In 1967, The Beatles released Magical Mystery Tour, a film that George Harrison admittedly found confusing. He said that the movie was half-baked. They didn’t have a director, a script, or even a completely solid idea of what they wanted to make. Harrison said he never had any idea what he was doing on set. Still, he believed that the project ended up helping the band.
George Harrison | Chapman/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images George Harrison said The Beatles’ film ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ didn’t make sense to him
The Beatles released Magical Mystery Tour in 1967. The film follows a group of people on a bus tour. While the band understood the premise, they didn’t have a script. Harrison admitted that this made it difficult to understand what was happening.
“It was basically a charabanc trip, which people used to go on from Liverpool to see the Blackpool...
George Harrison | Chapman/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images George Harrison said The Beatles’ film ‘Magical Mystery Tour’ didn’t make sense to him
The Beatles released Magical Mystery Tour in 1967. The film follows a group of people on a bus tour. While the band understood the premise, they didn’t have a script. Harrison admitted that this made it difficult to understand what was happening.
“It was basically a charabanc trip, which people used to go on from Liverpool to see the Blackpool...
- 5/27/2023
- by Emma McKee
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Who will be included for the special “In Memoriam” segment for Sunday night’s Oscars 2022 ceremony? For almost all other Academy Awards productions since the 1990s, producers typically select 40-50 people from the various branches. The 2021 segment had close to 100 people in a particularly fast-paced three minutes that was not very well-received since many of them were only on screen for a second or two.
SEECelebrity Deaths 2022: In Memoriam Gallery
Previous Oscar winners from acting categories passing away since last year’s late April ceremony are Olympia Dukakis, William Hurt and Sidney Poitier. Past acting nominees include Ned Beatty, Sally Kellerman and Dean Stockwell.
Almost all of the dozens on the list below were Academy members, previous nominees/winners or both.
Louie Anderson (actor)
Ed Asner (actor)
Ned Beatty (actor)
Marilyn Bergman (composer)
Val Bisoglio (actor)
Robert Blalack (visual effects)
Peter Bogdanovich (director)
David Brenner (editor)
Leslie Bricusse (composer...
SEECelebrity Deaths 2022: In Memoriam Gallery
Previous Oscar winners from acting categories passing away since last year’s late April ceremony are Olympia Dukakis, William Hurt and Sidney Poitier. Past acting nominees include Ned Beatty, Sally Kellerman and Dean Stockwell.
Almost all of the dozens on the list below were Academy members, previous nominees/winners or both.
Louie Anderson (actor)
Ed Asner (actor)
Ned Beatty (actor)
Marilyn Bergman (composer)
Val Bisoglio (actor)
Robert Blalack (visual effects)
Peter Bogdanovich (director)
David Brenner (editor)
Leslie Bricusse (composer...
- 3/24/2022
- by Chris Beachum
- Gold Derby
Film producer and ‘fixer’ behind Beatles films including A Hard Day’s Night and Magical Mystery Tour
Working in the film industry, Denis O’Dell, who has died aged 98, was a fixer, usually credited as an associate producer or assistant director and ensuring that everything was in place to make the film within budgetary constraints. He did not mind that others took the glory that he had made possible. Best known for his association with the Beatles, he worked on their first film, A Hard Day’s Night (1964), and was the producer on their television film Magical Mystery Tour (1967).
When the film company United Artists asked him to work with the director Richard Lester on A Hard Day’s Night, initially O’Dell was not keen. “I didn’t want to make a pop film as usually they are just a vehicle for making money,” he recalled. “Bud Ornstein told me: ‘These guys won...
Working in the film industry, Denis O’Dell, who has died aged 98, was a fixer, usually credited as an associate producer or assistant director and ensuring that everything was in place to make the film within budgetary constraints. He did not mind that others took the glory that he had made possible. Best known for his association with the Beatles, he worked on their first film, A Hard Day’s Night (1964), and was the producer on their television film Magical Mystery Tour (1967).
When the film company United Artists asked him to work with the director Richard Lester on A Hard Day’s Night, initially O’Dell was not keen. “I didn’t want to make a pop film as usually they are just a vehicle for making money,” he recalled. “Bud Ornstein told me: ‘These guys won...
- 1/14/2022
- by Spencer Leigh
- The Guardian - Film News
Denis O’Dell, the British film producer whose association with The Beatles earned him the rare honor of being mentioned, if obliquely, in one of the group’s songs, died of natural causes at his home in Spain last night. He was 98.
His death was announced to the Associated Press in Lisbon, Portugal, by son Arran O’Dell.
O’Dell had worked on a number of films, including It’s A Wonderful World, Tread Softly Stranger (both 1958) and The Playboy of the Western World (1962) when he signed on as associate producer of A Hard Day’s Night in 1964, beginning an association with The Beatles that would return to public attention with the 2021 Peter Jackson-directed Disney+ documentary series The Beatles: Get Back. (O’Dell is the one who loaned the group Twickenham Studios for their planned TV special.)
Following A Hard Day’s Night, O’Dell worked with John Lennon as an associate producer...
His death was announced to the Associated Press in Lisbon, Portugal, by son Arran O’Dell.
O’Dell had worked on a number of films, including It’s A Wonderful World, Tread Softly Stranger (both 1958) and The Playboy of the Western World (1962) when he signed on as associate producer of A Hard Day’s Night in 1964, beginning an association with The Beatles that would return to public attention with the 2021 Peter Jackson-directed Disney+ documentary series The Beatles: Get Back. (O’Dell is the one who loaned the group Twickenham Studios for their planned TV special.)
Following A Hard Day’s Night, O’Dell worked with John Lennon as an associate producer...
- 12/31/2021
- by Greg Evans
- Deadline Film + TV
Denis O’Dell, a producer on two Beatles movies as well as “How I Won the War,” “Robin and Marian” and “Heaven’s Gate,” died Dec. 30 from natural causes in Almería, Spain at his home in San José, Cabo de Gata. He was 98.
Father of “Exodus: Gods and Kings” producer Denise O’Dell and grandfather of Denis Pedregosa, producer of Netflix hit “The Paramedic,” O’Dell’s connection with movies stretches back to the ‘40s.
He had already produced six movies, such as Brian Desmond Hurst’s “The Playboy of the Western World” in 1962, before his association with the Beatles, which began in professional terms with O’Dell taking an associate producer credit on Richard Lester’s “A Hard Day’s Night,” starring the Beatles and released in 1964.
O’Dell is generally credited with persuading John Lennon to go to Almería to star in the absurdist WWII drama “How I Won the War,” during...
Father of “Exodus: Gods and Kings” producer Denise O’Dell and grandfather of Denis Pedregosa, producer of Netflix hit “The Paramedic,” O’Dell’s connection with movies stretches back to the ‘40s.
He had already produced six movies, such as Brian Desmond Hurst’s “The Playboy of the Western World” in 1962, before his association with the Beatles, which began in professional terms with O’Dell taking an associate producer credit on Richard Lester’s “A Hard Day’s Night,” starring the Beatles and released in 1964.
O’Dell is generally credited with persuading John Lennon to go to Almería to star in the absurdist WWII drama “How I Won the War,” during...
- 12/31/2021
- by John Hopewell
- Variety Film + TV
On Aug. 31, 1998, Variety reported that New Zealand filmmakers Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh would transform J.R.R. Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” trilogy of books into three films. Reporter Benedict Carver added that the books are “a highly prized literary property that has eluded filmmakers for years.”
It was the culmination more than three decades of trying to adapt Tolkien’s work for the screen, after the world of visual effects had finally caught up to the British author’s fantastical storylines.
But three decades before, the Beatles had tried to get a “Lord of the Rings” film off the ground. After playing themselves in “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Help!,” the Fab Four was ready to play fictional characters. Apple Films executive Denis O’Dell spearheaded the hunt for material, and Lennon reportedly loved the idea of “Rings.” Lennon would play Gollum, Paul McCartney would play Frodo, George Harrison would...
It was the culmination more than three decades of trying to adapt Tolkien’s work for the screen, after the world of visual effects had finally caught up to the British author’s fantastical storylines.
But three decades before, the Beatles had tried to get a “Lord of the Rings” film off the ground. After playing themselves in “A Hard Day’s Night” and “Help!,” the Fab Four was ready to play fictional characters. Apple Films executive Denis O’Dell spearheaded the hunt for material, and Lennon reportedly loved the idea of “Rings.” Lennon would play Gollum, Paul McCartney would play Frodo, George Harrison would...
- 12/15/2021
- by Tim Gray
- Variety Film + TV
During the period of Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back, John Lennon and Yoko Ono made many experimental films. One of the techniques they pioneered was film speed. They showed the erection of a building, from scratch, fit into a few minutes of screentime by shooting a few frames per day. Jackson does the opposite in his new documentary, creating a slow-mo cinema verité version of director Richard Lester’s A Hard Day’s Night.
In the greatest jukebox musical ever made, the band has to retrieve an errant band member in time to make a show, and when they make that show, it’s a success. The crowds go wild. Beatlemania is encapsulated for all time. They play all their songs during the long and winding road to the TV station, and during rehearsals. They actually have to escape from prying eyes during rehearsals. We get snippets of old songs,...
In the greatest jukebox musical ever made, the band has to retrieve an errant band member in time to make a show, and when they make that show, it’s a success. The crowds go wild. Beatlemania is encapsulated for all time. They play all their songs during the long and winding road to the TV station, and during rehearsals. They actually have to escape from prying eyes during rehearsals. We get snippets of old songs,...
- 11/28/2021
- by Mike Cecchini
- Den of Geek
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