Wednesday, June 8, 2011

"We just can't let it be"


Here is a story of photographer's memory of meeting the Beatles while they were making the movie, Help in '65.




As a fashion photographer for publications such as Redbook, Vogue and Brides in the swinging ’60s, it wasn’t rare for Stan Young to rub shoulders with celebrities.

But while shooting on Paradise Island in the Bahamas, a chance meeting had him sharing lunch with two of the Fab Four.

“We had three or four models and a crew, and noticed that down the beach, there was another professional group,” remembered the West Palm Beach resident.

Suddenly, the famed disc jockey Murray The K walked up to Young’s party and was invited to lunch.

Murray asked if he could “bring the boys,” said Young, who agreed without having any idea to whom he was referring. “And up comes John Lennon!”

The Beatles, it turned out, were filming their second movie, Help!, nearby. Ringo Starr was shooting a scene on the water, and Young thinks it was probably just Lennon and George Harrison who sat down to lunch with him, several models, including his wife, Evelyn Tripp, and actor Victor Spinetti, who also was in the movie. Their conversation turned to further adventures.

“In those days, we rented boats to come over to Paradise Island, these little speedboats with water skis,” he said. “John says to me, ‘You know we have a break now. I would love to water-ski.’ So I said, ‘Oh, take John for a run around!””

During the two hours they spent with the boys, Young shot various photos, until a guy from the Help! production crew came over and saw the camera.

“He said, ‘You know you can’t shoot the boys. Nobody can shoot the Beatles,”” Young recalled, noting that he stopped taking pictures.

Fortunately, he still has them, and his memories of a great afternoon.

“That really was something,” he said. “These were all the good times.

2 comments:

  1. It's just weird. All the photographs are actually the same photo, but everyone is re-arranged.. I wonder how the original pic looked like.

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  2. I have the originals. My mother Jeanne West was there. I have several different shot.

    ReplyDelete