Tony Palmer

In an entertaining interview on BBC Radio Cornwall this morning with host Julie Skentelbery, BAFTA and Emmy Award-winning director Tony Palmer shared why, at 85, he is heading to The Regal Cinema in Wadebridge this Sunday.

From guiding John Lennon around Cambridge in a fake beard to directing landmark films featuring Jimi Hendrix, Leonard Cohen, and Maria Callas, Tony’s career shaped how the world today watches music. That seems like a bold statement to make but come and judge for yourself if it's true.

I'd certainly encourage every music lover, film fan, and aspiring young creative in North Cornwall to join us in Screen 1 Regal Cinema Wadebridge on Sunday night to find out and ask questions.

Tony shared the hilarious backstory of how John Lennon challenged him to make a "proper" music film back in the 1960s and that conversation led to Tony’s groundbreaking 1968 documentary All My Loving, featuring Pink Floyd, Cream, and Paul McCartney.

"In the film, Paul McCartney looks at the camera and says, 'Pop music IS the classical music of now.' Suddenly, people took it seriously. They realized these were extraordinary musicians with something important to say."

In a brilliant bit of cinema serendipity, while Tony Palmer is in Screen 1 sharing his firsthand memories of John Lennon, The Regal happens to be screening Don't Look Back in Anger on the big screen this week all about the Gallagher brothers.

Adding to their local connection, Liam Gallagher’s son  was actually staying with us in New Polzeath just this summer—a friend of my nephew, who handles merchandising and road logistics for the band Villanelle.

During his Radio Cornwall interview today, Tony also recalled his early days making rock films with blues-rock titan Rory Gallagher (no relation to Gene or Liam, but a massive influence on 90s rock). It creates a complete full-circle moment for music fans: Oasis built their sound on the foundations laid by John Lennon and Rory Gallagher—and the man who actually filmed Lennon and Rory Gallagher live in the 60s and 70s will be sitting right here in Screen 1 on Sunday night!t!

Tony isn't just coming to Wadebridge to look back; he said he's coming to inspire the future and that 50% of every £6 ticket sold goes directly to Young and Talented Cornwall, supporting young local artists, performers, and filmmakers across our county.

"People need to be encouraged," Tony urged. "If you were born in a tiny village down near Land's End or St Buryan, how do you fulfill your potential? People need to see what their role in life can be. Anything I can do to pass on my experience and provide those opportunities is really important to me."

Thanks to generous festival donors, free "Pay It Forward" seats are reserved at the Box Office for local students, young musicians, and seniors from the Betjeman Centre who want to experience this historic night out and not have to worry about the cost of a ticket.

If you want to read the entire story of John Lennon's fedora disguise, the three-year callback delay, and Tony's adventures at Cambridge then the link for the Full Transcript of Tony Palmer's BBC Radio Cornwall Interview today is in the comments.

Event & Booking Details

Join us for a remastered big-screen presentation followed by an unscripted live Q&A with Tony himself!

When: Sunday, 13th September at 7:30 PM

Where: The Regal Cinema, Wadebridge (Screen 1)

Tickets: £6.00 flat rate (50% goes to Young & Talented Cornwall)

Recorded Live: Sound engineered on-site by Mark Yeomans Photography  and former BBC staff for archival broadcast!

Book Your Sunday Tickets Direct at WTW Cinemas

Explore the Full Polzeath Resonance Festival Lineup

Here is the complete, verbatim transcript of BBC Radio Cornwall interview with Tony Palmer:

Presenter: Let's crack on with Free for All Friday now, and I would love to mention an event which is coming up at The Regal Cinema in Wadebridge on Sunday evening, which will be a fascinating opportunity to hear about the long and successful career of BAFTA and Emmy Award-winning film director Tony Palmer, who joins me now. Tony, I understand you were interrupted—the cricket for this—so it must be important! Hi.

Tony Palmer: Yes, good morning. Uh, yes I am, but... talking to you is far more important. What else can I say?

Presenter: Fabulous, fabulous! Just give me a sense of some of the stories you are looking forward to talking about on Sunday night.

Tony Palmer: Well, um... I mean, as you know, I've become involved in this Young & Talented Cornwall Trust, and I think anything I can do to support it is important.

Um, my career is very long and rather crazy, but I mean, I was always very lucky. I just got into the BBC in the mid-60s just in time. Some of my best friends were famous rock and roll stars—the obvious one, of course, being John Lennon. And through all my contacts at that time, I had the kind of opportunities that I don't think I would have nowadays. So, I'm very keen to pass that on—my experience—in any way that I possibly can.

I mean, I began by making rock and roll films. I made a film, Farewell Concert of Cream. I made a big film with Leonard Cohen. I made a film with Rory Gallagher, but I then "progressed"—if that's the right word—to making films about classical musicians. So I made a big film with and about Maria Callas, and also with and about Margot Fonteyn, and Benjamin Britten, and William Walton, and so on, and so on.

And so, as I say, I mean, when I look back—given that I'm fairly geriatric nowadays—when I look back, I realize how incredibly fortunate I was to be in the right place at the right time. Now, that's not something that comes to most people, so anything I can do to provide those opportunities is really important to me.

Presenter: Absolutely! And you've directed the greats: Richard Burton, Vanessa Redgrave, Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud... John Lennon was your—

Tony Palmer: You're embarrassing me! (laughs)

Presenter: (laughs) I don't mind! I'm quite prepared to shame you. But no, I mean, what a career, and I'm sure it will be a fascinating evening. But just give us a little insight into the real John Lennon. As a friend, what aspects of his personality do we as the public not appreciate?

Tony Palmer: Well, I don't think there's any aspect of his personality that we now don't know about. I mean, I was at university at Cambridge, and he was there with The Beatles—this is, we're talking October 1963. I mean, can you... can you think back that long? (laughs) It's appalling! It's over 60 years ago!

And I went to a Beatles press conference because they were performing that night. The Beatles were already famous, but not intergalactic. And the press conference was like all of those early Beatles press conferences—pretty silly. And he came up to me afterwards and said, why didn't I ask any questions? I didn't think he'd even noticed! And I said, well, I thought the press conference was pretty silly. He asked me what I did, and I was doing a subject—don't laugh—it was called Moral Sciences, which had absolutely nothing to do with morality, and even less to do with science!

Presenter: (laughs) Sorry, I couldn't help myself!

Tony Palmer: He thought that was very funny! And he said, well, would I show him around the university? I think he thought the university was one place rather than lots of little colleges. Anyway, at first I said no, because I thought, you know, he'd just be mobbed and this wasn't my idea of fun. So he said, "Well, how about if I come in disguise?" So having had my bluff called, I then arrived at the hotel immediately after lunch to pick him up. And there was this absurd figure—this enormous fedora hat, the dirtiest raincoat you've ever seen, and a big beard!

Presenter: (laughs)

Tony Palmer: So, I mean, we both got the giggles! And I got him into King's College Chapel—you know, the famous Christmas carols chapel—and also, really more importantly, into the library at Trinity College, which is called the Wren Library. And I mean, he was just grabbing books off the shelf! And I thought, I'd better be careful here, my university career will be over before it's finished! But he was very polite and very well-behaved.

And I realized, of course, that like a lot of people—goes back to what we said at the beginning—a lot of people of his generation, because he'd got swept up in the rock and roll world, he'd missed the opportunity to have a proper education. And that's what he desperately wanted to acquire.

Anyway, at the end of the afternoon, they had to go off and play. He scribbled a telephone number on a piece of paper and said, "Call me when you come to London." I said, "Well, I don't think I'm coming to London, certainly not yet, because I want to be an academic." I was a miserable, total failure as an academic! So eventually I finished up at the BBC—sorry about that! (laughs)

And I still had this piece of paper. But by now, of course, 1966, The Beatles were intergalactic! And so I thought, well, I'll dial the number, nobody will answer it. To my astonishment, somebody did answer it! And you could tell from this poor girl's voice on the phone that I was the 400th person that morning who'd rung up and said, "John Lennon said to call!"

Presenter: (laughs)

Tony Palmer: So I said, "Well, he really did, this is my number," and I thought, I'll never hear another word. 30 minutes later, a man called Derek Taylor, who was The Beatles' long-time publicist, called me and said, "I've got a message for you from John." I mean, I began to tremble! I thought, what's it going to be? "Who the hell are you and why are you bothering us," etc, etc. So eventually I said, "Well, what's the message?"

"John says, why has it taken you three years to call me back?"

Presenter: (laughs out loud)

Tony Palmer: And so, then there was the inevitable lunch of brown rice! And then we—we hatched a plot about how we could change popular music on television, because for the most part, it was just Juke Box Jury—which lately, I think almost nobody now remembers—and also a very kind of crude Top of the Pops.

And so he gave me a list of great musicians like Jimi Hendrix, and Eric Burdon and The Animals, Frank Zappa, Cream, Pink Floyd... and said, "You know, these guys are wonderful musicians as well as being very, very interesting people," he thought. And I thought too, when I got to know them. And he said, "You've got to make a film which gets them onto television."

So I made a film, it was called All My Loving—I think I'd heard that title before, but he thought it was a good joke to use that title! And it did—I mean, it's difficult for me to say—but I mean according to most people who wrote about it, when it was first broadcast in 1968, it completely changed popular music on television. Suddenly, people took it seriously! They thought, this is serious music.

I mean, in the film, Paul McCartney tells a very—I think a very apposite story. He says, you know, "I was in a taxi one day, and the taxi driver—to the left of the taxi driver on his seat—he had some sheet music." So Paul, being Paul, of course inevitably said to the taxi driver, "What's that?" And the taxi driver, according to Paul, said, "Oh, you won't like that, that's classical stuff." And then Paul looks at the camera and says, "You know, I know what it is. Pop music is the classical music of now."

So I think the really important thing I'm trying to say is that people suddenly—it wasn't "sex, drugs, and rock and roll", although of course that's an element—but it was actually: these are extraordinary musicians who had something important to say about the world in which they live. Which takes us straight back to this fund, Young & Talented Cornwall. You know, people need to be encouraged. They need to see what their role in life is, otherwise they just finish up under... almost under the dirt heap, which is terrible, terrible!

And I mean, I live at Land's End, and I've just been hearing the horror stories about the A30—it's a road I know well! (laughs)

Presenter: (laughs)

Tony Palmer: As I drive—sometimes I drive down to my home, which is at Land's End, and, you know, I keep thinking as you pass through some of the little villages, you know, if you were born in a village—I won't mention any particular place—you know, what chance have you got?

I mean, I had a friend who lived in St Buryan, which is the nearest village to me, who is a really very... rather beautiful young lady, who moaned at me the whole time! She said, "How do I get into..."—well, she wanted to go into the BBC. Bad idea, sorry I should say that!

Presenter: Well, some of us are stuck in a lifetime of servitude here, I tell you!

Tony Palmer: (laughs) Yes! Well, I mean, she obviously had potential, but she's living in this tiny little village, and she didn't know who to ask, or where to go, or what to do to fulfill her potential. Luckily, I did manage to get her a job—not at the BBC, but some comparable place—and she's flourishing!

Presenter: That is a wonderful story! And I'm sure—I mean, honestly, I must just cut you short there, mainly because you need to get back to the cricket, but also I've got some more guests! Can I just ask you, I could talk to you for hours and hours and hours... down the line somewhere, Tony, will you come and have a proper, longer sit-down chat with me?

Tony Palmer: I'd love to! It would be great fun.

Presenter: It would be wonderful! And I hope you get an absolute sell-out for the event on Sunday, it sounds wonderful. Tony, I won't forget—I won't forget to take you up on your agreement for that visit!

Tony Palmer: I won't forget either, don't worry.

Presenter: It'll be a joy!

Tony Palmer: I'm looking forward to Sunday. I mean, I've never been to the cinema, so it's a new experience for me, but they have invited me before and I always was never either in the country or in Cornwall at that time. But this time I thought, I can't keep putting it off, so I'm really, really looking forward to it.

Presenter: Brilliant! Well, thank you very much indeed, and I'm sure the audience are very much looking forward to it. You can get tickets for that in support of Young & Talented Cornwall by going to wtwcinemas.co.uk/wadebridge, but if you just look for The Regal Cinema website, it will take you to where you need to be.

Tony's interview on Radio Cornwall today was quite inspirational and he talked not only about his amazing influence and career on the music scene of today but also why it is so important for young people in Cornwall to get the support to fulfill their dreams. As Lennon once said: a dream you dream alone is just a dream, a dream you dream with others is reality. Something like that. Certainly I'd encourage anyone with an interest in a future in music or the film industry to come along to ask Tony questions and met someone who really was there. I have free tickets for any young and talented student who wishes to come but can't afford a ticket. Just ask.