-Our first guest tonight is
CNN's chief White House correspondent,
anchors "The Lead" and "State of the Union,"
and a best-selling author.
His latest novel, "The Devil May Dance," was published this month
and is already a "New York Times" best seller.
Please welcome back to the show our friend Jake Tapper.
How are you, Jake?
-Hey, Seth, how are you doing? Good to see you.
-I'm doing very well.
I like that you have the title
of the book over your shoulder.
That is very neat. -Oh, did I?
Oh, I didn't even -- I didn't even know that I did that.
I didn't even -- -You're a natural.
You're a natural at self-promotion.
I really tip my cap.
-I just put the painting up there on the wall.
By the way, do you know what this is?
This is a hat that Tug McGraw gave to Henry Winkler.
-Really?
And then you broke into Henry Winkler's house?
[ Laughter ] -Henry Winkler, you know,
discovered that I was a Phillies fan and sent it to me.
-That's really nice. Did Tug McGraw sign it?
-It says 45 on it,
which I think was his number, but he did not sign it.
-So anybody could've written that.
-It has sweat stains though, so I assume those are
actually Tug McGraw's sweat stains.
-This is the only thing.
So, Henry Winkler heard I was a Red Sox fan,
and he sent me a hat and he said it was Babe Ruth's.
[ Laughter ]
I think what I'm saying here is
I think we should not necessarily trust Henry Winkler
when he sends us an old, sweaty hat.
-But here's the thing.
I did do some research because you know me.
I like to research. -Yeah.
-And the cast of "Happy Days" actually did do, like,
promotional baseball games in the late '70s,
and they did actually go to Philadelphia, I think, in '79.
So, I mean, it checks out is all I'm saying.
It checks out. -It lightly checks out.
[ Laughs ]
-I couldn't find any evidence that Tug McGraw
gave Henry Winkler the hat, but I also couldn't find
any reason why he would concoct the story
and then send me a sweaty ball cap.
-You know what?
I think the takeaway here should be a reminder to all our viewers
that Henry Winkler is possibly the nicest person
not only in show business but any business.
-In the world. -In the world.
-100%. The nicest guy I've ever met.
And I can't even understand. Like, he's the Fonz.
Because the Fonz wasn't particularly nice.
-No.
I mean, he was helpful, you know,
whenever the jukebox wasn't working.
[ Laughter ] He would give it a bang.
And that was good for the gang.
-Not the only thing he gave a bang to, if you know what I --
[ Laughter ] -Okay, you know what?
I'm pretty sure that didn't actually happen on the show.
So, this is -- I want to talk about this
because you wrote the first of your books, a best seller.
Congratulations. -Thank you.
-And did you write that with any sense
that you were gonna write another one?
-No.
I mean, I thought, "I hope it doesn't fail.
I hope people buy it. I hope people read it.
I hope people like it."
And then once that happened, I'm like, "Oh.
Maybe I can write another one."
And, you know, around that time, I heard this crazy story
that was true that Sinatra, who had helped get JFK elected,
had wanted President Kennedy to stay at his compound
in Rancho Mirage, and he had it all built up,
a helipad and phone lines and rooms.
And then Attorney General Kennedy heard about this
and said, "I'm investigating organized crime,
and Sinatra is actually friends with mobsters.
I don't know about this trip."
And I heard about this around that time.
I'm like, "Well, that's a great setting for the second book."
-So, these are, you know,
a lot of fictional characters in this book,
but you're also writing about real people,
and yet, in a fictional way, which I am sure people
accuse you of doing on CNN all the time.
-[ Laughs ] Yes.
But this is actually fake news.
-Okay, gotcha. -This is the true fake news.
All of the stuff that we reported about President Trump,
et cetera, that, believe it or not, although in many ways
it's stranger than fiction, that actually happened.
-So, do you enjoy the research that goes into a book like that,
and are you also particularly drawn to that era
of American politics and culture?
-I love that era.
And it's so glamorous on its face
but also, underneath it, really full of menace.
And I do like the research.
I mean, I got into this business because I love history.
I love it while it's going on.
I love it from 100 years ago, 50 years ago.
So it's fun for me.
-You write about the Rat Pack in this book.
Who are you in the CNN Rat Pack?
Are you the Sinatra of CNN?
Are you the Dean?
-I'm kind of like the Joey Bishop.
[ Laughter ]
The funny Jew who goes home to his wife at the end of the day.
-We thought that too, but we didn't want to say it.
We were hoping. -[ Laughs ]
-We wanted to find out. -The sweet family man.
The sweet family man. -Yeah.
You know, it's interesting.
I've heard you say a lot of the people that were famous
in the time you set this book are still very famous.
It's really interesting. -Yeah. It's incredible.
I mean, so many of the stars back then,
and so many of the films that I write about,
because when Charlie and Margaret, my characters, go to
investigate whether or not Sinatra is actually mobbed up,
having been enlisted to do so by Attorney General Kennedy,
you know, they go to a movie set of "The Manchurian Candidate,"
and they meet people in addition to the Rat Pack --
Dean Martin, Peter Lawford, Sammy Davis Jr. --
they run into -- you know, there's Alfred Hitchcock.
There's Tippi Hedren. There's Janet Leigh.
I mean, all of these people. It's incredible.
They're still so iconic, and the movies are still
a part of our discourse, part of popular culture.
-Well, you're very wise.
You're very wise to make that what your book was about.
I've known you to be a smart guy
for a long time, and I am not surprised.
I have a lot more questions.
We'll be right back with more from Jake Tapper.