Fact #52194
When:
Short story:
Driving home at the end of a day of Filming in Twickenham, near London, England, UK, John Lennon and Paul McCartney of The Beatles write Help!, which will become the title track of their next film.
Full article:
Richard Lester (film director) : There was a legal problem. Our original title was Help, Help. And the lawyer said it had already been registered and you mustn't use it, so we had Beatles Two and then Eight Arms To Hold You.
Paul McCartney : We were gettin' a bit desperate for titles, and then somebody said Eight Arms To Hold You. Ringo said it, and we all said "Yeah, great", y'know. But then we suddenly realised a couple of days after that we were all sick of it, and we didn't like it. And we thought it was a bit... bit daft, y'know, the idea.
Richard Lester : Finally, the group said, 'We can't write a song for Eight Arms To Hold You, and I said, 'What happens if we just ignore the lawyers?' And everybody went,'Oh, no!' Then I asked was there an exclamation point with Help, Help, and there wasn't. So I said, 'If I put an exclamation point, haven't I changed the title? And they said, 'Yes,' so we said, 'OK.' Bang.
And then we told the boys, 'You've got to write a song right away,' and in the car going back from the studio, having made that decision, by the time they got back to the centre of town 25 minutes later, they'd written Help!
And the next night, after shooting, they recorded it. The day after we got it, we filmed them singing and it was cut, and within a week we shot the dart-throwing overlay for the back projection of the song.
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Paul McCartney : We were gettin' a bit desperate for titles, and then somebody said Eight Arms To Hold You. Ringo said it, and we all said "Yeah, great", y'know. But then we suddenly realised a couple of days after that we were all sick of it, and we didn't like it. And we thought it was a bit... bit daft, y'know, the idea.
Richard Lester : Finally, the group said, 'We can't write a song for Eight Arms To Hold You, and I said, 'What happens if we just ignore the lawyers?' And everybody went,'Oh, no!' Then I asked was there an exclamation point with Help, Help, and there wasn't. So I said, 'If I put an exclamation point, haven't I changed the title? And they said, 'Yes,' so we said, 'OK.' Bang.
And then we told the boys, 'You've got to write a song right away,' and in the car going back from the studio, having made that decision, by the time they got back to the centre of town 25 minutes later, they'd written Help!
And the next night, after shooting, they recorded it. The day after we got it, we filmed them singing and it was cut, and within a week we shot the dart-throwing overlay for the back projection of the song.