Music and Michael Winterbottom have always seemed to be natural bedfellows. And no, that’s not a 9 Songs joke – the director has either forged superb soundtracks for his films or, in the case of 24 Hour Party People, made one of the most compelling biopics of a musical movement put on celluloid. So he would seem to be the safest pair of hands for a film that promises to chronicle the difficult forming of Apple Records and the eventual collapse of The Beatles in The Longest Cocktail Party.
The story would follow John, Paul, George and Ringo as they set up their own company, through to the acrimony and accusations around the recording of Let It Be.
As reported by the fine fellows at The Playlist, Winterbottom and regular producing partner Andrew Eaton have been involved with the project for some time. Along with Oasis loudmouth Liam Gallagher, the pair has planned to adapt Richard DiLello’s book The Longest Cocktail Party: An Insider’s Diary Of The Beatles, Their Million Dollar Apple Empire And Its Wild Rise And Fall. And now Winterbottom has decided he’s going to direct it himself.
But if you’re already hopping up and down in your seat with excitement at the thought of a great filmmaker such as Winterbottom tackling the Fab Four, get ready to be patient. The director is already busy getting set to make Bailout and has plenty of other films on his To Do list. So it’s a matter of scheduling, according to Eaton, even though they’ve got a screenplay to hand from a solid writer: “Jesse Armstrong, who did In The Loop, **Four Lions **and Fresh Meat, has done the script. That’s a timing thing. We’re developing for Michael to direct, it’s one of my passion projects.”
Plus there’s the small matter of getting the music rights from Apple Records itself. But if they can pull it off? This could be something amazing.