Artist News

24 Hour Party People director takes charge of Liam Gallagher’s wig-free Beatles flick

By | Published on Friday 14 October 2011

Liam Gallagher

Michael Winterbottom, the man behind the Factory Records movie ’24 Hour Party People’ of course, has been newly named as director of forthcoming Beatles biopic ‘The Longest Cocktail Party’.

As previously reported, the film is being made by Liam Gallagher’s production company In 1 Productions, with Gallagher taking the title of co-producer. It’s based on a book by Richard DiLello, which has as its focus The Beatles’ company Apple Corp, where DiLello once worked, and follows the creation of that business through to the recording sessions for ‘Let It Be’ and the subsequent collapse of the band.

Speaking to The Guardian’s Xan Brookes at the Cannes Film Festival earlier this year, Gallagher said “The Beatles ain’t gonna be in this film”, by which we think he meant the actors playing the Fab Four won’t be cast or told to particularly look or act like Lennon, McCartney, Harrison or Starr (and not that those characters will be completely excluded from the film, which would be surprising, even if this movie is primarily based around the operations of Apple Corp). Gallagher added: “There’s gonna be no one auditioning for John, Paul, George, Ringo, and there’s gonna be no wigs. I think that’s where these Beatles films have gone wrong”.

Gallagher had expressed a wish that Johnny Depp play the film’s main protagonist, Apple press officer Derek Taylor, but his co-producer seems less certain, suggesting the actor may be too old and too American to portray a 32 year old Liverpudlian. Says co-producer Andrew Eaton: “There are other parts he [Depp] could do, but whether he could be Derek… I don’t know”.



READ MORE ABOUT: | | | |