King of the Sunset Strip: Hangin' with Mickey Cohen and the Hollywood Mob
Stevens traded Mickey Mouse for Mickey Cohen in 1959, after the mob mogul saw him play a "tuff guy" onscreen and sent a fan letter. Only 19, Stevens, who'd worked with Annette Funicello on The Mickey Mouse Club, was making the transition from child to adult actor, and under the tutelage of Cohen, he grew up fast in a world of guns, gambling, strippers and celebrities. Though the story is the familiar "innocent lured to the dark side by money, glamour and charisma" arc, Stevens and Lockwood's narrative chugs along after a slow start thanks to some snappy patter ("I was producing enough testosterone to make a major deposit in the Federal Sperm Bank") and the lure of the Hollywood mob-Ricky Nelson, Dean Martin and, of course, Frank Sinatra have cameos. The authors don't flinch from depicting the brutality Stevens endured at the hands of both Cohen and the cops, nor do they hesitate to bestow credit on the mob king when his men aid Stevens's father after a beating by thugs. Contrary to the title, however, this is Stevens's story. Cohen may have ruled the strip, but he's a supporting character in this memoir.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.