thumbs up for Khali

For I have got....

Lounging in the Bahamas

These great snaps of George and Pattie in the Bahamas are currently up for auction .   They are very neat and I would really love to know the story behind them.  

There has been a bit of speculation that these shots might have been taken when George and Pattie went to the Bahamas in December of 1964.     I believe that these are indeed from 1966 because in 1964, George's hair was pretty shaggy and while his hair is wet in these photos, it still doesn't seem to be as shaggy.   And most importantly, Pattie's autograph reads "Pattie Harrison" and not "Boyd" which shows us that the newlywed was signing her first autographs as Mrs. Harrison.

Meet the Beatles on the Beach

In February 1965, when the Beatles were in the Bahamas filming Help!, one fan's family vacation became a dream come true.   This fan and her sister came down from the United States to the Bahamas for some sun and sand.   Being big Beatle fans, they were excited to hear that the Beatles were right where they were and for the several days, the two girls went to Paradise Island and opening snapped photos and spoke with the Beatles.    

When the Beatles all came off of the boat at Paradise Island, she was waiting for them with a newspaper announcing their arrival for them to sign.   She managed to get all 4 Beatles signatures, plus Victor Spinetti's.

After the Beatles had left for the day, she and her sister took turns sitting the Paul's sports car and she took an empty cigarette pack as well as the call sheet for the previous day's filming session that Paul had left behind.

All of these items are currently available at Heritage auction house.   Bid now!  (and send me scans later).  :)

Ringo interview with Derek and Dave

This is an interview by Derek Taylor and Dave Hull of KRLA for The Beat magazine.   They were in the Bahamas and interviewed the Beatles.   This interview with Ringo seems to focus a lot on Ringo's recent marriage to Maureen.   I can just feel that Ringo wanted to say, "listen----she told me that she was pregnant, and so I asked her to marry me.   I love Maureen and we were most likely going to get married eventually, but the baby on the way sped up the whole thing.   That is what is up."   But of course he couldn't  say that.    

Hullabalooer and Ringo

KRLA the Beat

March 31, 1965

Derek:  Good morning, Ringo

Ringo:  Good morning, Derek.  Good to see you again.

Derek:  Good to see you, Ringo, particularly in weather like this.  Is it too hot for you?

Ringo:  Uh…it gets a bit hot when you’re staked in the sun and have to lay there for half an hour or so, fully dressed.

Derek:  Why the red paint all over your suit, Ringo?

Ringo:  Well, it’s…the film is basically a chase film and it’s about a ring, and it starts off where they’re going to sacrifice a girl, and they paint everyone they sacrifice red, you see…this tribe…but they can’t sacrifice the girl because she hasn’t got this magic ring on which she sent to me because I wear rings.  And so they’re after me now and they can’t get the ring off and so they’re going to sacrifice me…and that’s why I’m red.

Derek:  And the paint has been put on you so they could sacrifice you?

Ringo:  Yes.

Derek:  How many times have you been painted up now?

Ringo:  Oh, about four or five times.

Derek:  Do you like filming?  It seems hard work for you.  You always seem to be the one out on your own while all the other Beatles are in bed.

Ringo:  Not all of the time.  Some of it.  I’ve enjoyed filming anyway.  It’s just that I hate to get up in the mornings.  That’s the only drag.

Derek:  What tie do you have to get up in the morning, Ring?

Ringo:  Malcom woke me up at 25 to seven this morning.

Derek:  How do you stand the separation so soon after getting married?

Ringo:  Oh, you know, you just when we were getting married that I would have to leave to come out here for the film and we just got used to the idea.  It’s a bit of a drag, y’know.  But there was no point fetching Maureen because we’re working like lunatics and we don’t have a day off when we’re on location.

Derek:  It wasn’t a question then, really, of having a Caribbean honeymoon, which is many people’s dream?

Ringo:  No, no.  Well, we didn’t have an England one…never mind the Caribbean one.

Derek:   how long were you actually away from London?

Ringo:  We got married on a Thursday and went back on a Sunday night.

Derek:  It was quite a dramatic story, which broke at a very good time of day, too.   How long was it planned before it happened?

Ringo:  Well, we decided to get married two weeks to the day, and it started getting planned from then.

Derek:  Well, let me say congratulations because everyone who knows you, and knows you both, is delighted.  I think it was a marvelous move and I’m sure you thought so too or you wouldn’t have done it.

Ringo:  Well, thanks a lot, Derek.  I thought it was a good move.

Derek:  It means that at least we won’t have to deny or confirm the quires, “Is Ringo married,” so will you now say into the mike something for all time, on record, “I married Maureen Cox.”

Ringo:  I married Maureen Cox.  I’m very happy…and her name is now Maureen Starkey.

Derek:  Which is no bad name and we’re all very happy.  Tell me, the other Beatles in the film…are they detached form you for a time as they were in ‘A Hard Day’s night?’”

Ringo:  Yes, just a short time.  Not too long this time, though.

Derek:  In this film there’s no question of you falling out at all?

Ringo:  No, no.  Well, as I say, I get captured and things and they’re looking for me, and when they’re looking for me you won’t’ see me on the screen, and when I’m sort of being captured and taken away you’ll see me and not  them.

Derek:  Is the film in Technicolor?

Ringo:  Yes, yes.  Well, it’s in some color.  I don’t know if it’s in Technicolor or one of the other colors.

Derek:  It’s a beautiful day, Ringo.

Ringo:  It’s marvelous.  I think it must be getting 75 or 80 degrees.

Derek:  It’s a different climate form California, of course, because I think there is more humidity coming in from Florida.

Ringo:  Well, it’s very hot if you get into the town.   It’s not so bad while you’re on the beach, but while you’re in town it’s hard going, y’know….you sweat like a pig.

Derek:  this sort of climate suits me very well, which his really why I came to live in California.   Dave Hull just walked up.

Ringo:  Yes, I’ve noticed.  Hi, Dave.

Dave:  Hi Ringo.  I think it’s my turn to toss a few questions at you.

Ringo:  Yeah, I sort of expected that.

Dave:  Speaking of Maureen again, are you happily married?

Ringo:  Yes, very happily, thank you.

Dave:  Good.  That’s very good.  I know all of your fans..there are a few dissenters but I’m sure most of your fans.

Ringo:  I hope I haven’t upset anyone too much.

Dave:  No.  I don’t think it has.  Most of your fans are quite happy if you’re happy.  I know that’s they well they feel.

Ringo:  Well that’s good.  Thank you.

Dave:  The time you were in the States, in Hollywood, and in Los Angeles in particular, I asked you a question, “What about Maureen? And your answer was:  “Maureen who?”  Do you know the Maureen that I meant now?

Ringo:  Yes, yes.  Yes, but I mean…when I was last in the States there was nothing…no thought about getting married or anything.  I just used to take her out a lot and other people as well, you know.   And I got back and about November/December we sort of went out together, just the two of us, all the time.  I didn’t go with anyone else or anything, and then three weeks before we got married I asked her to marry me.  And then two weeks form the day before we got married we started setting up the wedding.

Dave:  How did she feel about not being with you on this particular trip?

Ringo:  I don’t know, really.  I don’t think she likes it.  When I phone her says, you know, “I miss you,” and things like that.  And I miss her.   But you know, we’re working every day and there would be nothing for her to do and she’s busy with all the family because none of the family came to the wedding, only her mother and father and mine, and she’s sort of going around being congratulated by the aunties and uncles, you know.  So, she’s doing that job while I’m doing mine.

Dave:  that’s good.  Yesterday—to get back to the movie for just a moment---yesterday there was—not a mishap, but the car is which they were shooting you and John and Paul and George, slammed into the tree a little hard.  Is that correct?

Ringo:  Yesterday?   That was about four days ago---three days ago.  None of us were in the car.  George was on top of it when it smashed into the tree, and it’s all part of the film…so…

Dave:  Oh, it is?

Ringo:  So there was no great danger.

Dave:  They are shooting some of this in Austria?

Ringo:  Next Wednesday we go back to Britain for two days and then we fly out to Austria for eight days, and then we finish the film in Britain the next two months.

Dave:  Listen, it has been awfully nice of you to take this time, Ringo.

Ringo:  It’s my pleasure.

Dave:  Best of luck to Mrs. Starkey.

Ringo:  Thank you very much.   I’m still not really used to that name:  Mrs. Starkey.

Beatles Love Bahamas, but Feeling far from mutual

I thought this newspaper article from 50 years ago today was quite interesting!

Photo by Henry Grossman

photo by Henry Grossman

 

Beatles Love Bahamas, but Feeling far from mutual

Tuesday March 9, 1965

Ocala Star-Banner

Back home in England the Beatles may be great, but since their arrival here they’ve done little to endear themselves to the press or public.  

The entertainers got off to a bad start last December when Beatles George Harrison arrived with his girlfriend, Patti Boyd for a hush-hush week’s stay with Dr. W.T. Strach, the Beatles’ business manager.

Efforts by local officials then to keep reporters and fans away led to a near-riot at the airport.

When the four mop-tops arrived Feb. 22 to film a movie, they gave local fans the slip by being whisked from their plane in an automobile, not allowing even a glimpse of them.

Charges of “ignoring their fans” were denied by Brian Epstein, the Beatles’ personal manager, who claimed this was an arrangement by local authorities.

But the Beatles’ behavior here is generally resented.  They’ve refused to pose for any photographers and fans have been unable to get autographs as the entertainers rush back and forth in fast cars and dodge autograph seekers. 

Photographers have been subjected to foul language and the public generally has come in for similar treatment. 

Tony Howard, their publicity manager, today denied reports that Ringo had burned the hand of Pete Gardner, manager of a restaurant, with a lighted cigarette.

“When I told Ringo about it, he went into a fit of laughter, saying he couldn’t understand how anyone would think he could do such a thing,” Howard said.   “The whole thing was just a joke.”

Howard admitted that Ringo did gesture toward Gardner’s hand with a cigarette but he said he had no intentions of burning him.

In spite of the bad press they have received here, Howard said the Beatles loved the Bahamas and plan to return for a holiday as soon as their schedule permits.

Commenting on adverse publicity, Howard said, “I think they’ve come to expect this kind of thing.  It probably happened because the people were getting a bit bored with all the nice things which have been said about the Beatles and the newspapers were just looking for a new angle.   The boys feel that recent statements about them in print are quite wrong or vastly exaggerated and as far as they are concerned, they’ve clear consciences and nothing to regret.”

Filming of the movie, so far unnamed, has proceeded on schedule and the Beatles are due to leave Wednesday.  Full preparations are being made to allow fans a good view of the Beatles on their departure.  They will arrive at the airport an hour before scheduled takeoff

During the weekend the Beatles broke their daily “work and bed’ routine and dined with Sir Harold and Lady Christie on Friday and tourist minister Sir Stafford Sands on Saturday when they met the governor of the British Crown Colony, Sir Ralph and Lady Grey.

Painted Red

50 years ago the Beatles filmed the last scene on the beach for the movie, Help!   Here are some behind the scenes shots.

For I have got another girl

Did you know that George Harrison's sister, Louise was asked to be the girl that Paul strums like a guitar in the "Another Girl" sequence in the movie Help!?   In her book, My Kid Brother's Band, Louise states that she was considered for the part, as she was with the boys in the Bahamas in the early filming of the movie.  However, George was pretty embarrassed by the thought of his sister in a bikini on the big-screen and the idea was dropped.    However, Lou was in the movie---even though no one has spotted her yet.   She was in the crowd when the boys were in the swimming pool.  

The Beatles all wet

While making the film, Help! in the Bahamas, The Beatles started off by filming the scene where they pop up in a swimming pool.  This scene was filmed 50 years ago today!    The people in the background, not paying any mind to the Beatles always kill me in these photos.