He laughed and said: "You know how big I'm going to be when you get that back from the developer?" He held up his hand to display approximately a quarter inch and added: "About that big. You won't know if I'm James Darren or Johnny Mathis!"

The second half of the show picked up with the film clips, including ones from the Flintstones; James getting slapped by several female stars; a piece from The Donna Reed show with Shelley Fabares fainting; and then James kissing all these onscreen stars like Angie Dickinson, Heather Locklear, etc. He said his job was very "difficult and demanding" but that he was a "perfectionist."

One clip was from the movie "For Those Who Think Young". James told us that usually he did his own stunts, but for the scene where he falls down a flight of stairs with a surf board, that was actually his brother, John.

The last slides were of his wedding to Evy, shown with the song Young at Heart playing in the background. This was one of the highlights of the evening and very sweet of him to share his wedding day movies with us. James sang a rendition of Everybody Loves Somebody and played home movies of Dean Martin with his wife Jeannie. I have to tell you it was a chore for me to decide who to watch - James or the screen! (Actually I did the tennis match thing, back and forth.) I've read many books about Dean Martin which portray him as a cold and unaffectionate man who did not connect with people. However, if you could have seen those film clips of him kissing his wife Jeannie I'm sure you would have found this difficult to believe. There were at least 20 different scenes of him kissing Jeannie and they were lovely to behold.

James said old movies are from a much simpler time, where the worst thing that could happen to a teenager was "they might get a pimple. Now, they show you how to make babies." My favorite part of the show was the Blues Medley. I can't remember all the songs he sang but one of them I do remember was Stormy Weather. I swear you could have heard a pin drop during this medley. It was awesome! I'm hoping that it makes his next release. I thought it was fabulous - he really had that audience in the palm of his hand at that particular point.

I also loved his renditions of There's No Such Thing and Our Day Will Come. They sounded terrific live! The majority of the audience were in their 40s and 50s and were not nearly as appreciative as I thought they should be; they waited until the last note sounded before they clapped after any song he sang (it was excruciating to me). But James came back for an encore after what was supposed to be his final song and sang World on A String (which was supposed to have closed the first half of the show) and got the standing ovation that he truly deserved. Then the show was oh, too soon over. An experience I will probably never get to repeat.

All in all, it was a night I will remember for a long time and I was ever so glad that I did not allow the fact that I had to go by myself keep me from attending this event. James did mention that he likes Texas: Dallas, Houston and my current home town, Austin! Now if we can just get him to come HERE ...

Still Reminiscing - Rejane