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I was born on the night of October 1940
when I believe the Nazis were still booming us
Official YIFY movies site: YTS.MX
-led by Madolf Hitlum. -[audience laugh]
Soon, we had won. Anyway, they didn't get me.
[audience laugh]
[chanting] We want The Beatles! We want The Beatles!
We want The Beatles! We want The Beatles!
[cheerful music plays]
[Delbert] Liverpool was a pretty bleak place, bleak and lonely.
The black buildings you know and, uh, certain, uh….
very melancholy in a way.
It was kind of biblical bleak. [laughs]
You know what I'm saying?
I mean, those storms and the life shafts cutting through and the…
and the sea hitting up against that seawall.
[Gambaccini] Liverpool rock-and-roll fans were very lucky
because they had the services of the Cunard Yanks.
That was the name given to the men who worked on the boats
that went back and forth between Liverpool and New York.
And those seamen would bring over records from New York.
And this is how people in the Liverpool area
got to hear the Chuck Berry records and other blues records and R&B records.
[John on recorder] When I was a kid, I was a fan of Elvis Presley
and Little Richard and Chuck Berry.
Until then, all rock-and-roll
was basically about being black and poor, rural South,
-or whatever city slum. -[man on recorder]Mm-hm.
[John]And the whites had been truckers like Elvis.
So rock and roll, this bit about when did it start?
It means when did the hunkies notice it
that it was something strong, powerful, and beautiful.
Julia, who was John Lennon's mother, was a big rock and roll fan
and played him illicit songs like, what , "I Put a Spell on You"
by "Screamin' Jay" Hawkins.
So when he started his group,
it would be a curious combination of skiffle,
which was the rage at the time when Lonnie Donegan
and rhythm and blues material from the States.
[Sting] Well, I mean, it was The Beatles really who woke us all to, uh,
to, uh, black music in the '60s.
I don't think we would have heard it without The Beatles.
You know, they record a lot of Smokey Robinson songs,
and so brought him [stutters] into, uh, view so we owe a lot to that.
John was really into black music, like a true musician.
I don't think he looked at it like the real colours
just he just looked at it for what it was, you know what I'm saying?
[Gambaccini] It was at that famous Woolton village fete in 1957
that Ivan Vaughan introduced Paul McCartney to John Lennon,
he was a mutual friend,
And Paul impressed John
because he knew the words to "Twenty Flight Rock" by Eddie Cochran.
People tend to think they met, and then, they were famous,
but of course, there were five years of hard work before "Let Me Do."
And a few people came and went, but George Harrison came in
because he was a friend of Paul's from school,
and he auditioned for John by playing the song "Raunchy."
And of course, Ringo was the last one in
because, famously, there was Pete Best before that.
And of course, in Hamburg, there'd been Stu Sutcliffe
John's great dear friend who died.
So there were several other people who could have been Beatles,
or who were briefly Beatles.
But when "Love Me Do" came out,
those were the four people who were The Beatles.
[Cynthia] When I went to our college, it was fantastic, absolutely wonderful.
I integrated beautifully after the first two years,
took about two years.
John was a rebel and an individual and very enigmatic.
I just couldn't resist him.
I knew they were easy men in the world.
In fact, I was going out with a very easy, boring man at the time.
You know, sort of almost planned marriage,
and building societies and saving up for marriage.
Behind John just-just lifted me away from all this,
and the excitement of college, of meeting individuals,
new people growing up.
And John just… was topped it all for me.
He was just the most outrageous character I've ever come across.
And I loved him for it.
[interviewer] Who had to make the first move?
Did the woman have to catch or did he propose?
Well, I say what is it a woman chases a man until he catches her last,
but I suppose in a way, it was a similar sort of situation.
When John first met me, I had gone through all the gamut
of changing hairstyles, and growing it, and changing it to red
and goodness knows how many other colours.
When I met John, he influenced me
because he did love… he loved French film stars.
He loved, um, the accent, and the, uh, the mystery
of Brigitte Bardot and, uh, you know, knock-you-down-to-earth Liverpool girl.
So the closest I could get to it was to grow my hair longer.
So I slowly gradually went from red to blond.
And that's how I evolved as the nearest I could get to Brigitte Bardot for John.
And tight skirts and black stockings and all that business.
[John on recorder] I was thrown out of college,
that's why I was always getting expelled on.
And although I've been me all the time, you know, tell me now,
I've been learning all down the line, so I mean, I'm not saying
I've been compromised.
You're compromising by not smashing everything you don't like
when you feel like smashing it.
The compromises within yourself, you know.
[interviewer] One question I don't think you've been asked,
you're probably have, I don't know, why are you called The Beatles?
[gasps] Why not?
-You got any other name, eh? -[chuckles]
It was the name John thought of.
Did John think of it?
-Mm-hm. -Oh, John did.
[interviewer] Who thought of it? Ringo, Did you think of it?
-John thought of it. -[interviewer] John thought of it.
John thought of it.
[Gambaccini] For the Please Please Mealbum,
they included some of the rhythm and blues favourites of theirs.
And some of them, they'd been doing in their live set
because as everyone knows, they were playing for hours a night.
The one that is most known of these is "Twist and Shout"
because they recorded it in the last ten minutes of the session.
When John's voice was shot, from singing all day,
but he gave it all he could, and the result is this
on the edge vocal
which actually is one of the rare cases when Isley Brothers' record was improved.
[John on recorder] The[hooting] effect in The Isley Brothers,
-uh, "Twist and Shout." -[man on VO]Yeah.
I mean, which we stuck in everything. "From Me To You" and all that.
[reporter] The fans bought half the tickets by post.
And then, 5,000 queued.
Some of them, for two nights in hope of obtaining the ring.
[fans cheering]
[reporter] The manager makes sure that every member of his staff is ready
for the biggest night of the year.
Able to cope with a terrific audience response,
-"Here, There, Everywhere" by The Beatles. -[screaming]
[reporter] The boys show the press their latest presents.
They're a natural, these fabulous four, bubbling over with fun.
Getting as much kick out of entertaining as the fans get from them.
-[loud music plays] -[crowd cheering, applauding]
[reporter] When they come to your town,
well, you won't need any further invitation, you'll be there.
[cheering]
[interviewer] What was it like when it all took off?
I think the word somewhere is used
[stutters] you used the word "joy" about the best moments of it.
That's a very strong word "joy," was it that much fun?
Oh, yes, he said looking back on films of the old days, the very early days,
it was such, such a tremendous experience, the joy of that experience,
and nobody, very few people have gone through that experience before.
and appreciated it. And being in the centre of it was frightening.
[cheering, applauding]
[Cynthia] It was just overwhelming.
We didn't have time to think about whether it was going to stop or carry on.
It was just like… [sighs] it was just something that went on and on and on,
and got better and better and bigger and bigger.
And being in the centre of it, you just got swept along by.
[crowd cheering, applauding]
[host] Were they easy to produce? What were they like?
Were they disciplined in studio or did they muck about a lot?
I don't know to begin with. Uh, I mean, they had to toe the line
to begin with, you know, and, uh…
No, they didn't really muck about, I mean, they were always very dedicated.
Of course, we had fun, you know, it isn't to say we didn't relax a bit.
Now, flange happened to be one of those silly words
that I always used.
When… when John Lennon heard double-tracking
that we'd done, automatic double-tracking, or other artificial drop of tracking,
that we managed to devise at Abbey Road Studios,
he asked me what it was.
And I said, "Well, it's a bit complicated, John, you wouldn't understand,
but it's all done by means of a double bifurcated smashing flange.
And this is sort of gobbledygook, you know, he looked at me for a moment,
then he laughed.
And after that, when we used to do this, he used to call it flanging,
And it's still a term used today in recording.
If you flange something, you know what you're doing with it.
And flange just was one of those words.
[chuckling]
Um, who's really in charge then?
I mean, when you got a band as big as The Beatles,
who really calls the shots in the recording?
Is it you or is it The Beatles?
No, I mean, what actually happened was, we were…
It changed. I mean, to begin with, I would say, "This is what we're gonna do
and we're gonna be this long, and this is how it begins, and so on."
But over the first year or so, it changed because they'd gotten such great success,
and they were very quick to learn. I mean, in no time at all.
They'd learned all about studios, and all about song writing,
and then, admit they were going all over the world.
So after that, it then became the leader was the person
who wrote the song at the time.
[George] They were very few songs they wrote really together.
Always in the early days.
There's always competition between them, and that was the great thing about them.
I mean, it was friendly competition.
They were trying always to get, I went up on the other guy.
-[upbeat music plays] -[crowd cheering, applauding]
[audience screaming]
[interviewer] Those wonderful days, the rollercoaster of Beatlemania,
if you had to say one thing, what was the best?
I suppose, oh, I think the first trip to America,
when I was allowed to go with them.
But I was always in the background, and I was always protected.
But to experience that, the sound when we arrived in America
at the airport. We all thought they was screaming jets.
You know, the noise as we got off the plane
to the tremendous screaming and shouting.
We thought it was another jet alongside us when we got out.
This credible noise of thousands and thousands of fans.
I just… it's just so hard to describe.
-The Beatles are the best! -[screaming]
How are we gonna get in then?
[man] Hi, everybody.
[John] I'd love to go.
[fans screaming continues]
[Ringo] Hi, girls.
[interviewer] What was the worst thing about the Beatle's lives,
at that time?
[Cynthia] The lack of space, uh, feeling of imprisonment.
The fact that you couldn't go out on your own.
You couldn't go for a walk hand in hand down by the river, you know,
without constantly being…
-We were constantly besieged by fans… -[telephone rings]
…by the press, by the fans.
Oh, hello, yes? Who do you want? Quick, speak up.
Good news? [chuckles]
-[Cynthia] Just constantly. -[indistinct chattering]
[interviewer] As a pop star, of course, in those days,
John Lennon was not meant to be married, was he?
Oh, no, it was disastrous.
I mean, as far as the fans were concerned, definitely not meant to be married.
[interviewer] Did your wife enjoy the view?
-Uh, she loved it, who? Who? Who? -[chuckling]
-[shushes] -Don't tell them that he's married.
[interviewer] Oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm sorry.
[interviewer] How long was it a secret?
Oh, about 12 months, maybe 18 months.
During the time that I was pregnant, you know, that it was all very quiet.
Did you feel resentment about it?
Not really, not really, no.
Again, um, perhaps, I should. [chuckles] In retrospect I should.
I should have been a totally different sort of character
during the whole time, but no.
At the time, I was… I was concerned about the baby to come.
I was happy that we were married.
And I was quite happy to keep a low profile for the sake of the boys.
[Cynthia] That was what Brian thought would be the best.
Then I was quite happy to go along with it.
[interviewer] Did you ever feel that you were a rival to Brian
or that Brian was a rival to you?
I didn't feel a rival to Brian, maybe, um, on Brian's side,
he felt that I was the rival to him because he did have a great love for John.
John and I were very close and very tight-knit.
He had been going out together for three years before we were married.
And we had quite a very strong understanding.
[crowd cheering, applauding]
[interviewer on recorder] You look forward to the day when come and go
as a normal entertainer would with a certain amount of fans, there and so on.
Nothing like the 7,000 over there today.
[John on recorder] Uh, were there 7,000 there?
[interviewer on recorder] Well, they'll be getting to 7,000.
-I don't know exactly. -[John] I wouldn't know.
-[cheering] -[chanting] We want The Beatles!
We want The Beatles! We want The Beatles! We want The Beatles!
[screaming]
[reporter 2] It's bigger New York, but they were outside the hotel,
so a lot of them got in, and you…
you'll find them in strange… bathrooms, and things hotted up.
The New York Hotel was a bit higher though,
you know, it was sort of… It was great big skyscraper.
[chanting] We want The Beatles! We want The Beatles!
[reporter 3] School was out literally at Penn Station.
Fifteen hundred screaming youngsters
were on hand waiting for their heroes, The Beatles.
A veteran police officer called the mob festive,
but potentially dangerous. But that did not deter either the fans
or according to police, publicity meant for The Beatles
who allegedly provided buses to bring the fans to the Plaza.
Police cordons were broken down at one point by near-hysterical teenagers.
One girl was trampled and taken to Roosevelt Hospital,
where she was said not to have been seriously hurt.
[indistinct dialogue]
[reporter] Another girl fainted in the mob scene.
Her friends revived her.
She refused medical attention, and returned to the fray.
[cheering, applauding]
[reporter] Finally, police using loudspeakers told the teenagers
The Beatles would go straight from Penn Station to Carnegie Hall.
[man 1] After we get them out.
[man 2] We want to get up to the street whenever we can.
[indistinct dialogue]
-You, fellas, warn them. -[man 2] Yeah.
[man 1] Fellas, wait a moment.
-[John] Okay. Oh. -[chuckling]
[man 2] Hardly as plush as the elevators at the Plaza.
Oh, that's very, very favourably. Hey, look at that. Snap that up.
[all laugh]
[clamouring]
[John] I think them, um,
half of the crowd, at least, can hear what we're playing.
I mean, I can't hear what the boys are playing, but I know what I'm playing.
I think if they stopped and listened to us, we'd be finished.[chuckles]
No, it's only a joke. You know, it's only a joke.
[Gambaccini] John Lennon gave a perfectly ordinary respectable interview
to the Evening Standard in which he told the journalist,
Maureen Cleave, that The Beatles' phenomenon in America
had gotten to such a size that were more popular than Jesus now.
This was not intended as a comment on religion, as a comment on Jesus.
It was intended as a comment on the social phenomenon
known as Beatlemania.
And, in particular, um, the young people of America.
His point was… that more young people were spending time
listening to and thinking about The Beatles
than they were about Jesus Christ.
[interviewer] Tell me, why this violent reaction to what John Lennon said.
Well, I wouldn't call exactly what I have done a violent reaction.
However, uh…
The Beatles, for a long time have been able to,
because of their tremendous popularity throughout the world,
especially, with the younger set, have been able to, uh, say
whatever they wanted to without any regard for judgment or maturity
or the wisdom of it.
And no one yet has challenged them to any tremendous degree,
where it might count, where they might feel it.
[interviewer] Wasn't this a challenge like this there?
Wasn't it a serious article asking John Lennon how he felt about things?
Wasn't he just being honest?
I suppose, you never can tell about him.
His answers are so flippant, and his attitude is so bizarre.
Many instances, you never know whether he's honest or not.
And honesty is a relative matter to the seriousness of the moment
or the mood of the person.
It would be the same as if an American group, such as myself,
or an American singing group, sounded off on the Queen.
And really took her to task and said who needs her,
and she's on her way out and the system of having a king and a queen is,
uh, ridiculous and it's shrinking, and gonna fade.
[reporter] Birmingham people supported Tommy Charles' ban
on Beatles' records, and in the Bible Belt, some 40 other radio stations
followed his lead.
Worried that far-right extremist groups might try to become involved,
Charles cancelled his plans for Beatle bonfire.
But many teenagers sent in their records and souvenirs
to Waky Radio, nevertheless.
They said, uh, get rid of The Beatles, ban the records, uh, let's burn them,
or do something with them, and, uh, we acted, uh, of course,
on our own convictions, but we were backed up by the people,
especially, the younger people of this area.
Are you ever gonna play Beatles' records again?
Brian Epstein wanted to know when we were gonna take the ban off
because of the… it seemed that everybody was waiting
for us to make the move, and that, they want to know what it would take,
and I said, well, I don't have a price.
It's not something that I'm waiting in for The Beatles to do. I just don't know.
I wanted… I want them to make me change my mind about them.
I want to I want to see, uh…
I don't know. I want to see him grow up a little bit, I guess.
[John] If he's upset and he really means it,
you know, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I said it really for the message made.
But I never meant it as a lousy
or anti-religious thing or anything, you know.
I can't say any more about on that.
There's nothing else to say really, you know.
No more words.
[interviewer] Linda you run this record store,
how many Beatles' records were you selling before this row started?
Oh, quite a few.
[interviewer] And since?
They've dropped off considerably because, uh…
I mean, there, maybe, one a day, maybe, one a week.
[interviewer] The store hasn't thought of banning Beatles' records?
No, no. Of course not. [stutters] We promote anything that sells.
Well, I think, I think The Beatles are real talented group,
but I think that they need to watch what they say
because they're in such a position that a lot of teenagers
that really think of them as something really big,
and when they say things like that,
some teenagers are gonna just believe anything they said.
[interviewer] What are you burning your Beatles' record?
Yes, sir, I burned them.
-[interviewer] You burned them yourself? -I already burned them.
[interviewer] How did you do it, I mean, where, how?
Well, our Sunday School, uh, at MYF, we had a program
about The Beatles, and, uh, we have supper in MYF,
and it was in our backyard.
So after we'd finish cooking the hotdogs, I just put my records on there.
What John Lennon said really didn't have any effect on me
because, well, I think for myself,
and there's certainly no comparison between Jesus Christ and John Lennon
because I don't think that Christ came to be popular.
As a matter of fact, he was one of the most unpopular people
to have ever been alive.
I think most people are Christians and believe in God,
and I'm just, I'm just not used to this sort of thing.
[interviewer] You think it's pretty shocking?
I sure do.
I don't think they were comparing themselves to Jesus.
I think they were deploring the fact that, um, teenagers, you know,
like rock and roll better than Christianity.
The disc jockey Tommy Charles, who started this row off,
has said that he won't play your records until you've grown up a little.
How do you feel about that?
Well, I don't mind if he never plays them again.
[Paul] 'Cause you'll see this is a thing, you know.
Everyone seems to think when they hear or say things like this
that we're so childish, you know, I mean, you can't say things like that,
unless you're still a little child.
[Ringo] And if he was grown up, he wouldn't have done the thing,
because he only did it for them to stop anyway.
Do you think that Americans are out to get you, that this is all developing
into something of a witch hunt?
It doesn't matter about people not liking our record,
or not liking the way we look,
or what we say, you know. They're entitled to not like us.
And we're entitled not to have anything to do with them if we don't want to.
Or not to regard them. Uh, we've all got our rights, you know.
[reporter] In the two shows of the Coliseum,
The Beatles hoped for an audience of 26,000.
But as the fans began to arrive,
it was clear that the first house was not sold out.
Only days before, religious groups in the city
had decided to hold a revivalist rally on the same date
to demonstrate that here Christianity was no spent force.
Outside the Coliseum, this small band of small demonstrators
was the only sign of protest visible.
At The Beatles' press conference, the questioning was friendly.
The young people here were fan club officials,
and school magazine reporters.
The only man to raise the religious issue was shouted down.
All the same, The Beatles had been worried about their Memphis date.
Here, if anywhere on the tour,
the group would need protection from religious zealots.
I thank God Jesus Christ is popular with me because he saved me 31 years ago.
We meant more to kids than Jesus did or religion at that time.
I wasn't knocking it or putting it down. I was just saying it.
I'm not saying that we're better or greater or comparing us
with Jesus Christ as a person or God as a thing or whatever it is.
You know, I would just said what I said and it was wrong,
or was taken wrong, and now, it's all this.
John is deeply concerned and regrets that people with certain religious beliefs
should have been offended in any way whatsoever.
Brian Epstein, wanted The Beatles, to appeal to as many people as they could,
which meant that they were to be universally… applicable.
They weren't going to divide their audience by taking stands on every issue…
in that incredibly explosive decade.
[reporter] One of you, I believe, it was, uh, George, am I right? Uh…
said that you couldn't comment on Vietnam in this country but you could in England,
could you elaborate on that a little bit.
I didn't say that.
-Maybe one of us said that but… -[Paul] It was me.
Well, you, I mean, you know about that, anyway, you know, I mean,
we could say a thing about like John's religious thing in England
and it wouldn't be taken up, and misinterpreted quite as much
as it tends to get here a bit, you know. I mean, you know, it does.
-But it was… -Just say it again and again.
-They would come up with it. -The, uh, the thing is that,
I think you know you can say things like that in England,
and people will listen a bit more than they do in America
because in America, somebody will take it up
and use it completely against you.
And, uh, not having many scruples about doing that.
And I dunno, I'm probably putting my foot in it saying that, but…
You'll be explaining the next.
-Yeah, I know. -[audience laughing]
Oh, well, it's just wonderful here.
Paul commented that they, uh,
were told they shouldn't talk about the Vietnam War.
Because it was such a divisive event in America.
But even so, the little messages couldn't help,
but get through as in "Revolution", John's song.
But in general, Brian succeeded, indeed.
You could probably say that "Revolution" was a sign that Brian was dead
because it came out the year after Brian died.
[violin music plays]
[Cynthia] The whole business of losing Brian was a very crucial time.
I think that- that really upset everybody, and threw everybody
in different directions.
And then, of course, when Yoko came along
that was another great break in the whole situation.
But I couldn't alter the course of fate.
I couldn't have altered the course of John's fate.
it was a hard battle to fight because, at that time,
John was taking a lot of drugs, so I wasn't talking to a rational person
during that period.
Then along comes Yoko…
and offers him, a whole new subject area
because her subject area is not popular music.
And he's fascinated by the idea of performance art, and conceptual art,
and… uh, she takes him to places
where he never would have else- otherwise gone.
In art, usually artists give something that's an object, made object, and say,
this is art, you know.
But instead of that, art exists in people's thought,
and so, uh, we don't believe in just, uh, making something and completing it,
and giving it to people, but we like, uh, people to participate,
and, uh, sort of, all the pieces are unfinished.
-And they have to be finished by people. -[host] Now, now, we've… what we got here,
you were pointing this is, you were explaining that, Yoko.
Yes.
Tell us about this, it's what? A broken cup.
That's just an example.
[Yoko] But this is, uh, supposed to be a sculpture and it's a broken cup,
and, uh, an unfinished sculpture that would be just made by people,
just gradually, uh, rebuilding it into a cup.
[host] Uh, what… Is the sculpture then the broken cup,
or the way people rebuild it with glue?
[John] Well, the thing is there's no such thing
as sculpture or art, [stutters] and it's just a bit of…
it's just word, you know. Art is in everything, it's art.
And we're all art. Art is just a tag like a journalist tag, you know.
But artists believe it, and that sculptor is anything you care to name it.
This is sculpture us sitting here?
[John] This is a happening. We are here.
-I don't think this is art. -[John] This is art. Yeah, I mean,
so, I mean, if you gave that to a child, he wouldn't have any preconceived idea,
so you wouldn't have to say this is sculpture or this is a broken cup.
He'd say there's that, there's glue what you do? You stick it together.
And it's like your question, I think you can say
that this is just a process of art or process of things,
and everything's just a process.
[John] I always have this dream of meeting an artist woman, you know.
Then I would fall in love with all that, even from art school, you know.
And then, we met and we talk and that, and then, I know… [stutters]
You just realised that she knew everything I knew and more probably,
and, uh, that it was coming out of a woman's head, you know.
It just sort of bowled me over, you know.
[Yoko] I was feeling very good being in London,
and doing all my work kind of thing.
I was surprised
that there was an incredible, kind of, poetic society in England,
and was totally impressed, and also felt part of it.
Almost, there was a kind of empathy, but, uh…
I think John is still the first one I met that was kind of sexy.
[Yoko] I mean, wow, [scoffs] he was very sexy.
[John] She came over for a date as it were,
and I had a kind of little studio
which was really just a lot of tape recorder.
And we made two versions, and I was showing her
all my different tape recordings.
And all that, and I thought this is great, and I was gonna put
[gurgling sound] on the tapes, and she was gone [hooting sound],
and we did, we made a tape all night, and in the morning,
we made love as the sun came up.
[Gambaccini] John was the one who had the reputation
as being the thinking Beatle.
So, no surprise there then when he goes to his art gallery,
and climbs up and looks at this word on the ceiling which is yes.
She was having a show at this gallery.
I knew the fellow that ran it,
so it wasn't too embarrassing being a Beatle, anyway,
going into a shop, never mind going to the gallery
because the other or leap on anything else.
This is another morgue, you know,
-like a taxi, and you'll buy anything. -[audience laugh]
So, and I have a bit of a hangover about art to having been to art school,
and just like this sort of art attitude of the so-called artist.
So anyhow, I finally got to this show,
and, uh, she had all these things on like all these like hammer nail things
and on that clock there, you listen to it, stethoscope, all the things.
And at first I reacted like, uh, like a mug, you know.
Like the ones that they're saying they don't get a badge, you know.
I was thinking, ah, [chuckles] don't fool me with all this junk, you know.
So then, there was this ladder and a thing on the ceiling. So I climbed the ladder,
and on the ceiling it said, "yes."
-You see… -You see, so I thought,
oh, I agreed then, it's okay you know.
I mean, it's like those jokes while you're looking at here you're dribbling down
-your trousers nothing. -[audience laugh]
I mean, it's all sort of connected. I mean, people get a buzz out of that
[stutters] in the toilet, but if you put it on in a room,
it upsets them a bit because they've got preconceived ideas
about where those messages should be.
-It said, "Yes." -[audience laugh]
And if it had said no, I would have carried on with my preconceived ideas
about art and artists, you know, that they're all sort of yeah, yeah, sure.
But it said yes and that was enough, you know. And then she came up,
and said, uh, she didn't know who I was, and was saying,
do you like to hammer a nail in it? It's five shillings.
-[giggles] -So I said…
-He really won't say. -I didn't have any money on,
so I said I'll have my own imaginary nailing.
I'll give you an imaginary five shillings, and she agreed with that.
She accepted that on the same basis as we accept her work, you know.
I'd accepted her work, and that was, that was how we met actually.
[audience laugh]
I did not find attractive in his art, per se.
I think the initial attraction was that he was a very attractive man.
He was extremely attractive.
[John] But the point is, uh, it's her film,
-I'll explain what I think about it. -[chuckles]
The point is that it's a portrait.
You know, and I thought if Renoir or any of those people had made a portrait
of just somebody's face that never moves, and just hangs on the wall, you accept it.
Because it's, uh, people are used to that, but this is a portrait on film.
Also, well, let me say that, baby.
So there's three minutes of film that was taken,
I'm spaced out to last an hour, very slow motion.
So in an hour, in three minutes,
a lot happens to somebody's face, anybody's face.
A lot of amazing things happens, a lot of movement
that you never realise goes on, and in this,
you've got three minutes under a microscope
to examine anybody's face. Your own.
You can't be bothered sitting there for an hour looking at your own face.
And amazing things happen, the whole head changes shape,
your nose moves, every part of you is moving all the time
which is known, but you're not aware of this in everyday life.
But in her film, you can see it.
And when we showed it to her daughter, she just said, "Oh, look his nose is moving.
[Yoko] John has a funny nose and it's moving.
[John] All of that.
[stutters] And she went to somebody else,
well, um, a film about face for an hour? Oh, yeah, sure.
[audience laugh]
For 30 years, I've been struggling with my hostility to Yoko Ono.
I have tried to get over it.
I thought the murder of John Lennon would help, it hasn't.
I have so many resentments, um, against Yoko Ono.
The number one being that she stripped away from John Lennon
his brilliant sense of British humour, the surrealistic kind of writing and, um,
and, uh, pranksterism,
that came out of Lewis Carroll via Oscar Wilde.
Yoko thought it was silly. She never understood it.
She imposed a kind of moralism, a political correctness on John
that was… that really, um, I think, crushed his originality.
And over time, he may have been a happier person with Yoko,
but he was a lesser artist.
[Gambaccini] I don't know if Yoko took the fun out of the job,
because I wasn't there.
And what happened between John and Yoko happened between only John and Yoko.
I've noted that John could still tell a good joke in an interview.
With Yoko, he may have been very serious and earnest most of the time,
but he could he could still tell a good joke.
[John] He's hammering it in now, third stroke.
Beautiful stroke. Beautiful. Now, how do you feel?
I know this is a terrible condemnation of me,
but I just felt like a man hammering in a nail.
[audience laughing, applauding]
Winner!
-I've gone live hammering it in on TV. -[audience laugh]
-That's more accurate. Well thought. -[John] Yes.
Let me, uh, can I be… Just put my hat out for a collection.
-[chuckles] -[audience laugh]
-[Yoko] Poor artist. -[audience chuckle]
[audience laugh]
I'm having a bit of a tax problem.
[chuckling]
I think he was ready for something new.
He was dying to sort of find that opportunity
to [sighs] spring out of that scene that he was stuck in,
and just kind of do something.
And he was waiting for somebody to come and rescue him.
I mean, he actually said that.
So when I came into the picture…
It was like no nonsense, let's just do it.
I could have fought. I could have battled before the divorce from John,
but I knew that that wouldn't do any good
because people have their own lives to lead, their own fate.
Well, I'm great fatalist, and John had his life to travel on,
and I had my life to travel on.
We met for a short time, that was ten years,
but during that ten years, they were wonderful years.
Now, if I had tried, I had been aggressive about the whole business,
it wouldn't have altered a thing, it would have caused bad feeling.
And I'm quite happy as I am now, you know. I have really no regrets about it.
[interviewer] Says you got a hundred thousand divorce settlement.
Hmm.
[interviewer] Most people go, whoa, that's not much.
I had to buy a house out of that as well. [chuckles]
[interviewer] It doesn't seem a lot. Did it seem a lot to you at the time?
Yes, [stutters] I kept visualizing a football stadium
with a hundred thousand people in, and imagine each one as a pound note,
that's a hell of a lot of money.
Because I wasn't aware of, uh, the amount of money that was…
I mean, a hundred thousand pounds was a lot of money to me.
And in a way, what John's comment about,
what it's like winning the pools sin was quite true.
Because only a few years ago, say five or six years ago,
it was you would win the pools at 75,000 pound.
And it, for a lot of people, it would set them up for life,
but under the circumstances, it was a bit rough really. [chuckles]
It's clear how you must have felt about Yoko then.
Can I ask you how you feel about Yoko Ono today?
[chuckles] Very difficult question again. Um…
She's not my cup of tea as a person, and I can only say that.
I can only leave it at that.
I don't want to get into any deep discussions about Yoko but…
[interviewer] Have you met?
Yes, we met years ago. Mm-hm.
But [stutters] not since they left for America, haven't seen Yoko.
It is said that the breakup which was obviously so difficult for you
was also terribly difficult for Julian.
All that attention at the centre of the world
as it were at the age of seven, and then, suddenly, for him too, the divorce.
It was a traumatic change for Julian.
I had terrible problems with Julian for about three years following that.
[stammers] Following the divorce and the breakup,
he went through tremendously difficult emotional problems.
[Cynthia] How do you feel about those days, now,
looking at [stutters] these old pictures?
I don't know, you know, I can't really remember that much about it.
I remember that sort of wheelchair thing.
[Julian] Uh, nicking that out and roaming, bombing down the hills
on that, like a go-kart, and that's about it.
[Cynthia] How did you feel about your dad during those days?
[Julian] Alright. It's dad, you know.
-And there's mom. -[Cynthia] As you grew older,
-I know it's difficult to you as well. -[Julian] Well, I mean,
it was dad at first, and it became Beatle you know.
And dad again, it's one of those strange situations.
Cousin roller. That's great.
[upbeat music plays]
[man] That was one of the wheels of John Lennon's Rolls.
It's a gas. If you're over 80, that means it's fast. 6,000 pounds worth
of 1965 phantom, inside, almost as marvellous as out.
Well, perhaps not quite.
Now, that the supercar has been dolled up in the grand manner,
not even a Beatle could wish for more.
From front bumper to back, it's been beautifully adorned
after the manner of Roman-y art.
The decoration cost 1,000 pounds. Now, this John Lennon's car,
nobody can imagine what it may fetch if auctioned in years to come.
-Oh, that was, that was interesting. -At the time.
[Cynthia] Like, you went off to Scotland then.
Oh, gosh, that was an interesting…
[Julian] That's what I went to Ascot for the weekend.
And, uh, dad didn't tell me we were going off to Scotland, wasn't it?
-Mm-hm. -And we had a quick car crash over there.
I remember you telling me something very strange about that accident.
That I was the only one that wasn't hurt in the crash.
Everybody had a facial scar, you know. Dad has one along the bottom.
Yoko had had one at the top, and, Kyoko, Yoko's daughter had a gash across here.
And I didn't have a cut on me at all.
And they were all knocked out, and I mean, what did I say to you? What was it?
I remember it very clearly, you said that the reason, mum,
that nothing happened to me was that granddad lifted me off the back seat,
just as the car was about to crash, and you'd never met your granddad.
-[Julian] Yeah, that's a bit… -[gasps] You're that boy.
As time went on and you went off to America…
Hmm?
How did your relationship with your dad develop then?
Um, well, I don't know.
It's sort of, um, [clicks tongue] built up like, uh,
like, uh, and it was more like a wise uncle, you know,
sort of relationship, how it started off for them.
Sitting there, listening to what he was saying, you know, not saying anything.
And then it… then we started getting to proper father-and-son talk.
[Cynthia] What are your feelings about Yoko?
Um, well, I respect her a lot for, uh…
in ways, I suppose because she's been with Dad for such a long time and, uh…
you know, she's okay once in a while when we meet,
whenever we get a chance to meet, we have a nice chat.
Uh, that's about it really.
What John found in her was a kind of stripping down,
stripping away of the extraneous.
The first album that he did,
where he, um, just eliminated everything from the music,
and it's nothing but himself singing with his piano with a slight reverberation
um, that first… the songs were enunciation.
"There's nothing but Yoko and me, that's reality", and so on.
That is a wonderful work of art.
I think that all major artists need to go through periods,
where they strip everything away and get back to essentials.
[Gambaccini] Of course Yoko influenced John, it's there on the records.
He did a song about her while in The Beatles,
"The Ballad of John and Yoko."
He made records with her while he was still in The Beatles.
Uh, he made two albums with her… after The Beatles.
Some Time in New York City and Double Fantasy.
He made songs about her,
including the wonderful "Oh, Yoko" on the Imagine album.
"Woman" on the Double Fantasy album.
There's no doubt about it, she became a part of him,
and she was more important to him than the Beatles.
We try and explain ourselves in what we do like and I do it mainly through music,
and she does it through her art, like that and it's hard to put words to it.
We did like those kind of things. We're trying to communicate.
And communication itself is art and art is communication.
[John] We shot the cover ourselves privately and put out two versions.
And it was a kind of statement, as well, an awakening for me too, you know.
This is me naked with the woman I love.
[upbeat music playing]
[John] We're going to stay in bed for seven days.
Instead of having a private honeymoon.
It's a private protest.
[Yoko] For the violence that's going in the world, you see.
Be sure that instead of making war let's stay in bed for straight seven days.
[John] And grow your hair, the beast, let it grow 'til the peace comes.
[interviewer] You're against revolutionary violence, too, like your song.
Uh, I'm against violence, you know?
Uh, period. Whether it's violence begets violence, as far as I'm concerned,
has been proved by what's going on in the States
and protest marches in Grosvenor Square in London.
The only result of that was a lot of smashed heads
and front-page headlines about violence.
And it wasn't a press' fault nor the cops' fault,
nor the minority left-wing students fault or whatever they're called, you know.
It was just because the whole form they take,
doesn't work, you know? It doesn't work.
Because that's what happens when you do that,
and we're saying this is one other way of doing it.
[music playing]
[interviewer] While you're in bed and you're giving your press conferences
in pillowcases and all that,
-are you laughing at us? -No, no.
No more than you're laughing at us, you know.
I mean, we have a laugh, we think it's funny,
that the front page news should be the fact
that two people went to bed on their honeymoon.
-[chuckles] -We see the funny side of it.
And then in Vienna, which is pretty square place,
there's all these beautiful photographs of
microphones being held to her bag, you know.
-To wait for the bag to speak. -It's rather nice, yeah.
We're serious about the peace bit, you know.
And what, as we said to you in Amsterdam,
the laughs, if we make people laugh, that's enough.
-[male reporter] Can you come out? -[John] No.
[female reporter] Why not?
[John] Because this is a bag event. Total communication.
[male reporter] Don't you think it's a little bit out of fashion, what you do?
[John] Do you think it's a fashion to stay in a bag?
-What is it? -It's total communication.
[Gambaccini] The start of the breakup of The Beatles,
would be the start
of the attitude of John Lennon towards his own life.
And having devoted
all his intellectual attention to The Beatles,
to take back some of that energy,
and to spread it first to writing his books,
then being in the movie with Dick Lester, How I Won the War.
And…
that precedes Yoko's influence.
You can see that John was an artistic soul
who had a lot of different things to try out.
I don't know how what I actually do with the thoughts but they come out
on film, or on paper, or on tape.
I've just got lots of tape which I suppose if I put onto paper, it would be a book.
It's just a matter of do I want to make those tapes into paper,
or make the tapes into records?
[interviewer] Does it feel the same to you
when you're writing something on paper and when you're writing a song?
Uh, it does now.
In the old days, I used to think that song writing was this, you know,
an I love you and you love me,
and my writing was something else, you know,
even if I didn't think of it quite like that.
but now just realised through Dylan and other people, Bob Dylan not Thomas,
it is the same thing you know, that's why I didn't realise being so naive
and that, you know, you don't write pop songs
and then you do that, and then you do that.
Everything you do is the same thing, so do it the same way.
John was the most original of The Beatles.
He was the most, uh… He was an unusual person.
But he wasn't really the leader because he didn't…
he was too individual to be a leader.
He was the strongest, most dominant person in the early days,
because he was absolutely so iconoclastic and outrageous,
and did amazing things and he was tough and he was cynical.
With "Tomorrow Never Knows",
[blows raspberry] as with so many musical miracles of The Beatles…
it was an anticipation of the future.
It's hard to believe it was the first track recorded in Revolver,
because it sounds like the last and it's placed last.
So that you have this wonderful musical programme,
which then ends with what sounds like a trailer for next year.
It's as if they were saying at the end of 1966,
it's as if they were saying at the end of 1966, coming next year, psychedelia.
Because "Tomorrow Never Knows" is probably the most trippy song of all-time.
The message is very simple to understand. Six words.
Turn on. Tune in. Drop out.
[upbeat music playing]
[narrator] Turn on, tune in, drop out.
For this crowd of hip, young Americans, these six words are shorthand
for an electrifying experience most of them know well.
An experience called "the trip."
The trip is a drug-induced mental explosion
that has changed their whole way of looking at the world,
but for many other Americans, the six words stand for something else.
Controversy, crime and terror.
Turning on, tuning in and dropping out is what happens to you
when you take a dose of the strange new drug called LSD.
[upbeat music playing]
We'd had enough acid, it had done all it could do for us, you know.
There was no going any further, it only does so much.
-[host] What does it do? -Well, what it did…
What it does mainly, is that it's more of finding out about yourself, you know,
and your ego and I've kind of seen such more psychological, you know.
-Whereas not psychological? It seems like… -It will be in the end,
but I mean, well, if you have acid, it is just
oh, oh, you know all about yourself.
Am I did it what, you know it's all that.
But this is just sort of a bit gentler.
[Gambaccini] John had taken LSD
uh, before recording "Sergeant Pepper",
but "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" curiously enough was not about LSD.
It was genuinely about Julian's friend, Lucy.
And the picture in school that's Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.
[Gambaccini] The search for the meaning of it all, of course,
took them to India, got them involved with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
[John] The happiest time of my life
was in India in some kind of pit, you know.
And I had some great experience over there
because I was meditating eight hours a day and things like that,
and it is really some trip, like acid with no worry.
Just sitting there, muttering some word in a room,
and it's the biggest trip that I've had in my life, you know.
[narrator] A million and a half Americans are believed to be regular users of LSD,
many others still uninitiated, admire its heroes and talk its language.
They go on pretend trips like this with trick spectacle
from shops that cater to the hip trade.
LSD stands for dextralysergic acid diethylamide,
a chemical derived from a fungus that grows on rye.
It is not addictive like heroin or cocaine,
but it's far more powerful in its effects.
Taken in a pill or sugar cube, it acts in an hour and lasts up to 24.
During this time, the user soars into another world,
where the consciousness is vastly expanded or seems to be.
This is the famous psychedelic experience.
[John] Early paranoia and violence are not part of the trip,
that's what happens on acid boats.
Then from there, you start…
I don't know, maturing or thinking about the trip.
That the first effects of the drug wear off,
and you start coasting along a bit and you have time to look at the trees,
and that developed into the actual acid scene, the psychedelic bit, you know.
And everybody was grooving on with flowers and that, and then of course,
like any drug, it wears off and you're back to so-called reality.
[male reporter] Yesterday, John Lennon and his girlfriend,
the Japanese actress Yoko Ono were arrested,
charged with the use of marijuana and today they were arraigned
here at Magistrates Court in London.
He's the one who's known as the most way out of The Beatles.
Right now, John Lennon is looking very hard for his car
because if he doesn't get to his car, he's likely to be…
[woman] John! She's horrible! Cynthia's better than her.
That girl next to me this moment ago said Cynthia's better than her.
[man] In The Beatles, he's the sum of the whole.
They were a genius group but individually, you know,
all contributed something to it.
and that's really what John gave to them.
He was really, in many ways, the first punk.
I mean, it's strange to think back to the '60s,
even wearing long hair was looked upon as disgusting and awful.
[female interviewer] He's often said to have been very aggressive. Is this true?
Uh, I would say honest, really. He wasn't really aggressive,
because aggressive indicates you're trying to get something out of people,
or trying to force things upon people which he never was.
I mean, he's awful to fans who's shouting and screaming at them,
and would refuse to sign autographs if he didn't feel like it.
Whereas Paul was always the charming one, the PR one.
You know, Paul made things happen.
And Paul really was the leader in the end, because Paul organised them,
made him do various films.
[man] John was like very tough.
I mean, he had that ability to be gentle and soft and was lovely,
but he was, you know, he was acid, too.
I mean, that he gave that hard edge to The Beatles.
It does seem that on occasions, John was aggressive, selfish,
little cruel,
and yet, you never have a hard word to say about him.
You always defend him, why?
Because I defend the truth.
You know, and I knew the man, I knew the truth of the man,
and the heart of the man during my time with him.
Why should I say something that I don't believe in?
He was wonderful with me for many years.
I mean… [scoffs]
I mean, it's impossible for somebody to be wonderful all the time.
Paul once said to me,
"You have to understand,
John's mother was killed coming to visit him."
That's a terrible thing for anyone to live with.
She was fatally struck by a car in the street.
How would any of us feel if we knew that her mother had died visiting us?
So I completely understand how John could have been…
an upset individual,
as well as being an incredibly imaginative individual.
And I think to understand his behaviour in the latter days of The Beatles,
you do have to see him as a human being and not just one of the Fab Four.
[Cynthia] Paul and John were a great partnership,
and I think John and I were a great partnership,
but there are occasions in life when partnerships have to break up
to go on to form new partnerships,
and it did happen at that particular time and it was, again,
not coincidence necessarily, it just happened.
Brian's death, the complete, um, crash of Apple, really,
because it was chaotic, a lot of freeloaders, a lot of money lost.
You know, a very difficult time, all totally lost.
They're all lost in their own way.
And of course, there's always a catalyst in life,
and I think Yoko was the catalyst in that particular time,
that created the break up in the end.
[poignant music playing]
[Gambaccini] Whereas The White Album, 1968,
had everybody contributing a lot of different material,
John definitely takes a back seat in 1969.
Paul holds it together on the Abbey Road and Let It Be albums.
But there's a point beyond which you can't stretch the rubber band.
It just has to go… whoop!
And it was over.
[male reporter] Oh! Hold it!
[male reporter 1] Does this mean a business
or emotional split within The Beatles?
Actually, I think a bit of both, but I think it's more of a break.
He answers himself that he doesn't know whether it's temporary or permanent,
that's the truth. I think none of us know that.
But could be his financial interest in the band,
in the organisations will stay?
Yes, contractually they have to
and I think emotionally, they all wanted to.
They've never argued about money.
What are the personal differences that he refers to?
I don't know, it's probably to do with growing up and to do with…
there was a time when there were just four of them.
but now they're married and there are children and…
How about that it's true? Because Allen Klein's name is mentioned
and Allen Klein is definitely disowned in this question and answer by Paul?
Because he doesn't like Allen.
[male reporter 2] What do you feel about the fact that Paul, apparently,
is definitely dissociating himself from you?
It appears that he's antipathetic to you.
Well, it's never pleasant when someone appears not to like you.
I think his reasons are, uh…
are sad.
They're his own personal problems,
but unfortunately,
he is obligated into Apple, for a considerable number of years.
[male host] When did you personally decide
that Klein probably wasn't the man you thought he was?
Well, uh, you're concluding that I thought he was something, you know.
My position has always been the devil and the deep blue sea, and…
at the time, I do whatever I feel is right.
And although I haven't been particularly happy personally,
for quite a long time with the situation,
I didn't want to make any quick moves.
And I wanted to see if maybe, you know, something could work out.
[male host] Do you regret signing that contract with Klein, now looking back?
Uh…
Which contract?
-It can be quite anything, can it? -The basic American contract.
That might be the one with least regret.
That's very enigmatic. What does it mean?
Well, Mr Klein's contracts [chuckles] are amazing.
-That's strange, though. -No, no. They're cold, the opposite.
I don't want to go into the contract business because it's all…
you know, let the lawyers deal with the contracts.
It's going into a Rolling Stone article now.
No, it isn't, 'cause we're not answering, that's not the point.
No, I can't tell you about contracts.
I try not to regret anything, I'm not playing games with you, you know.
And whatever happened, happened, you know. I'm happy now,
and that's about all that is important to me.
That I'm enjoying myself.
The main thing that Yoko and I are doing
is to change the apathy that all the youth have.
Our job now is to tell them that there is still hope,
and we still have things to do,
and we must get out there and change their heads,
and tell them, "It's okay, we can't change it."
It isn't over just because flower power didn't work.
It's only the beginning, we're just in the inception of revolution,
which is beginning of change.
I know it's hard, you know.
Christ you know it ain't easy you know how hard it can be, ma.
But it is hard. So what, everything's hard it's gonna be hard tomorrow
and it's gonna be hard the next day.
So what? It's better to have it hard than not have it at all.
If it works, it's right if it doesn't work it's wrong.
[John] Well, nobody's ever given me a chance before, have they?
Nobody's ever given peace a complete chance.
Gandhi tried it, Martin Luther King tried it, but they were shot.
-But nobody's giving-- -You can't get
peace in a king-sized divan on we're talking--
[John] No, you don't expect that mainly to the revolutionaries
who think they can get it overnight by breaking
by breaking down the buildings, you know.
They can't get it, we thought about this for months.
This is the best possible, most functional, and effective way
of promoting and protesting against violence
that our minds combined to think of.
Some people sort of discovered a new reality
and some people are still sort of confident about the future
that we too are, you know.
Everybody's talking about all that
the way it's going and the decadence and the rest of it
but nobody's really, not many people are noticing all the good
that came out the last ten years
-which is the moratorium… -[Yoko] Mm-hm.
…and the vast gathering of people in Woodstock
which is the biggest mass of people ever gathered together
for anything other than war.
Nobody had that big an army that didn't kill somebody
or have some kind of, you know, violent scene
like the Romans or whatever.
And even a Beatle concert was more violent than that, you know,
and that was just 50,000.
And so, the good things that came out were,
were all this fast peaceful movement, you know.
If you can't have a beautiful time there,
then don't have it and stay at home in bed.
The only way to get them to understand you is to extend your hand
and really try to open their minds up, and try to give your love, you know.
That's the only way that they will come around.
[John] They know how to beat people up.
They know how to gas them
and they have- they have the arms and the equipment,
and the mistake was made that the kids ended up
playing their game of violence, you know.
And they know how to be violent.
They've been running it on violence for 2,000 years
or million or whatever it is.
And nobody can tell me that violence is the way after all that time, you know.
There must be another way but a lot of people fell for it
and it's understandable in a way
because when the bully's actually right there,
it's pretty hard to say, "Turn the other cheek, baby."
When we were in touch with the Berkeley kids during that, whatever was going on,
we were peacefully doing our peace demonstration in Montreal bed
and then, we suddenly were connected by phone directly to them, you know.
And they were saying, "Help us, you know,"
or "what are we gonna do, it's gonna go wrong," you know.
and this is the people who are organizing it
but they were saying "it's out of our control" and that
and "what can we say," you know, and of course, I haven't got any solution.
There's no path worth losing your life for.
You know, I don't believe in anything else.
And I don't believe there's any path or anything worth getting shot for.
And you can do better by moving on to another city
or going to Canada or go anywhere.
And then they've got nothing to attack and nobody to point a finger at.
[clamouring]
[John] A festival is more like it, man.
You know, sing Hare Krishna or something,
but don't move about if it aggravates the pig.
[Yoko] And don't worry if it works or not.
Everything works if you believe in it.
Don't get hassled by the cops and don't play their games.
My position on violence is I don't believe in it.
I think we all have violent tendencies I think it can be channelled.
I think violence begets violence
as proved by the various marches and things
that that always end up with cops and people getting beaten up
or cops beating up people or whatever it is.
And I think marching and placards is okay for the '30s when people wanted bread
and then it sort of had some impact on people.
But nowadays people are blasé about warn blasé about placards of marching
and I think there's many ways of protesting
and this bed-in is one of them, it mightn't suit you.
But you think of your own ideas.
That's all we're trying to do is make you aware
that there are other forms of protest.
And if you get, uh--
If you do a nonviolent protest like some guy said happened in Berkeley
and then you get beaten up,
all that means it's like sitting on the seashore
and you went in the deep end.
You went where the current was
so you've had the warning that this place is dangerous to swim in.
So you retire, think about it and make your next move.
Don't make the same move again because then they're gonna beat you again.
The Woodstock, Isle of Wight all the mass meetings of the youth
is completely positive for me.
And the fact that now we're all getting to know,
we're always showing our flags, you know.
And you show your flag, you're not alone, you know.
It's like we no need to be the- a few Christian martyrs
because there's lots of us.
And don't be afraid because, uh…
They do look after you whoever's up there, you know, if you get on with it.
And I'm completely positive and when I'm negative, I've got Yoko,
who is just as strong as me and it helps, you know.
And just… It is only the beginning.
[stammers] This '60s bit was just a sniff
that the '60s was just waking up in the morning, you know,
and we haven't even got to dinnertime yet.
And I can't wait, you know, I just can't wait.
I'm so glad to be around,
and it just gonna be great and there's gonna be more and more of us
and whatever you thinking there,
Mrs Grundy of South Birmingham on toast, you know, you don't stand a chance.
A, you're not gonna be there when we runnin' it,
and B, you gonna like it when you get less frightened of it, you know.
And it's gonna be wonderful and I believe it,
and of course, we all get depressed and down about it
but when I'm down or when John and Yoko's down
Desmond will be up or somebody else will be up there.
Always somebody carrying the flag and beating the drum, you know.
So they, whoever they are, don't stand a chance
because they can't beat love because all those old bits from religion
and about love being all powerful is true, you know.
And that's the bit they can't do. They can't handle it.
Anybody can put on paper
what our government and the American government etcetera
and the Russian-Chinese, what they are actually trying to do
you know, on how would what they think they're doing.
I'd be very pleased to know what they think they're doing it.
I think they're all insane, you know.
But I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that, you know,
That's what's insane about it.
[Gambaccini] John's solo music started off as experimental
and then they released some unusual stuff…
on Apple…
or Zapple which was for the really experimental stuff.
And of course, they did "Unfinished music: Life with the Lions"
number two I think, it was called.
Anyway, it included, um…
the sound of Yoko's miscarried baby, the heartbeat Yoko's miscarried baby.
This was obviously not the stuff of a pop hit
and, um…
her screaming on this record was greeted with derision.
Part of the problem was that Yoko besides not being a pop music artist
was a woman
just before feminism.
So it was easier to write her off.
She was oriental,
so it's easy to be racist
and she was older than John
so she was on the wrong side of 30.
And so, it was it was easy to not take her seriously.
You had a woman who was there in the limelight with John,
and obviously, having a profound influence on him,
but she was so different from the world of The Beatles
that the general public just didn't even want to go there and check her out.
They just wanted to say non-Beatle.
That's why she has the reputation as the woman who broke up The Beatles.
[male host] Why are you being deported?
Well, the sort of official reason is something about
uh, we overstayed, both of us.
So that's reason enough to throw us out.
The other official reason is that that I was busted in England for pot
and the real reason is because I'm a peacenik.
John, far from being
the divinity in the eyes of the American government, was persona non grata.
Richard Nixon was president,
J Edgar Hoover was the head of the FBI.
Uh, these were people who with hindsight we know
took liberties…
with the law.
I feel like I'm back in school again, you know,
I've been in trouble all my life, one way or the other,
and I'm back to see the head, you know.
And this time they don't cane me, that's all. They don't beat me anymore.
[male reporter] You say you've been in trouble all your life, why is that?
I'm just one of those faces, you know, people never like my face.
Teachers used to get furious about it.
Is it because you're anti-establishment?
I guess it must show on the face, yeah.
Whereas a normal person
would have found it easier to get his green card but John…
found it difficult.
Nixon was afraid that he would lead riots
or demonstrations by young people against the government.
Do you think that you will be deported?
I have no idea maybe it's just a process. I don't--
We're gonna go in, we're late, you know.
We'll see you when we come out if you want.
We have a number of matters we have to take care of.
Immigration is asking me to do really is to take a decision
on whether choosing my husba- husband or my child.
And it's a terrible situation to be in.
[male reporter] Well, you know, stop speaking out against the war because--
No, nothing will stop me and whether I'm here or wherever I may be…
It took years for John to get his complete permission.
Neil Sedaka wrote a song about his problems called "The Immigrant."
And there was tremendous support for him from the people until he finally won.
I wanna take this opportunity to thank all the kids and the fans
who wrote to all their Senators and their petitions
and all the rest of it that were working behind the scenes for five years
with no pay or no nothing, actually, just a smile.
Do you bear any grudge against the Strom Thurmonds
and the John Mitchells for putting you through this all these years?
No, I believe time wounds all heels. [chuckles]
John had this romantic notion of New York City.
He loved it.
He said he could go anywhere without being hassled,
he'd found personal happiness.
He earned that enjoyment.
So in a way, we should be glad
that he took out the five years to be a house husband
because those were the five years…
that were the equivalent of anyone else's retirement.
He got his chance to be a private citizen.
But no person who has made a great contribution to the human race deserves
to be deprived of his full lifespan.
[gunfire]
[male reporter 1] The former Beatle John Lennon
has been shot and killed in New York.
News of his death reached soon after half-past four this morning.
A man of peace struck down by an apparently senseless act of violence.
John Lennon was brought to the emergency room
at the Roosevelt site, St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital this evening,
shortly before 11:00 p.m.
He was dead on arrival.
[man] Numerous resuscitative efforts were made
after his arrival in the hospital,
including transfusions, surgical procedures, other procedures,
but in spite of the effort of many physicians
and after many procedures, we were unable to restore the life of Mr Lennon.
Sometime shortly before 11 o'clock,
John Lennon and his wife arrived back at the Dakota in a limousine.
They parked the limousine on the curb right outside the Dakota.
There is a driveway into which they might have gone
but on this occasion did not.
They got out of the car, out of the limousine,
and walked into the archway area of the Dakota
to the right as you walk in the archway area is kind of a vestibule
which has a doorway, a glass doorway.
This individual, Mr Chapman, came up behind him
and called to him Mr Lennon,
as he arrived at that doorway and then in a combat stance, he fired.
He emptied the Charter Arms .38 calibre gun that he had with him
and, um, shot John Lennon.
[man] Five gunshot wounds are not a rare event on the streets of New York
and yet just such an attack in the early hours of this morning
has left millions of people in the world feeling personally touched by tragedy.
Comparisons made today with the assassination of John Kennedy
are not entirely fatuous, in just such a way as that day in 1963.
So millions will remember exactly what they were doing
where they were, who they were with,
that moment when they heard that John Lennon was dead.
I saw John Lennon got out of the limousine.
They walked into the gate and, and then I…
I heard four or five shots, yes, yeah.
I heard the woman screaming. It was Yoko. She was screaming, "Help me!"
He's not dead. You're just saying that.
[male reporter] The doctor just announced it.
Yes, but I don't care they're just saying that to get people to leave.
He's not dead, John Lennon can't be dead.
[woman sobs]
[clamouring]
I was very shocked, you know. Terrible news.
What were you recording today?
No, just listening to some stuff. You know, I just didn't want to record.
-Why? -Oh, I didn't feel like it.
I heard about it early in the morning.
I had a phone call from New York about 6 o'clock.
I was woken up by it. Saying, "What do you think about John's death?"
I mean, it's not a nice way to wake up.
And of course, it's pretty shattering and I rang Paul straight away,
and said, "Look, I guess you don't want to come in, do you?"
He said, "I can't stay here. Would you mind if we go into the studio?"
So we met in the studio and we didn't any work we just talked
and it was the best way of dealing with it.
[Gambaccini] A creep killed John Lennon.
An attention-seeking creep
who had previously considered killing Johnny Carson,
the host of The Tonight Show.
[Gambaccini] I'm not naming this person
even though we all know this person's name
because these insects
do not deserve to be mentioned in the same breath as their victims.
We have to understand,
what a giant was taken from us by such a midget.
Total devastation.
I've never experienced anything like it in my life before.
[sighs] Uh, It's very, very hard.
It was a terrible experience for myself, for Julian,
for everyone who was close to John, for all his fans.
It was an experience I'll never get over
because I relive it constantly even though I wasn't there at the time.
Because person that I loved for so many years
you know went through such a horrendous death.
[interviewer] I sensed that you never really stopped loving John, did you?
[Cynthia] No.
[sad music plays]
I know it's a difficult subject…
and I wasn't with you at the time.
I wish I had been there to tell you.
Can you tell me how… What were your feelings
the time you heard your father's death?
I… You can't explain it, You can't… I mean, it's just…
Uh, you know, it's too much but we know how I felt I had to say.
I mean, stay strong, you know.
'cause I mean, you'd known him more than I had… longer.
And to keep you from going through it, you know.
You don't feel any bitterness or hate about it, do you?
[clicks tongue] Uh, well, I…
-The guy who did it? -Yeah. The whole act of…
Well, obviously, there was a bit of anger crushed up inside, you know,
but there's nothing I could do about it.
It was… I mean, obviously such a shock
because assassination is something which, you know, up until that time hadn't
really got down to the that level.
I mean, it was always presidents and leaders, and all that.
And I wouldn't think, you know, somebody who's a pop star
was important enough to kill.
You know, it's a terrible thing.
I don't think anybody is important enough to kill
[sad music plays]
[Gambaccini] It's so senseless. It's an appalling, abhorrent crime.
And also, annoying from an artistic point of view
because the album that he was promoting Double Fantasy
was proof that he still had it in him.
Just like starting over was a very good pop record "Woman"
was wonderful record, "Beautiful boy", very moving
"Watching the wheels", very perceptive,
study of what it was like to step back from fame.
So he had more good music in him
but he had more life left in him that he deserved to enjoy
because he had earned it.
[Cynthia] You've told me about this story when you were in America…
Mmm.
…two years before dad died about the feather.
Can you tell me more about that?
No, really, yeah, now he just said that if he was to pop off one day
that, um, that
that, um, if there was a way of getting through to me,
he'd float a white feather across the room
not down or anything just straight across.
So I've been looking now and then for something.
But I think if you look too much, you're not gonna find it, you know.
Let it happen, if it does, it does.
[Cynthia] Did you believe in life after death?
Yeah, I think there's something going on out there.
After he had been killed,
and there had been so many tributes,
the one that brought me to the verge of tears
was in the pharmacist around the corner from the Dakota
which had a picture of him in the window
that said, "We will never forget the example of our dear John Lennon."
[stammers] And this was like… an honour from the village.
This was the neighbourhood people saying,
"Thank you for being yourself."
[Yoko] He's still alive
very much alive in people's memories.
And his words and music are still growing in people,
and bringing wisdom to the world.
And I'm just…
If anything, I'm getting the benefit of it
in a sense that, um, I might be overshadowed
some people might think that I'm overshadowed
but I'm in the shade of this beautiful tree
and the tree is protecting me.
We've got the gift of love, you know, love is like, uh…
a precious plant, you know.
You can't just accept it and leave it in the cupboard
or just think it's gonna get on with itself or like a pet, you know.
That's Desmond. [chuckles]
You've got to keep watering it, you know.
You've got to really look after it and…
love, you have to water and be careful of it
and keep the flies off
and see, that it's alright and nurture it, you know.
And to get a relationship between two people is the start
and then if we two can make it maybe we can make it with you, you know.
Mm-hm.
And from maybe us four, you and yours can make it with the next four.
[sad music plays]