Ron Howard will chronicle The Beatles' live years in authorized documentary.
Opie Cunningham always wanted to be a Beatle. From his days as Sheriff Andy’s kid on The Andy Griffith Show through his Happy Daysas a teenager finding a thrill on “Blueberry Hill.” The Beatles never covered “Blueberry Hill,” at least it was never captured on tape, but Fats Domino did show off a bling ring to Paul McCartney on their first American tour. The movie should hit theaters next year.
The Beatles are known as a studio phenomenon, bringing new chords, time signatures and sonic landscapes to rock and roll and creating rock music. But the band started off as a wild, leather-clad, north of England stage act. Cursing and smoking on stage when John Lennon wasn’t peeing on nuns’ heads or wearing toilet seats and making fun of spastics. Then Brian Epstein put them in collarless Calvin Klein suits and unleashed them on the unwitting south.
Ron Howard, who has been an unabashed Beatlemaniac for most of his life, will direct an authorized documentary on the group’s touring years between 1960 and 1966. The film will be produced by Howard’s Imagine Entertainment in conjunction with Apple Corps Ltd., White Horse Pictures and the full cooperation of Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Yoko Ono Lennon and Olivia Harrison.
The doc will follow the fabs from the cellars of Liverpool, they will mak shau in Hamburg, Germany, through their rising invasion of America, Australia, New Zealand and Australia, to their last live show at Candlestick Park in San Francisco in 1966. Between 1960 and 1966, The Beatles gave 166 concerts in 15 countries and 90 cities around the world.
In making the announcement, Howard said “I am excited and honored to be working with Apple and the White Horse team on this astounding story of these four young men who stormed the world in 1964. Their impact on popular culture and the human experience cannot be exaggerated.”
“What’s so intriguing to me is not only the subject, but the context we can bring to it now,” Howard continued. “Not only can we do a study of these touring years, the narrative of an odyssey, we can look at the significance of the Beatles as individuals -- as musical geniuses, as societal leaders and their effect on global culture. Dramatically it makes a lot of sense and cinematically, we have a chance to offer a unique experience.”
Howard turned 10 years old less than a month after the Beatles changed history on The Ed Sullivan Show.
“After I saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan, all I wanted after that was a Beatles wig. My parents said no but then they gave me one for my 10th birthday,” Howard said.
Now he usually wears a baseball cap.
White Horse’s Nigel Sinclair, who helped out on Martin Scorsese’s Emmy-winning George Harrison: Living in the Material World, and Grammy-winning No Direction Home: Bob Dylan, as well as musical docs Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who, The Last Play At Sheaand Foo Fighters: Back and Forth, will be pouring over concert footage, pro and fan-shot home movies.
“If we find a performance that’s particularly good, say in Cleveland in 1964, and have been able to find the sound with separated tracks, that’s something that will add a whole new dimension,” said Sinclair.
SOURCE: VARIETY
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