“A Hard Day’s Night”

Didja know that it was on this day August 12, 1964 (Yep, 53 years ago) United Artists released “The Beatles in their first, full length, Hilarious, Action Packed Film!”….. (that’s exactly how “The one sheet” poster read)….

United Artists were very optimistic about “A Hard Day’s Night” and it opened in 500 movie houses across the U.S.A. The film was an immediate critical and financial Grand Slam. In fact TIME magazine declared it one of the “100 greatest movies of all time”….Hmmm, that may be pushing it just a bit (even for us!) On the other hand, as a young Beatlemaniac in 1964, it was Thee greatest movie we’d ever seen…

Did you get to see it during it’s initial run? In my gang, it was not a matter of “If” but more of “How many times! For me, I think I made it to Seven before the end of the year….. YOU ?

Further, didja know that after completing “Night” Brian Epstein went ahead with another film starring another one of his charges. In Jan 1965 U.A. Released “Ferry ‘Cross The Mersey” starring Gerry Marsden of Gerry and the Pacemakers…. To call this movie “A poor mans Hard Day’s Night” is paying it a huge compliment! Did you ever see it? Some theaters hooked it to The Fab Four Film, that’s how we saw it, as the opener for “A Hard Day’s Night” Which only highlighted what a feeble attempt this was to cash in on The Beatles success! Clearly as the manager of both Bands, this was one of Brian Epsteins BAD ideas!

Lastly, we couldn’t recognize this anniversary without a couple of “A Hard Day’s Night tid bits……First, do you know what the original title was? It was to be Called “Beatlemania” But then Ringo came to the rescue with his “Malaprop” of “A Hard Day’s Night”….. Here’s something else you may not know,

In the party scene John is being interviewed by a young pretty reporter, the reporter asks John if he has any hobbies? John grabs a pencil and paper, jots down a word and hands it to the reporter who is immediately appalled! The word John wrote down was,……”Tits”

Yeah, Yeah, Yeah…