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WORK TITLE: Dinner with DiMaggio
WORK NOTES: with John A. Positano
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE:
WEBSITE:
CITY: Brooklyn
STATE: NY
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
http://www.simonandschuster.com/authors/Rock-Positano/2116360884 * https://www.hss.edu/physicians_positano-rock.asp
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Male.
EDUCATION:New York University, B.A., M.Sc.; New York College of Podiatric Medicine, D.P.M.; Yale University School of Medicine, M.P.H.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Podiatrist. Hospital for Special Surgery, New York, NY, founder and director of the Non-Surgical Foot and Ankle Service, 1991-; Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Center at HSS, founder and director; Weill Cornell Medical College, clinical assistant professor.
WRITINGS
Has written and edited several peer-reviewed articles and has edited medical textbooks.
SIDELIGHTS
Dr. Rock G. Positano and his brother, lawyer and writer John A. Positano, collaborated on the memoir Dinner with DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero, which chronicles Rock’s friendship with New York Yankees baseball icon Joe DiMaggio. An internationally known podiatrist and sports doctor who specializes in nonsurgical treatment of foot disorders, Rock treated DiMaggio for a heel injury that benched the player in 1949 and forced his retirement in 1951.
Since 1991, Rock has worked at the Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) in New York City, where he is director of the Non-Surgical Foot and Ankle Service. He is also founder and director of the Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Center at HSS. With a medical degree from New York College of Podiatric Medicine, Positano also teaches and is a clinical assistant professor at Weill Cornell Medical College. John A. Positano is a lawyer, radio producer, war game developer, and writer. He is associate producer of The Joe Piscopo Show and the weekly Live from Downtown New York City radio shows. He holds a degree from New York Law School and has argued federal cases. He also writes articles on the military and law for such media outlets as LI Pulse, Huffington Post, and New York Daily News.
Forty years younger than DiMaggio (1914–1999), Rock was his confidant during DiMaggio’s final years and served as his dinner companion, wingman, and go-between. Rock describes how the typically private baseball icon was a mentor who shared with him stories of Lou Gehrig, Joe Louis, and Mickey Mantle; discussed his romantic life and issues of faith, politics, and family loyalty; and spoke about his friend turned enemy Frank Sinatra and ex-wife Marilyn Monroe. Rock also delves into DiMaggio’s moodiness, temper, and arrogance. Falling short of hero worship, “the narrative provides wonderful glimpses of DiMaggio’s integrity, kindness, and sensitivity,” according to a Publishers Weekly reviewer, who added that Rock portrays DiMaggio as a complicated man who jealously guarded his image.
With the help of John, Rock “renders a wholly human portrait of an American icon navigating his way through an adoring yet relentlessly demanding public,” noted Alan Moores in Booklist. A writer in Kirkus Reviews contended that the book will have the most appeal to baseball fans and that “the sections that explore DiMaggio’s mean streak and inflexibility are diluted by Positano’s interjections of the great man’s virtues.” Acknowledging that readers don’t have to be baseball fans to enjoy the book, Karl Helicher said in Library Journal that the memoir “explores such universal themes as friendship, celebrity, aging, and mortality.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, May 1, 2017, Alan Moores, review of Dinner with DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero, p. 50.
Kirkus Reviews, March 1, 2017, review of Dinner with DiMaggio.
Library Journal, April 1, 2017, Karl Helicher, review of Dinner with DiMaggio, p. 90.
Publishers Weekly, March 13, 2017, review of Dinner with DiMaggio, p. 73.
ONLINE
Kirkus Reviews, https://www.kirkusreviews.com (February 13, 2017), review of Dinner with DiMaggio.
It’s about the Money, http://itsaboutthemoney.net (May 8, 2017), review of Dinner with DiMaggio.
Rock G. Positano, DPM, MSc, MPH
Non-surgical Foot and Ankle, Sports Medicine, Podiatry
HSS Main Campus - River Terrace
519 East 72nd Street
Suite 203A
New York
NY
10021
Tel:
212.606.1858
Fax:
212.774.2370
Overview
Education
Publications
Research
Spanish: Español (pdf)
Italian: Italiano (pdf)
French: Français (pdf)
German: Deutsch (pdf)
Portuguese: Português (pdf)
Turkish: Türkçe (pdf)
Greek (pdf)
Japanese (pdf)
Chinese (pdf)
Arabic (pdf)
Korean (pdf)
Russian (pdf)
Hebrew (pdf)
Dr. Rock G. Positano has been on staff at Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) since 1991 and is nationally known for his non-surgical approach for the treatment of foot disorders. He serves in the capacity of Founder and Director of the Non-surgical Foot and Ankle Service and the Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Center at HSS. Dr. Positano was featured on the front page of the New York Times (Dec. 7, 2003) in an article concerning the dangers of cosmetic foot surgery. He has authored and edited numerous peer reviewed articles and has served as the editor of 8 medical textbooks ranging from foot and ankle orthopedics to sports medicine. His thesis on Foot Health was approved with "Honors" and "With Distinction" by the faculty of the Yale School of Medicine.
The Non-surgical Foot and Ankle Service is dedicated to evaluating the majority of foot and ankle problems that often can be treated successfully without surgery. This service is dedicated to providing non-surgical treatment for foot and ankle problems and is the very first in the greater New York area located at a major orthopedic teaching hospital dedicated to orthopedic/musculoskeletal care and research in developing non-surgical treatments for foot and ankle ailments as well as optimizing the relationship between foot function and the effects on the knee, hip and lower back disorders.
The service is nationally renowned for its expertise in the design and fabrication of prescription foot orthotics used to treat many orthopedic foot and ankle problems. In addition, foot orthotics are prescribed to treat biomechanically related problems involving the knee, hip, and lower back, as these conditions are often responsive to the stability and improved mechanics that these devices provide.
The service treats non-complicated fractures of the foot/ankle and has a direct affiliation and access to the Sports Medicine Service, the Orthopedic Trauma Service (OTS) at Hospital for Special Surgery and NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, the Limb Lengthening and Deformity Service, and the Orthopedic Service of the Department of Surgery at MSKCC.
The Non-surgical Foot and Ankle Service provides access to state of the art diagnostic testing that includes diagnostic ultrasound, computerized motion and gait analysis, bone densitometry, MRI, CAT scan, X-rays, and bone scans.
Back in the Game Patient Stories
All 24 patient stories »
Appointments
Director and Founder, Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Foot and Ankle Center
Director and Founder, Non-surgical Foot and Ankle Service, Department of Orthopaedics, Hospital for Special Surgery
Director, The Foot Center / Sports Medicine, Orthopedic Trauma Service, NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical College
Clinical Assistant Professor, Weill Cornell Medical College
Faculty, Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Weill Cornell Medicine
Faculty, Department of Medicine/Endocrinology, Weill Cornell Medicine
Faculty, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Weill Cornell Medicine
Professor and Chairman, Department of Academic Orthopedic Surgery, New York College of Podiatric Medicine / Foot Center of New York
Foot and Ankle Consultant, Orthopedic Service of the Department of Surgery at Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSKCC)
Deputy Chairman of the Board, New York College of Podiatric Medicine / Foot Center of New York
Specialty
Non-surgical Foot and Ankle
Sports Medicine
Podiatry
Affiliations
Sports Medicine Service
Orthopedic Trauma Service
HSS Spine
The New York Mets, Foot and Ankle Consultant
The New York Giants, Foot and Ankle Consultant
Limb Lengthening and Deformity Service
The Associated Press, Sports Medicine Consultant (Foot and Ankle)
CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, FOX, PAX, Television Foot Consultant
New York Daily News, Weekly Sports Medicine Columnist
The Huffington Post, Weekly Health Columnist
Office of the Chief Medical Examiner, City of New York (Forensic Identification), Consultant
Education
MPH, Yale School of Medicine - Master of Public Health, New Haven, Connecticut
DPM, New York College of Podiatric Medicine - Doctor of Podiatric Medicine, New York
MSc, NYU School of Medicine - Master of Science, New York
BA, NYU College of Arts and Science, New York
Fellowship
Foot Clinics of New York, New York
Yale School of Medicine
NYU Medical Center- Institute of Environmental Medicine, New York
State Licensure
New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island
A Foot Doctor Who Learned at a Renaissance Man’s Knee
Added by paul on February 4, 2016.
Saved under Health, NYC
Tags: Yale University, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, Brown University, NYU, Achilles tendon, Dr. Brian Halpern, Dr. Rock G. Positano, Dr. Thomas J.A. Lehman, Dr. Thomas P. Sculco, flat arches, hammer toes, Hospital for Special Surgery, Leonard da Vinci, New York College of Podiatric Medicine, New York-Presbyterian/ Weill Cornell Medical College, pediatricians
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Dr. Rock G. Positano. | HOSPITAL FOR SPECIAL SURGERY
BY PAUL SCHINDLER | Successful professionals, when asked what inspired their interest and passion for their field of endeavor, will often recall a favorite professor or an older practitioner whose work they admire.
Dr. Rock G. Positano, the director of the Non-Surgical Foot and Ankle Service at the Upper East Side’s Hospital for Special Surgery, looks a bit further back in time when answering the question — to the 15th and 16th centuries.
“My interest in the foot and the ankle came from my study of da Vinci’s anatomical drawings,” he said. “He was amazed that this small device had to carry a human body all their life.”
Explaining that the original Renaissance Man thought about the human body in much the same way he investigated the impact of pulleys and levers in the rudimentary machines he sketched out, Positano said, “I figured da Vinci couldn’t be all wrong.”
Rock Positano builds a career on non-surgical solutions for most podiatric challenges
The most important insight Positano gained by starting from da Vinci’s perspective is that “feet are the pedestal of the body.” The two most important factors in the average person’s quality of life, the foot specialist believes, are the ability to see and the ability to walk.
And here’s where the “non-surgical” part of Positano’s work comes from: “With foot and ankle surgery, you could do textbook perfect surgery, but that there is no guarantee it will work the same way. You don’t want to take a part of the body that is working and change it.”
As with any surgery, Positano explained, “joint preservation is key,” but if surgery creates or exacerbates problems in the foot or the ankle, the impact of those problems can easily migrate “up the chain” to the knees, hips, and lower back. Positano and his colleagues at the Hospital for Special Surgery, he said, are always mindful of the relationship among pathologies in all these parts of the body.
The vast majority of foot and ankle problems, he said, can be successfully and more safely addressed without surgical intervention. That’s a perspective that wins broad agreement among foot care specialists today, but that wasn’t always the case, Positano argued.
“I’d like to think I was a trailblazer,” he said. “Back in the ‘70s, there was a lot of emphasis on what were termed minimally invasive procedures for problems like bunions. Unfortunately, the long term outcome was often not good.”
After earning his bachelor’s degree at NYU, Positano, a Bay Ridge native, received his medical training in the 1980s at NYU’s School of Medicine and the New York College of Podiatric Medicine, before going on for a master’s degree in public health at Yale. It was in New Haven that he focused on “ways to improve foot function without surgical intervention.”
In 1991, he joined the Hospital for Special Surgery, where he found a welcoming climate for advancing his thinking on foot and ankle care. He credits Dr. Thomas P. Sculco, the hospital’s longtime director and a hip replacement specialist, for his receptiveness.
“He understood the importance of proper foot function,” Positano said.
He also singled out the contributions of Dr. Brian Halpern, the first board-certified non-surgical sports medicine physician at the hospital.
Leonardo da Vinci’s anatomical drawings of the foot.
Not surprisingly, sports medicine is an important part of the work of the Hospital for Special Surgery, and Positano has served as a consultant to the Mets and the Giants, as well as a sports medicine columnist at the Daily News and expert with the Associated Press. One New York athlete with famously bad knees went to Positano, where he was outfitted with shoe inserts that corrected the problem within a month.
In fact, it is his association with a marquee sports name that likely accounts for how Positano is best known among the general public. Yankee slugger Joe DiMaggio was decades retired when he visited Positano in 1990 complaining of painful bone spurs, which were successfully treated with arch supports. The foot doctor soon found himself part of DiMaggio’s “Bat Pack” of guys the ex-Yankee dined with when he was in New York.
When DiMaggio died at age 84 in 1999, it was Positano who organized the public memorial service held at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and he now he heads up the Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Foot and Ankle Center that he founded.
As a New York Times story about the DiMaggio memorial service makes clear, Joltin’ Joe was far from the only high profile Positano client — the list also includes the likes of Rudy Giuliani, Henry Kissinger, and Mort Zuckerman. But the foot specialist made clear his practice and research interests connect him with all types of people experiencing problems with their feet.
In collaboration with Harvard Medical School researchers working with the Framingham Foot Study, he has investigated the correlations between problems with bunions, hammer toes, and Achilles tendons and knee and hip pathologies. A peer-reviewed article authored by Positano concluded that nearly 90 percent of youth who suffer from flat arches go on to develop knee and back problems. Dr. Thomas J.A. Lehman, a pediatric rheumatologist colleague of Positano’s at the hospital, often finds that his patients can benefit from examination by a foot care specialist.
With his interest in public health, Positano voiced satisfaction that as much as 70 percent of his practice today is in preventive medicine — not only among athletes, but also business professionals who play sports to alleviate stress.
“They’ll play squash, golf, and of course tennis,” he said. “But professional people today are not so quick to push the button on surgery. They tend to take an active interest in participating in strategies to avoid problems. And nobody wants to be out of work for any length of time.”
It’s the same type of person who will think about preventive care for their children who might be involved in sports.
“Parents are often told there’s nothing that can be done about flat arches,” Positano said. “But then those parents will go around them and come see us.”
On the bet, however, that many more parents won’t think to do that, he added, “We have an active campaign to educate pediatricians about the importance of feet, ankles, knees, hips, and lower backs.”
If feet form the pedestal that influences the health of knees, hips, and the lower back, Positano also points to bigger life and death issues that are involved. Conditions that lead to immobility also contribute to obesity, which in turn can have a severely negative impact on cardiovascular health. Among many positions he holds — including as director of the New York-Presbyterian/ Weill Cornell Medical College’s Foot Center and teaching posts at Weill Cornell, the SUNY Downstate Medical Center, and Brown University — Positano said that one of his “proudest appointments” is in the Cardiothoracic Surgery Department at Weill Cornell.
“I help them to keep patients ambulatory at Cornell,” he explained, a factor that makes a vital contribution to their quality of life — and, often, even survival.
It is sports medicine, above all, that Positano, in talking about his career, seemed to credit for cluing him in to the benefits and satisfaction of that sort of interdisciplinary collaboration.
“One of the beauties of sports medicine practice,” he explained, “is that my colleagues are always looking to integrate other specialties.”
That’s a point of view da Vinci would probably have appreciated.
Dr. Rock G. Positano is the Director of the Non-Surgical Foot and Ankle Service at the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City, where he has been on staff since 1991. He graduated from Yale University School of Medicine, where his thesis on foot health was approved, with Honors and Distinction. He is a clinical assistant professor at Weill Cornell Medical College. He is internationally known for his non-surgical approach for the treatment of foot disorders. Visit him at HSS.edu/Physicians_Positano-Rock.asp. Dinner with DiMaggio is his first book.
Dinner with DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero
Alan Moores
113.17 (May 1, 2017): p50.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/ala/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist_publications/booklist/booklist.cfm
* Dinner with DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero. By Rock Positano and John Positano. May 2017.302p. Simon & Schuster, $26 (9781501156847); e-book (97815011568611. 796.35.
Rock Positano's unlikely friendship with Joe DiMaggio began in 1990, when the 32-yearold podiatrist successfully treated, without surgery, DiMaggio's famously damaged right heel--an injury that sidelined the Yankee legend for some 65 games in 1949 and led, in no small part, to DiMaggio's early retirement in 1951 at age 36. Positano would soon earn DiMaggio's confidence, then love and respect, becoming his frequent New York dinner companion, wingman, go-between, and, ultimately, biographer until DiMaggio's death in 1999. If DiMaggio was publicly discreet on pretty much every subject--and Positano maintained that discretion throughout their friendship--he's positively loquacious here in confiding to Positano his thoughts on everything from his split with Marilyn Monroe (he wanted kids, and she couldn't have them) to Bill Clinton (not a fan), Frank Sinatra (friend turned enemy), Mickey Mantle (DiMaggio decried his successor's wasted talent), how to play the game right, even al dente pasta (not a fan of that, either). Positano, helped by his brother John, renders a wholly human portrait of an American icon navigating his way through an adoring yet relentlessly demanding public. Turns out DiMaggio had a sense of humor, too, as when he remarked to Positano, upon passing a large Manhattan billboard of Monroe clad in tight jeans: "I've got to tell you she looked a helluva lot better with the jeans off than she did with the jeans on."--Alan Moores
Moores, Alan
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Moores, Alan. "Dinner with DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero." Booklist, 1 May 2017, p. 50. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA495035022&it=r&asid=3fb1cb14be5a819be134bed57c10782a. Accessed 8 Oct. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A495035022
Helicher, Karl
Library Journal. 4/1/2017, Vol. 142 Issue 6, p90-90. 1/5p.
DINNER With DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero (Book)
POSITANO, Rock
DIMAGGIO, Joe, 1914-1999
Positano, (director, Non-Surgical Foot & Ankle Svc., Hosp. for Special Surgery) treated Joe DiMaggio (1914–99) for the heel injury that prematurely ended his career with the New York Yankees in 1951. Despite their more than 40-year age difference, the two became best friends. Here, the author shares funny and poignant stories about their lives, including DiMaggio’s personal codes of la bella figura (cutting a beautiful figure) and being a stand-up guy. However, this is no hagiography, as DiMaggio’s moodiness, temper, and judgmental arrogance are displayed. Yet, those qualities are balanced by a softer side, which shows his loyalty and devotion to family. Memorable tales include DiMaggio lamenting his loss of sexual prowess, awing a crowd, in his 80s slashing line drives to the outfield, and the bittersweet final dinner the men shared a few months before DiMaggio died from lung cancer. VERDICT Readers do not have to be baseball fans to be captivated by this memoir, which explores such universal themes as friendship, celebrity, aging, and mortality, and will appeal to admirers of Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie. [See Prepub Alert, 12/5/16.]
Publishers Weekly. 3/13/2017, Vol. 264 Issue 11, p73-73. 1/6p.
DINNER With DiMaggio: Memories of an American Hero (Book)
POSITANO, Rock
POSITANO, John
DIMAGGIO, Joe, 1914-1999
NONFICTION
Unassuming Manhattan podiatrist Rock Positano considers his close friendship with baseball icon Joe DiMaggio (1914–1999), which lasted through the Yankee's last decade. Positano notes that the relationship started with his treatment of DiMaggio's damaged right heel, an injury that benched him for 65 games in 1949 and forced his retirement two years later. He falls short of hero worship as he sums up the tale of "the Yankee Clipper," the son of a San Francisco fisherman, who became one of the greatest players in baseball. There's never any doubt about the doctor's admiration for DiMaggio as a man of honor, who spoke frankly to his pal about people such as Lou Gehrig, Joe Louis, Mickey Mantle, Frank Sinatra, and the Kennedys, Hollywood, as well as topics such as women and faith. The narrative provides wonderful glimpses of DiMaggio's integrity, kindness, and sensitivity, portraying him as a complicated man who jealously guarded his image. (May)
DINNER WITH DIMAGGIO
Memories of an American Hero
by Rock Positano & John Positano
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KIRKUS REVIEW
A remembrance of the baseball great’s final decade, from his friend and doctor.
The relationship between Joe DiMaggio (1914-1999) and podiatrist Rock Positano—a professor at Weill Cornell Medical Center and director of the Joe DiMaggio Sports Medicine Foot and Ankle Center—began in 1990 with a medical referral. As a star outfielder with the New York Yankees and during later decades as a global celebrity, DiMaggio experienced constant pain from a bone spur in his heel. Positano got drafted to treat the ailment when he was 32 and DiMaggio was 76. A friendship seemed unlikely, partly because doctors and patients rarely bond socially but mainly because DiMaggio was famously private about his personal life—with good reason given the countless celebrity seekers who worshipped professional baseball players, not to mention the former husband of Marilyn Monroe. However, as the author writes, he became one of DiMaggio’s few confidants regarding his two failed marriages, his troubled son from his first marriage, the baseball people he respected and disrespected, his political beliefs, his distress at individuals who failed to dress properly or show old-fashioned courtesy, and much more. For readers who already admire DiMaggio, Positano’s overly celebratory memoir will have much to offer. For others, the presentation may be grating, as the author’s name-dropping never ceases, and the sections that explore DiMaggio’s mean streak and inflexibility are diluted by Positano’s interjections of the great man’s virtues. “Accompanying him to all sorts of events,” writes the author, “I saw a stunning array of famous, rich, powerful people who were in awe of him and wanted to get close to him. The intensity of their admiration surprised me.”
Baseball fans will savor DiMaggio’s views about Ted Williams, Pete Rose, and many other famous players; Marilyn Monroe fans will find less of interest. As for other potential readers, the appeal will be limited.
Pub Date: May 9th, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5011-5684-7
Page count: 320pp
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 13th, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1st, 2017
Book Review - Dinner With DiMaggio
May 8, 2017 Paul Semendinger
Dinner With DiMaggio is a thoughtful 350 page compendium that chronicles the last ten years of Joe DiMaggio's life as seen through the eyes of Dr. Rock Positano, DiMaggio's best friend in New York City during that period.
The book is, at once, touching, informative, revealing, and brutally honest. The reader gets a feel for who Joe DiMaggio was as a person, and aging legend, during his golden years. Through the text, the reader begins to understand what drove DiMaggio to be the great ballplayer that he was, and how, through his own exacting standards, he maintained his public dignity and revered status as an American icon through to the very end.
The author, Dr. Rock Positano, became Joe DiMaggio's trusted friend and confidant after helping DiMaggio get relief from the heel pain caused a premature end to his playing career. decades earlier. As their friendship grew, DiMaggio opened up with Dr. Positano about aspects of his life that this reviewer had never known despite being a long-time and extremely well-read follower of the New York Yankees.
While the book does not focus specifically on Joe DiMaggio's playing days, Dinner With DiMaggio does share recollections about some of the players and events that shaped DiMaggio's career. This reflection is not a play-by-play of the famous games or pennant races that DiMaggio was part of, rather, the reader is brought back to those times through various anecdotes about specific players. Dr. Positano maintained extensive notes from each visit with DiMaggio and he draws upon those notes as he shares Joe DiMaggio's personal feelings about players such as Lou Gehrig, Mickey Mantle, Phil Rizzuto, Lefty Gomez, and Yogi Berra. The only modern day Yankee discussed in this book is Derek Jeter. The text also discusses DiMaggio's opinions of both Ted Williams and brother Dom DiMaggio, both members of the rival Red Sox during Joe DiMaggio's playing days. The book is worth reading just to understand some of what DiMaggio had to say about these baseball legends. Some of DiMaggio's thoughts and perspectives are, to say the least, surprising.
Because he was such a popular figure, who also happened to be married to the legendary Marilyn Monroe, Joe DiMaggio also had personal connections with all sorts of celebrities from the past sixty years. The reader is taken to Hollywood gatherings with the rich and famous. One gets to know about Joe DiMaggio's relationship with Frank Sinatra. The reader is also brought to chance meetings with other celebrities such as Tom Hanks and Woody Allen to name two.
The author also shares how Joe DiMaggio opened up to him about his relationship with Marilyn Monroe and his first wife Dorothy Arnold, also a Hollywood starlet. In his life, Joe DiMaggio never revealed much of the behind the scenes stories of his relationship with the women in his life, but this book opens the doors to those marriages, at times in intimate detail.
One also gets to catch brief glimpses of Joe DiMaggio's relationships and perspectives on many well known political figures of his day including Presidents John F. Kennedy, George Bush, Bill Clinton, and others such as Henry Kissinger, Rudy Guilaini, and more.
A great deal of the book deals with how DiMaggio had to deal with the fame that followed him everywhere. Positano's remembrances paint DiMaggio as a icon who worked diligently to create and maintain an image of grace and class. While doing this, the author reveals much of what made Joe DiMaggio human. The reader sees the real struggle between DiMaggio's sometimes conflicting desires to be at once both a revered god-like figure and a regular person. One story in particular, which recounts a visit to a old friend in Brooklyn raveged with cancer is particularly poignant and remarkably touching. This reviewer feels that was the most powerful reflection in the entire text.
The book is revealing and sincere. It is clear that Dr. Rock Positano held Joe DiMaggio in the highest regard. Through this book, he brings Joe DiMaggio to life once again. Any fan who wants to know more about Joe DiMaggio would enjoy reading this text. At times this reader felt like a little too much might have been revealed, but it is, all, part of who Joe DiMaggio was.
In the end, it is clear that Joe DiMaggio was revered, cherished, and loved by his special friend Dr. Rock Positano.
Dinner With DiMaggio will be available from Simon & Schuster beginning May 9, 2017. It will be available at book stores and on-line retailers everywhere.