On March 8, 2008, the Rutland Times reported the breathtaking news that the world and elsewhere would soon be privy to something quite remarkable: “Rutlemania! The Tribute Concert.” Even more impressive to fans of the Prefab Four, however, was the announcement that the famed Mods & Rockers Film Festival would be handling the official 30th-anniversary celebration of the Rutles on March 17, with Dirk (Eric Idle), Nasty (Neil Innes), Ricky Fataar (Stig), and John Halsey (Barry) all in attendance for a screening of the original 1978 version of The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash, the 1975 British TV skit that inspired the film, Rutles-related footage from Saturday Night Live, and highlights from the 2003 film The Rutles 2: Can’t Buy Me Lunch.
Damn. I really wish I could’ve been there for that.
Fortunately, David Haber from WhatGoesOn.com was there, and provided two separate reports over at his website, one a general summary and the other focusing specifically on the Rutles’ first full reunion performance ever. Better you should go there yourself rather than allow me to cannibalize all the good stuff here, but let’s just say that any event that can draw an audience that includes Andy Summers, Jeff Lynne, Aimee Mann, Michael Penn, Stephen Bishop, Howard Kaylan of the Turtles, producer extraordinaire Peter Asher (who was also half of Peter & Gordon), Emo Phillips, Marcia Strassman, and Dan Castellaneta was clearly the place to be that night.
If you’re a Beatles fan who’s never heard the genius parody that is the Rutles, you’re really missing out. It’s a fair assessment to suggest that 90 percent of all power pop is unabashedly derivative of the works of John, Paul, George, and Ringo, and plenty of comedians have taken the world’s most famous Liverpudlians and had a laugh at their expense, but few have done such an exquisite job of it and gotten the blessing of the members themselves to boot — well, three-quarters of them, anyway. George actually made a cameo in the original film; as for the others (if we can trust Wikipedia’s word on the matter), Ringo liked the happier scenes but felt the ones that mimicked the sadder times in the band’s career hit too close to home, while John loved the film so much that he refused to return the videotape and soundtrack he was given for his approval, warning Neil Innes that “Get Up and Go” was too close to “Get Back” and to be careful so as not to be sued by Paul. This might explain why Macca always said “no comment” when asked of the film at the time of its release, as well as Innes’s remark that Sir Paul “had a dinner at some awards thing at the same table as Eric one night, and Eric said it was a little frosty.”
Well, fair enough, you can kind of understand that. It’s fine and well for us to have a laugh at it all, but then, we didn’t live it. George was around for much of the planning of the original film, but according to producer Gary Weis, even the Quiet One got a bit testy at one point, snapping, “We were the Beatles, you know!” Moments later, however, he shook his head and said, “Aw, never mind.”
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