Everyone has a pop group/band that were an essential part of their teen years. I count myself really lucky as i was a young adult in the UK in the 60’s when the Beatles appeared from seemingly nowhere and conquered the world. Those were the days when you could saunter up to the Box Office and get prime seats for very little and get to see a great deal. For me it was 1964 and I WANNA OLD YOUR HAND was No 1 in the UK Charts for 16 weeks !
Little did I know then that just 6 years later Paul McCartney would be announcing that the world’s supergroup was splitting up. People blamed him for the break up, but we know now looking back it was John Lennon who wanted out. He had married Yoko Ono the year before and this drastic change from his marriage to Cynthia from Blackpool and the mother of Julien was manna to the tabloids.
Lennon and Ono first met in London, where the Beatles stopped by Ono’s solo exhibit at the London art galley after hearing about “this Japanese avant-garde artist coming from America”. They both claim it was love at first sight. The couple went to Amsterdam on their honeymoon and immediately made headlines for staging a “bed-in” protest — inspired by the sit-in protests of the time — in which they did not leave their bed at the Hilton Hotel for five days as part of a campaign for world peace, inviting reporters to come and ask them questions during the day.
Two months later, as the Vietnam War continued, they held another weeklong bed-in in Montreal. During that protest, Lennon recorded one of the era’s defining songs, “Give Peace a Chance,” at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel.
Lennon’s music became much more political, especially on the two albums he recorded with Ono and it attracted a great deal of attention. Nixon wanted them deported but Mike Douglas wanted them to co-host his Daytime chat show. The lawyers fought Nixon and won ….and in 1972 they accepted Douglas’s offer and made a week of rather esoteric and offbeat progams that were seemingly radical at the time.
Now filmmaker Erik Nelson (Grizzly Bear) has edited the programs into a intriguing documentary that leaves you bemused and confused at times, even though it is hard not to like them …. especially Mike Douglas.
Confession time : the Beatles are not only the pop/rock band of this writers generation but for a year back in 60’s he worked in London’s Saville Row two blocks from their HQ of Apple Corps their management company. Seeing teenage girls screaming in the street became a daily sight. (Not sure why there were no guys in the group but it was still illegal to be gay in the UK then).
Watching the new documentary two things strike you most. One is the very genuine connection between Lennon and Ono which would later still survive when Lennon had a very public affair with his assistant. The second point is this is the most we have ever seen of Ono on camera and although we may not fall in love with her, it gives us a chance to understand her more.
The film however is uneven : it comes alive when Chuck Berry is a guest and has a love fest with Lennon, and we fall in love with singer Vivian Reed but is almost embarrassing to watch anti-war leader Jerry Rubin make a clumsy pitch trying to be liked.
I’m unsure who beyond music historians and people of my generation will want to see the movie…… but seeing Lennon sing ‘Imagine’ is worth sitting through the whole 90 mins
ROGER WALKER-DACK Creator, Editor-in-Chief Miami Beach, FL / Provincetown, MA IG @QUEERGURU Member of G.A.L.E.C.A. (Gay & Lesbian Entertainment Critics Association) and NLGJA The Association of LGBT Journalists. and The Online Film Critics Society. Ex Contributing Editor The Gay Uk & Contributor Edge Media Former CEO and Menswear Designer of Roger Dack Ltd in the UK
Labels: 2024, Daytime Revolution, John Lennon, Mike Douglas, review, Roger Walker-Dack, Yoko Ono
