January 11, 2023 • 29 mins
Dean considers moving back to the U.S. and relaunching his career there. But a promotional tour and a 60 Minutes profile exposes Dean to just how much America has changed since he left.
Red Elvis is a co-production of iHeart Podcasts and School of Humans and is part of the Curiosity Audio Network. It's based on the Curiosity Stream documentary Red Elvis: The Cold War Cowboy. Check out the doc at https://curiositystream.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
The STASI is the colloquial term for the Ministry for
State Security. It was founded in February of a short
while after East Germany was founded, and it was tasked
was making sure that the Communist Party would always be
in power and that any sort of dissent, criticism or
(00:32):
two threats to power were kept in check and quelched.
Dagmar Horvestad is the current head of communications for the
Stasi records Archive in Berlin. She has access to Papa's
extensive files as far back as the mid seventies. As
soon as he arrives, he comes into the view of
the stars because he's an American with an international reputation,
(00:56):
and he's both he's his security risk and he is
great potential. So every move that he makes will get
noted and documented. There are people injected in his surroundings
that our informants for the Stasi and deliver information on
where he's going, what he's doing, who is meeting, and
his interactions in East German everyday life. In about nineteen
(01:20):
seventy seven, the documents of the Stasi here from the
archives show that they were ready to approach Dean Read
to possibly work for them. By that time they had
figured he was sincere about socialism. He's lifted in East
Germany and he still was an international icon with many connections,
huge amount of fans. Papa's connections extended beyond South America,
(01:42):
Europe and into the air world as well. So particularly
in that phase, he was very much interested in the PLOOR,
the Palestinian Liberation Organization. The head of the PLO, yes
or air Fat was a big fan of Papa's Western movies.
They met a few years back and he invited Papa
to come to Lebanon. In nineteen seventy seven, I wrote
(02:09):
this song to the Palestinian people, if yourself to basically
the Palestinia, the song that talks about the right for
the Palestinian people to be able to return to their
homeland and to live in peace with all other people
there seem for my lastest no what with two conflict
(02:35):
in the Middle East created an opportunity. Just like in
Cuba and Argentina, the Americans and Soviets were competing for
political influence. Here's US President Gerald Ford. Thanks to American leadership,
the prospects for peace in the Middle Easter righter than
I have ballly in three decades, it was clear which
side Papa was on. Here's Cold War expert Justin Jample.
(03:00):
I think Dean Reed saw the PLO as like nat
of Americans are indigenous people's. The PLO was all about
land rights of returning to h ancestral homes, and that's
a message that would have resonated with him very deeply.
Haara Fat and Papa got along well. He was invited
(03:22):
back in. There's this incredible moment of the two of
them dancing together. In the documentary film American Rebel. Papa
is singing Ghostwriters in the Sky Free are deep ghost
Rados in ghost Yah. But the trip to Lebanon started
(03:47):
an avalanche. When Dean Reid comes back to East Berlin
after his visit with Arafat and Lebanon, the Stasi wants
a debrief. They sit down with Dean Reid. Indeed, reads
talks about the virtues of the plo UM and all
the good work they're doing, and exchanges ideas and strategies
(04:07):
for how East Germany could support the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
The Stasi were only interested in possibility to gather intelligence.
They didn't want to hear his policy ideas Dean Read
goes around the STASI and appeals directly to Eric Hannacher,
who's the general secretary of the Essay Day, the Socialist
Eronheights party which controls East Germany, and he starts advocating
(04:31):
for things that he thinks that East Germany ought to
do for the PLO. And he says, I don't want
to work for the Stasi anymore, And once again, Dean
Read is a rogue outlaw, not following what he's supposed
to do. It worked in South America when he was
resisting American influence, but when he is now in the
(04:55):
Soviet Block and supposed to be working for them. If
you don't align yourself with the secret Police, you are,
by definition suspect. Love your brother, but hate your Anna Read.
(05:19):
I'm Ramona Read and this is red Elvis. Are you
to think that peace and love with just say hey?
Then I learned the life is not only a gay hate.
Each man must fight and fight a game. But never never,
never let your life just flow away. Eight Let your
(05:42):
life have value of every day. Episode five Old Cowboys
Never Die. It's I'm thirteen years old, a little ahead
of my age, dancing, singing, dreaming, of Hollywood. I rode
horses like Papa had. I spoke to him on the
(06:03):
phone maybe once in his second marriage had ended a
while ago, and on one phone call I learned to
Papa's new relationship. He'd fallen in love with Bernado Bloom.
They co started in a film a while back called
Kit and Company. Renato was one of the most popular
actresses in East Germany. She had played car Marked, his
(06:24):
wife in a TV biopeic that was broadcasted throughout the
Soviet Union. They were married in a small ceremony. I
wasn't there. I was back home in California. Dear Harmona,
you have written home so often, but I can only
answer you when your father is by my side because
I have not had time to learn English until now.
(06:44):
But I would like to tell you that I love
you and would like to meet you some day soon.
You let us are very open and loving, and you
sound as if you are already a young woman. Someday
we hope that you can visit us here in Berlin.
I wish you and your mother much love and friendship
(07:05):
of ant They were like royalty in the East German
film industry. Papa could write, direct, act and composed music
for his own films, films that were guaranteed to be
shown everywhere behind the iron curtain. Papa always felt comfortable
doing Westerns, and too many East Germans cowboy culture was
(07:29):
American culture, bravado, conquest, nostalgia. Papa's film sing Cowboys singh
did well at the East German box office, but the
reviews in the press weren't great. The singing full seats
almost entirely was out praz and ilantending sometimes towards the sentimental,
sometimes towards the techie. Papa's music career was struggling to
(07:53):
He recorded an album in German, but it didn't do
as well as he hoped. He was getting older, after all,
using too his forties. This is Victor, Papa's friend and
fellow ex In the mid eighties, the East Berliners decided
to let in some of the top musicians from the
West as guest performers. One of them was Bob Dylan,
(08:16):
one was Joe Coca, but most important was Bruce Springsteen.
And these three all had concerts in East Berlin which
were not only jammed. Bruce Springsteen, I think was a
d fifty thousand or more people jammed this huge, huge stadium,
plus television and radio. They just wanted to hear the
(08:38):
latest music that they were listening to in the West,
and of course that her Dean's audience. The Eastern Bloc
was changing. It felt like, after seventy years of life,
the old man Communism was basically taking its lost browth.
(08:59):
This is Lona Davis, a lifelong Dean read fan. As
Soviets Union was slowly crumbling and the Eastern Bloc was
crumbling with it. People were turning away from Jean's movies,
Dean's concerts, Dean songs more and more towards the West.
None of it was interesting to the people anymore. When
(09:22):
the people turn away from you, you become meaningless. Papa's
friend Neil Jacobs, I mean the Soviets wanted him to
do political music, and I think he wanted to be
an entertainer. His movies and you know, extin Cowboys saying
and his music in general. They were more interested in
the political stuff than the last two albums were Cowboys
(09:43):
Songs and We're Nostalgic for Coming Home. Rock Father was
a cowboy band from trouble Boy The Other ran which
lead through every well, if you're un sometimes he said,
I was proud. It was what dead you ever crawled?
He was in a round? Oh god, never, Uh, they
(10:06):
do smell that. Oh Papa's dad. My grandfather Cyril, committed
suicide that year October. He needed medical care he couldn't
(10:28):
afford and was too proud to ask for help. Their
relationship had been strained. But loving, dear father, you say
I was brought up in an honest, moral family, but
now I have changed. You were right that I was
brought up in an honest and moral family. But I
have not changed. I have just carried that morality and
(10:48):
honesty to its ultimate end. Papa's mentor from his early
days in Hollywood, Peyton Price, died that year too. Papa
was struggling, and the political climate in East Berlin was
not great either. After ten years pretty much of living
in East Germany, he has reached himself a level of
frustration and the ideals and the reality the gap between
(11:13):
that has widened, and with his many occasions to talk
to East Germans, he understood their frustration, and by the
early eighties, all the goodwill that was there for the
socialist experiment and for its grand future had sort of evaporated.
It was a lot for Papa to deal with. It
would be for anyone report about an incident on November
(11:34):
five with the actor and singer Didn Read in East Germany,
also known as the g d R. My father had
to run in with the police. Dean Read of his
ladder onto the close parking lot. He got out of
the vehicle, approached the police officers on duty. The FOCA
(11:54):
members asked it to leave the parking lot and to
continue on his journey. Disregarding this request, Read began to
make insulting and defamatory remarks, calling members of the FALCA
Traffic Group people could, comparing the g d R to
a fee state, and expressing that like seventeen million GDR citizens,
(12:15):
he was fed up with it up to here he
emphasized the letter words with a certain hand movement. The
incident was immediately reported by the FALCA officials to the superiors.
Here's Mark Bali, the actor who studied Papa's career and
has been the voice of Papa on this podcast. Dean's
(12:36):
in trouble. He's caught in a trap more or less
of his own making, and he's only going to make
things worse for himself, and he's only gonna kind of
tighten the news. He's rebelling against this government that he
had previously cooperated with and benefited from it. If this
trend continues, then the easter German government is going to
be in a dilemma. You know, do they you know,
(12:58):
do they do something about Dean? For a man who
prided himself and thrived on his independence, the irony is
that he was an exile, the rebel, outlaw, all by
himself speaking out against authority, except this time he had
given up everything he had known on behalf of the
government that he now rejected. Good leaves to you by
(13:25):
on about ten years now. You've been living here with us.
This term living here? Could you replace that with the
word home nine the speed No. I think every person
who lives in exile in a foreign country gets homesick.
(13:47):
I would love to speak my language again. The German
mentality isn't better or worse than mine. It's just it's different. Yes,
I really missed my people. Papa started to put together
a plan, big train. I'm big a play. But if
I do all I'm going sactor. They got some crazy
(14:19):
get me take it away. A plan to head back home.
There's a great picture of the two of us in
(14:41):
front of Tower Records in l A a past boarding
a brown turtleneck, a gold chain with a piece of
holding a guitar case with a B I P luggage tag.
I'm wearing a sun yellow sweater in a huge perm
which was normal for the eighties. We both looked so happy.
It was for an interview for Star magazine. Papa was
(15:02):
back in the US to promote a documentary of out
his life called American Rebel, the one with that scene
of him in air fat dancing. It was a great trip.
I remember giving him a ride on my motorcycle through
the streets of Los Angeles. I was seventeen, fearless, not
afraid to speak my mind. I had recently been on
(15:23):
his Moscow tour and we were feeling closer than ever.
We talked more about his plans to come home. Gosh,
I was so excited. We threw him a party where
he's sang and told stories. He was so fun to
have around home on all Yeah, d cross me let
(15:58):
me see the treat of I believe very much in
the American relasion, very much in the principle was the
mainest count I missed my home, and thank you for
making me feel home at times. It's good to have
you home. When we think about Americans who defect to
(16:22):
the other side of the Iron Curtain, we usually think
about traitors or spies. Dean Read is neither. An entertainer
who has become the Soviet version of a superstar. Sixty minutes.
Wanted to interview Papa, and he was thrilled. Millions of
Americans could now see him on primetime TV, the American press.
Some of them call me the Red Sinatra, and some
of them call me the Johnny Cash of communism and
(16:44):
called me the elders of South America. I'm an American.
If it went well, it could relaunch his career here,
and I was hoping speed up his return home. I
think there's a conspiracy of silence about me, and I
thank you for starting to stop this conspiracy of silence
and that people will know who Dean is. Why is
he a superstar there and not here? But it didn't
(17:06):
go exactly as we all hoped. You equate Ronald Reagan
with Joseph Stalin. I equate the possibilities of Ronald Reagan
with with Stalin. He I say, he has the possibilities
to do the same injustices and much more by incinerating
this planet through an atomic war. Do you think that Mr.
Gober Chop is a more moral man, a more peace
(17:28):
loving man than Ronald Reagan? Very much so, without a doubt.
The United States have changed a lot since he left it,
and the radicalism of the Vietnam War period has now
been replaced by Reagan's America. America's recovery may have taken
Soviet leaders by surprise. They may have counted on us
(17:50):
to keep weakening ourselves. They've been saying for years that
our demise was inevitable. They said it so often they
probably started believing it. Well, if so, I think they
can see now they were wrong. My father he stuck
to his ideals. He had faith in the common sense
of regular people. There's much more that unites the American
(18:13):
people in the Soviet people than divises. He returned to
his home state of Colorado for the documentary premiere. Here
he is doing an interview with local radio host Peter
Boyle's this is This is gonna be a difficult interview
because I I did I didn't have a chance that
as we were talking about some things in Seattle. Dean
Read is our guest. I don't necessarily approve, not necessarily, hell,
(18:36):
I don't approve of what you've done. Um, and I
don't want to be one of those guys that sort
of lays in the weeds and tries to drop a
bomb on you. How can you say you don't agree
with what I did? If I got to think you
don't know what I've done? Do you consider yourself a defector?
That you not at all? I consider myself an American patriot.
It was a call in show. You're listening to Dean Read.
(18:56):
We can do phone calls five And I think he
underestimated the political climate the all good morning, you're on
the air. I think you're you're more of a Communist
trader or American trader than an American rebel because of
your political affiliations in the past twenty five years. And
I think this Triple Years Back is just an attempt
(19:17):
to to start an American show business career that you
haven't had up to this point. And I just urged
people not to go to the movie. In fact, I'm
gonna go there with a sign saying do not see
American trader because of your true what you really are.
I think anybody who has a fear to look at
(19:40):
any film, uh, if somebody has agreed lack of money,
your communist spinko. And I'm not afraid to call you
that because that's exactly what you are, German communist. Because
you're not welcome here in America anymore. Maybe you were
ten years ago, fifteen years ago, but this is not
(20:02):
the same America. All Right, We're gonna take a thank
you from the audience. Thought in the audience, everybody that
I read says that the people were starving because the
Marxist government got to take the Western food and feed
the people in the trade. You're talking just like the
neo Nazis that killed Berg here. Don't you ever give
me that. I think right now, if you ever say
anything like that to me, that's the way you're talking,
(20:23):
and I think that's very dangerous. Get out of here,
Take a walk, get me out of here, follow me
that out. Papa spoke about his confrontation with Peter Boils
in a later interview. It was a very unhappy experience
for me and for him. I can imagine. I think
you would have liked to have slugged me, and I
would have defended myself. These people they do hurt me
(20:45):
because I'm not a trader. I believe I'm an America.
There were bomb threats and death threats because of the
radio interviews he did. You worked on the documentary as
an associate producer. He was there the night of the
film's premiere. The guards came to get us all and
take us underneath and the secret entrance to the cinema.
The whole time, we're gone, worrest Dean, where's Dean? We're
(21:07):
you know, we're going death threats And he went right
there in the front door. That that explains Udana is.
He just wasn't going to be coward. I think my
father liked being provocative, and I think he missed the
spirit of public debate in America, the free speech that
many people didn't have an East Berlin, I'm sure that
he missed home. He would tell me after driving across
(21:28):
the country and he would say, you know, I would
you know what I really want to do is get
an RV and get Ranata and just drive around, just
drive across the country and see everything. There was a
certain longing to be back. I don't know that Ranada
would have gone with him. Papa headed back to East Berlin,
back to his life with Nata and the new film
(21:50):
they were working on together. What is her nex project?
What do you is very important? I've written a film,
feature film about wounded me in nineteen seventy three, will
be I'll be co director and my wife and I
are playing the leading roles. Will be make it next
year in the Soviet Union. At home, Papa and Renato
were not getting along. They fought, often in big, explosive ways,
(22:15):
and this complicated the production of their new film together,
a film that was already delayed by the workings of
the Soviet film system. Dearest Ramona, I'm waiting on a
Soviet delegation of filmmakers to arrive. If they don't arrive
within this month, then again I must postpone my film
for another year, which would be a tragedy for me.
(22:35):
Keep your fingers crossed that they will arrive in time.
So Papa continued to work on his exit strategy at
the same time, a plan that Renato didn't like very much.
She didn't want to leave in East Germany. Renato was
a star in America, she would be an unknown actress
who didn't speak English. In early Papa wrote to his
(22:57):
manager in the US February, I'm sitting in a small
recording studio outside of Prague. The bass player keeps making
so many mistakes that he is either a bricklayer in
disguise or a CIA agent who is trying to sabotage
my LP. Those are some of the advantages of socialism,
which over the years have turned into disadvantages. It is
(23:22):
difficult to write on paper all my thoughts concerning how
I see my return to America. My value as a
person and as an artist is precisely what will scare
some people away. But in each city across America, there
are thousands of people who also believe as I do,
and who are fighting for their own freedoms and for
the freedom of others. Let's not put the country label
(23:44):
on me. For various reasons, country music in the South
are the most conservative and reactionary in their political feelings
within the entire USA. I doubt very much if you
will find anybody in Nashville who will put his heart
into making me a star. Be aware of using the
photos with the cowboy hats too often my days and
(24:05):
are packed with work because of the film and my
TV special. For some reason, I am not sleeping well.
Must be springtime. In East Berlin they didn't broadcast American
shows like sixty Minutes, but certainly the East German authorities
had taken notice of Papa's interview. Maybe they liked that
Papa praised Gorbachov, but they probably didn't like some of
(24:28):
the other things he said. You really buy the whole
I don't buy the whole communist line at all. If
you knew how many how many things I don't agree
with here and now three things that you don't I
don't agree with the baracracy here. We are not open
enough with criticism against the problems within the society. Here
(24:48):
I believe that there should be more individual freedoms in
this country. And then in the middle of all that,
we were recently stricken by a disasters, the Chona Bill
nuclear power accident. It deeply affected these of his people
and disturbed the world opinion so much for Papa, we're
(25:09):
not just plans to film in the Soviet Union, not
to mention the increased tension across Europe. Papa reached out
to one of the producers of the film, a man
named Garrett List. He said, I'm leaving and I said
that's not possible anymore. We signed the contact. But Garrett
(25:31):
List was more than a producer. In fact, the Stars.
He called him by a different name. The Stars. They
talked to a guy they call Frank Read in the document,
one of the people they recruited as an informant in
the close circle around Dean Read was a friend from
the Data studios from the East German film Studios that
(25:52):
they worked with on a regular basis, who then ended
up informer on him for close to over a decade.
In a taped interview, Frank Reads, the informant to the Stasi,
delivers the news that Dean Reed had called him the
night before he disappeared. That's why I'm sparting up someone Pelton.
(26:15):
At ten pm, Dean called me at my apartment. You're
my only friend. Can I sleep at your place tonight?
I agreed? And here in his darkest hour, the friend
he confides and with his most terrible secrets and life crisis,
is really an informant to the Stasi. It's very heartbreaking.
(26:37):
And then about it hard. I waited until two thirty
I m forteen to arrive, but he never did. Coming
up on the final episode of Red Elvis, so Dean
(26:57):
we goes missing. The car is found near the lake.
I sincerely believe that he killed himself in I do
not blame here for it. He's a very dramatic person.
He wouldn't have just gone off in a whimper like that.
It would have been dramatic. Why would the Stasi Killdean?
Read there's nothing to gain, there's nothing to cover up.
Had he lived three more days, he had and big letters,
(27:21):
capital letters, Call BBC, call ABC, call all the news services,
and cover the whole page. He was going to make
an announcement. Red Elvis is a co production of iHeart
Podcast and School of Humans, based on the Curiosity's Dream
documentary Red Elvis the Cold War Cowboy, directed by Thomas
Letter and produced by Tallis Films. Check out the doc
(27:43):
at curiosities Dream dot com to learn more about Dean
and Ramona and to watch his performances from all over
the world. This show is hosted, co written, and executive
produced by Ramona Read, Jason English, Virginia Prescott, Brendan Barr
and L. C. Crowley are executive producers. Ryan Murdoch is
the co writer and senior producer. Jessica Metzger as the
senior producer Jeremy fall That's Me as our editor in
(28:07):
fact checking by Savannah Hugely and Adam Business. This episode
was mixed and mastered by Zubin Hensler Thomas Ladder as
consulting producer. Dean Read is voiced by Mark Valley. Patty
Read is voiced by Nicole Britton. Casting support services provided
by Breakdown Services. Additional voices provided by Nicole Luhan Fabbi
and Verfel Noured and Tabney and Alex Beckett. Music licensing
(28:30):
by John Luongo for Tructor Entertainment. Additional music by Zuban Hendler,
Jeremy Thall, and Ross belenoif narration recorded at JTB Studios,
Los Angeles. Special thanks to John Higgins with Curiosity Stream.
If you're enjoying the show, leave a review in your
favorite podcast app. Check out the Curiosity Audio Network for
podcasts covering history, pop culture, true crime, and more. Mind
(29:00):
Blown School of Humans
The STASI is the colloquial term for the Ministry for
State Security. It was founded in February of a short
while after East Germany was founded, and it was tasked
was making sure that the Communist Party would always be
in power and that any sort of dissent, criticism or
(00:32):
two threats to power were kept in check and quelched.
Dagmar Horvestad is the current head of communications for the
Stasi records Archive in Berlin. She has access to Papa's
extensive files as far back as the mid seventies. As
soon as he arrives, he comes into the view of
the stars because he's an American with an international reputation,
(00:56):
and he's both he's his security risk and he is
great potential. So every move that he makes will get
noted and documented. There are people injected in his surroundings
that our informants for the Stasi and deliver information on
where he's going, what he's doing, who is meeting, and
his interactions in East German everyday life. In about nineteen
(01:20):
seventy seven, the documents of the Stasi here from the
archives show that they were ready to approach Dean Read
to possibly work for them. By that time they had
figured he was sincere about socialism. He's lifted in East
Germany and he still was an international icon with many connections,
huge amount of fans. Papa's connections extended beyond South America,
(01:42):
Europe and into the air world as well. So particularly
in that phase, he was very much interested in the PLOOR,
the Palestinian Liberation Organization. The head of the PLO, yes
or air Fat was a big fan of Papa's Western movies.
They met a few years back and he invited Papa
to come to Lebanon. In nineteen seventy seven, I wrote
(02:09):
this song to the Palestinian people, if yourself to basically
the Palestinia, the song that talks about the right for
the Palestinian people to be able to return to their
homeland and to live in peace with all other people
there seem for my lastest no what with two conflict
(02:35):
in the Middle East created an opportunity. Just like in
Cuba and Argentina, the Americans and Soviets were competing for
political influence. Here's US President Gerald Ford. Thanks to American leadership,
the prospects for peace in the Middle Easter righter than
I have ballly in three decades, it was clear which
side Papa was on. Here's Cold War expert Justin Jample.
(03:00):
I think Dean Reed saw the PLO as like nat
of Americans are indigenous people's. The PLO was all about
land rights of returning to h ancestral homes, and that's
a message that would have resonated with him very deeply.
Haara Fat and Papa got along well. He was invited
(03:22):
back in. There's this incredible moment of the two of
them dancing together. In the documentary film American Rebel. Papa
is singing Ghostwriters in the Sky Free are deep ghost
Rados in ghost Yah. But the trip to Lebanon started
(03:47):
an avalanche. When Dean Reid comes back to East Berlin
after his visit with Arafat and Lebanon, the Stasi wants
a debrief. They sit down with Dean Reid. Indeed, reads
talks about the virtues of the plo UM and all
the good work they're doing, and exchanges ideas and strategies
(04:07):
for how East Germany could support the Palestinian Liberation Organization.
The Stasi were only interested in possibility to gather intelligence.
They didn't want to hear his policy ideas Dean Read
goes around the STASI and appeals directly to Eric Hannacher,
who's the general secretary of the Essay Day, the Socialist
Eronheights party which controls East Germany, and he starts advocating
(04:31):
for things that he thinks that East Germany ought to
do for the PLO. And he says, I don't want
to work for the Stasi anymore, And once again, Dean
Read is a rogue outlaw, not following what he's supposed
to do. It worked in South America when he was
resisting American influence, but when he is now in the
(04:55):
Soviet Block and supposed to be working for them. If
you don't align yourself with the secret Police, you are,
by definition suspect. Love your brother, but hate your Anna Read.
(05:19):
I'm Ramona Read and this is red Elvis. Are you
to think that peace and love with just say hey?
Then I learned the life is not only a gay hate.
Each man must fight and fight a game. But never never,
never let your life just flow away. Eight Let your
(05:42):
life have value of every day. Episode five Old Cowboys
Never Die. It's I'm thirteen years old, a little ahead
of my age, dancing, singing, dreaming, of Hollywood. I rode
horses like Papa had. I spoke to him on the
(06:03):
phone maybe once in his second marriage had ended a
while ago, and on one phone call I learned to
Papa's new relationship. He'd fallen in love with Bernado Bloom.
They co started in a film a while back called
Kit and Company. Renato was one of the most popular
actresses in East Germany. She had played car Marked, his
(06:24):
wife in a TV biopeic that was broadcasted throughout the
Soviet Union. They were married in a small ceremony. I
wasn't there. I was back home in California. Dear Harmona,
you have written home so often, but I can only
answer you when your father is by my side because
I have not had time to learn English until now.
(06:44):
But I would like to tell you that I love
you and would like to meet you some day soon.
You let us are very open and loving, and you
sound as if you are already a young woman. Someday
we hope that you can visit us here in Berlin.
I wish you and your mother much love and friendship
(07:05):
of ant They were like royalty in the East German
film industry. Papa could write, direct, act and composed music
for his own films, films that were guaranteed to be
shown everywhere behind the iron curtain. Papa always felt comfortable
doing Westerns, and too many East Germans cowboy culture was
(07:29):
American culture, bravado, conquest, nostalgia. Papa's film sing Cowboys singh
did well at the East German box office, but the
reviews in the press weren't great. The singing full seats
almost entirely was out praz and ilantending sometimes towards the sentimental,
sometimes towards the techie. Papa's music career was struggling to
(07:53):
He recorded an album in German, but it didn't do
as well as he hoped. He was getting older, after all,
using too his forties. This is Victor, Papa's friend and
fellow ex In the mid eighties, the East Berliners decided
to let in some of the top musicians from the
West as guest performers. One of them was Bob Dylan,
(08:16):
one was Joe Coca, but most important was Bruce Springsteen.
And these three all had concerts in East Berlin which
were not only jammed. Bruce Springsteen, I think was a
d fifty thousand or more people jammed this huge, huge stadium,
plus television and radio. They just wanted to hear the
(08:38):
latest music that they were listening to in the West,
and of course that her Dean's audience. The Eastern Bloc
was changing. It felt like, after seventy years of life,
the old man Communism was basically taking its lost browth.
(08:59):
This is Lona Davis, a lifelong Dean read fan. As
Soviets Union was slowly crumbling and the Eastern Bloc was
crumbling with it. People were turning away from Jean's movies,
Dean's concerts, Dean songs more and more towards the West.
None of it was interesting to the people anymore. When
(09:22):
the people turn away from you, you become meaningless. Papa's
friend Neil Jacobs, I mean the Soviets wanted him to
do political music, and I think he wanted to be
an entertainer. His movies and you know, extin Cowboys saying
and his music in general. They were more interested in
the political stuff than the last two albums were Cowboys
(09:43):
Songs and We're Nostalgic for Coming Home. Rock Father was
a cowboy band from trouble Boy The Other ran which
lead through every well, if you're un sometimes he said,
I was proud. It was what dead you ever crawled?
He was in a round? Oh god, never, Uh, they
(10:06):
do smell that. Oh Papa's dad. My grandfather Cyril, committed
suicide that year October. He needed medical care he couldn't
(10:28):
afford and was too proud to ask for help. Their
relationship had been strained. But loving, dear father, you say
I was brought up in an honest, moral family, but
now I have changed. You were right that I was
brought up in an honest and moral family. But I
have not changed. I have just carried that morality and
(10:48):
honesty to its ultimate end. Papa's mentor from his early
days in Hollywood, Peyton Price, died that year too. Papa
was struggling, and the political climate in East Berlin was
not great either. After ten years pretty much of living
in East Germany, he has reached himself a level of
frustration and the ideals and the reality the gap between
(11:13):
that has widened, and with his many occasions to talk
to East Germans, he understood their frustration, and by the
early eighties, all the goodwill that was there for the
socialist experiment and for its grand future had sort of evaporated.
It was a lot for Papa to deal with. It
would be for anyone report about an incident on November
(11:34):
five with the actor and singer Didn Read in East Germany,
also known as the g d R. My father had
to run in with the police. Dean Read of his
ladder onto the close parking lot. He got out of
the vehicle, approached the police officers on duty. The FOCA
(11:54):
members asked it to leave the parking lot and to
continue on his journey. Disregarding this request, Read began to
make insulting and defamatory remarks, calling members of the FALCA
Traffic Group people could, comparing the g d R to
a fee state, and expressing that like seventeen million GDR citizens,
(12:15):
he was fed up with it up to here he
emphasized the letter words with a certain hand movement. The
incident was immediately reported by the FALCA officials to the superiors.
Here's Mark Bali, the actor who studied Papa's career and
has been the voice of Papa on this podcast. Dean's
(12:36):
in trouble. He's caught in a trap more or less
of his own making, and he's only going to make
things worse for himself, and he's only gonna kind of
tighten the news. He's rebelling against this government that he
had previously cooperated with and benefited from it. If this
trend continues, then the easter German government is going to
be in a dilemma. You know, do they you know,
(12:58):
do they do something about Dean? For a man who
prided himself and thrived on his independence, the irony is
that he was an exile, the rebel, outlaw, all by
himself speaking out against authority, except this time he had
given up everything he had known on behalf of the
government that he now rejected. Good leaves to you by
(13:25):
on about ten years now. You've been living here with us.
This term living here? Could you replace that with the
word home nine the speed No. I think every person
who lives in exile in a foreign country gets homesick.
(13:47):
I would love to speak my language again. The German
mentality isn't better or worse than mine. It's just it's different. Yes,
I really missed my people. Papa started to put together
a plan, big train. I'm big a play. But if
I do all I'm going sactor. They got some crazy
(14:19):
get me take it away. A plan to head back home.
There's a great picture of the two of us in
(14:41):
front of Tower Records in l A a past boarding
a brown turtleneck, a gold chain with a piece of
holding a guitar case with a B I P luggage tag.
I'm wearing a sun yellow sweater in a huge perm
which was normal for the eighties. We both looked so happy.
It was for an interview for Star magazine. Papa was
(15:02):
back in the US to promote a documentary of out
his life called American Rebel, the one with that scene
of him in air fat dancing. It was a great trip.
I remember giving him a ride on my motorcycle through
the streets of Los Angeles. I was seventeen, fearless, not
afraid to speak my mind. I had recently been on
(15:23):
his Moscow tour and we were feeling closer than ever.
We talked more about his plans to come home. Gosh,
I was so excited. We threw him a party where
he's sang and told stories. He was so fun to
have around home on all Yeah, d cross me let
(15:58):
me see the treat of I believe very much in
the American relasion, very much in the principle was the
mainest count I missed my home, and thank you for
making me feel home at times. It's good to have
you home. When we think about Americans who defect to
(16:22):
the other side of the Iron Curtain, we usually think
about traitors or spies. Dean Read is neither. An entertainer
who has become the Soviet version of a superstar. Sixty minutes.
Wanted to interview Papa, and he was thrilled. Millions of
Americans could now see him on primetime TV, the American press.
Some of them call me the Red Sinatra, and some
of them call me the Johnny Cash of communism and
(16:44):
called me the elders of South America. I'm an American.
If it went well, it could relaunch his career here,
and I was hoping speed up his return home. I
think there's a conspiracy of silence about me, and I
thank you for starting to stop this conspiracy of silence
and that people will know who Dean is. Why is
he a superstar there and not here? But it didn't
(17:06):
go exactly as we all hoped. You equate Ronald Reagan
with Joseph Stalin. I equate the possibilities of Ronald Reagan
with with Stalin. He I say, he has the possibilities
to do the same injustices and much more by incinerating
this planet through an atomic war. Do you think that Mr.
Gober Chop is a more moral man, a more peace
(17:28):
loving man than Ronald Reagan? Very much so, without a doubt.
The United States have changed a lot since he left it,
and the radicalism of the Vietnam War period has now
been replaced by Reagan's America. America's recovery may have taken
Soviet leaders by surprise. They may have counted on us
(17:50):
to keep weakening ourselves. They've been saying for years that
our demise was inevitable. They said it so often they
probably started believing it. Well, if so, I think they
can see now they were wrong. My father he stuck
to his ideals. He had faith in the common sense
of regular people. There's much more that unites the American
(18:13):
people in the Soviet people than divises. He returned to
his home state of Colorado for the documentary premiere. Here
he is doing an interview with local radio host Peter
Boyle's this is This is gonna be a difficult interview
because I I did I didn't have a chance that
as we were talking about some things in Seattle. Dean
Read is our guest. I don't necessarily approve, not necessarily, hell,
(18:36):
I don't approve of what you've done. Um, and I
don't want to be one of those guys that sort
of lays in the weeds and tries to drop a
bomb on you. How can you say you don't agree
with what I did? If I got to think you
don't know what I've done? Do you consider yourself a defector?
That you not at all? I consider myself an American patriot.
It was a call in show. You're listening to Dean Read.
(18:56):
We can do phone calls five And I think he
underestimated the political climate the all good morning, you're on
the air. I think you're you're more of a Communist
trader or American trader than an American rebel because of
your political affiliations in the past twenty five years. And
I think this Triple Years Back is just an attempt
(19:17):
to to start an American show business career that you
haven't had up to this point. And I just urged
people not to go to the movie. In fact, I'm
gonna go there with a sign saying do not see
American trader because of your true what you really are.
I think anybody who has a fear to look at
(19:40):
any film, uh, if somebody has agreed lack of money,
your communist spinko. And I'm not afraid to call you
that because that's exactly what you are, German communist. Because
you're not welcome here in America anymore. Maybe you were
ten years ago, fifteen years ago, but this is not
(20:02):
the same America. All Right, We're gonna take a thank
you from the audience. Thought in the audience, everybody that
I read says that the people were starving because the
Marxist government got to take the Western food and feed
the people in the trade. You're talking just like the
neo Nazis that killed Berg here. Don't you ever give
me that. I think right now, if you ever say
anything like that to me, that's the way you're talking,
(20:23):
and I think that's very dangerous. Get out of here,
Take a walk, get me out of here, follow me
that out. Papa spoke about his confrontation with Peter Boils
in a later interview. It was a very unhappy experience
for me and for him. I can imagine. I think
you would have liked to have slugged me, and I
would have defended myself. These people they do hurt me
(20:45):
because I'm not a trader. I believe I'm an America.
There were bomb threats and death threats because of the
radio interviews he did. You worked on the documentary as
an associate producer. He was there the night of the
film's premiere. The guards came to get us all and
take us underneath and the secret entrance to the cinema.
The whole time, we're gone, worrest Dean, where's Dean? We're
(21:07):
you know, we're going death threats And he went right
there in the front door. That that explains Udana is.
He just wasn't going to be coward. I think my
father liked being provocative, and I think he missed the
spirit of public debate in America, the free speech that
many people didn't have an East Berlin, I'm sure that
he missed home. He would tell me after driving across
(21:28):
the country and he would say, you know, I would
you know what I really want to do is get
an RV and get Ranata and just drive around, just
drive across the country and see everything. There was a
certain longing to be back. I don't know that Ranada
would have gone with him. Papa headed back to East Berlin,
back to his life with Nata and the new film
(21:50):
they were working on together. What is her nex project?
What do you is very important? I've written a film,
feature film about wounded me in nineteen seventy three, will
be I'll be co director and my wife and I
are playing the leading roles. Will be make it next
year in the Soviet Union. At home, Papa and Renato
were not getting along. They fought, often in big, explosive ways,
(22:15):
and this complicated the production of their new film together,
a film that was already delayed by the workings of
the Soviet film system. Dearest Ramona, I'm waiting on a
Soviet delegation of filmmakers to arrive. If they don't arrive
within this month, then again I must postpone my film
for another year, which would be a tragedy for me.
(22:35):
Keep your fingers crossed that they will arrive in time.
So Papa continued to work on his exit strategy at
the same time, a plan that Renato didn't like very much.
She didn't want to leave in East Germany. Renato was
a star in America, she would be an unknown actress
who didn't speak English. In early Papa wrote to his
(22:57):
manager in the US February, I'm sitting in a small
recording studio outside of Prague. The bass player keeps making
so many mistakes that he is either a bricklayer in
disguise or a CIA agent who is trying to sabotage
my LP. Those are some of the advantages of socialism,
which over the years have turned into disadvantages. It is
(23:22):
difficult to write on paper all my thoughts concerning how
I see my return to America. My value as a
person and as an artist is precisely what will scare
some people away. But in each city across America, there
are thousands of people who also believe as I do,
and who are fighting for their own freedoms and for
the freedom of others. Let's not put the country label
(23:44):
on me. For various reasons, country music in the South
are the most conservative and reactionary in their political feelings
within the entire USA. I doubt very much if you
will find anybody in Nashville who will put his heart
into making me a star. Be aware of using the
photos with the cowboy hats too often my days and
(24:05):
are packed with work because of the film and my
TV special. For some reason, I am not sleeping well.
Must be springtime. In East Berlin they didn't broadcast American
shows like sixty Minutes, but certainly the East German authorities
had taken notice of Papa's interview. Maybe they liked that
Papa praised Gorbachov, but they probably didn't like some of
(24:28):
the other things he said. You really buy the whole
I don't buy the whole communist line at all. If
you knew how many how many things I don't agree
with here and now three things that you don't I
don't agree with the baracracy here. We are not open
enough with criticism against the problems within the society. Here
(24:48):
I believe that there should be more individual freedoms in
this country. And then in the middle of all that,
we were recently stricken by a disasters, the Chona Bill
nuclear power accident. It deeply affected these of his people
and disturbed the world opinion so much for Papa, we're
(25:09):
not just plans to film in the Soviet Union, not
to mention the increased tension across Europe. Papa reached out
to one of the producers of the film, a man
named Garrett List. He said, I'm leaving and I said
that's not possible anymore. We signed the contact. But Garrett
(25:31):
List was more than a producer. In fact, the Stars.
He called him by a different name. The Stars. They
talked to a guy they call Frank Read in the document,
one of the people they recruited as an informant in
the close circle around Dean Read was a friend from
the Data studios from the East German film Studios that
(25:52):
they worked with on a regular basis, who then ended
up informer on him for close to over a decade.
In a taped interview, Frank Reads, the informant to the Stasi,
delivers the news that Dean Reed had called him the
night before he disappeared. That's why I'm sparting up someone Pelton.
(26:15):
At ten pm, Dean called me at my apartment. You're
my only friend. Can I sleep at your place tonight?
I agreed? And here in his darkest hour, the friend
he confides and with his most terrible secrets and life crisis,
is really an informant to the Stasi. It's very heartbreaking.
(26:37):
And then about it hard. I waited until two thirty
I m forteen to arrive, but he never did. Coming
up on the final episode of Red Elvis, so Dean
(26:57):
we goes missing. The car is found near the lake.
I sincerely believe that he killed himself in I do
not blame here for it. He's a very dramatic person.
He wouldn't have just gone off in a whimper like that.
It would have been dramatic. Why would the Stasi Killdean?
Read there's nothing to gain, there's nothing to cover up.
Had he lived three more days, he had and big letters,
(27:21):
capital letters, Call BBC, call ABC, call all the news services,
and cover the whole page. He was going to make
an announcement. Red Elvis is a co production of iHeart
Podcast and School of Humans, based on the Curiosity's Dream
documentary Red Elvis the Cold War Cowboy, directed by Thomas
Letter and produced by Tallis Films. Check out the doc
(27:43):
at curiosities Dream dot com to learn more about Dean
and Ramona and to watch his performances from all over
the world. This show is hosted, co written, and executive
produced by Ramona Read, Jason English, Virginia Prescott, Brendan Barr
and L. C. Crowley are executive producers. Ryan Murdoch is
the co writer and senior producer. Jessica Metzger as the
senior producer Jeremy fall That's Me as our editor in
(28:07):
fact checking by Savannah Hugely and Adam Business. This episode
was mixed and mastered by Zubin Hensler Thomas Ladder as
consulting producer. Dean Read is voiced by Mark Valley. Patty
Read is voiced by Nicole Britton. Casting support services provided
by Breakdown Services. Additional voices provided by Nicole Luhan Fabbi
and Verfel Noured and Tabney and Alex Beckett. Music licensing
(28:30):
by John Luongo for Tructor Entertainment. Additional music by Zuban Hendler,
Jeremy Thall, and Ross belenoif narration recorded at JTB Studios,
Los Angeles. Special thanks to John Higgins with Curiosity Stream.
If you're enjoying the show, leave a review in your
favorite podcast app. Check out the Curiosity Audio Network for
podcasts covering history, pop culture, true crime, and more. Mind
(29:00):
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