Just before the lights dimmed for a Monday screening of “Paul McCartney: Man on the Run,” a figure emerged from the wings of the Veterans Memorial Auditorium. As he casually strode to his seat in the middle of the audience, hushed whispers and gasps filled the theater as audience members gradually recognized the figure’s face — which would soon be appearing on the screen in front of them.
After the screening of the documentary feature film — now available for streaming on Amazon Prime Video — Paul McCartney and Morgan Neville, the film’s director, sat down for a conversation with President Christina Paxson P’19 P’MD’20.
The conversation walked the line between nostalgia and comedy. When asked what he hopes younger audiences will take away from the film, McCartney cheekily responded, “I hope that they will see how loose and crazy (the ’70s) were. I mean, it is 4/20,” to which audience members erupted into cheers.
Neville hopes that young audiences learn the importance of not only finding one’s voice, but keeping it.
“(Your voice) can change, and people expect you to do things and want you to keep repeating yourself, and Paul had the courage of his convictions to not second guess his own creative instincts,” Neville said. “And I think that is something that is a huge lesson.”
The film follows McCartney from the breakup of The Beatles to the height of the Liverpool-based musician’s next band, Wings. When Paxson asked why he decided to revisit this period in his life, McCartney laughed before pointing at Neville, saying, “It’s all his fault.”
When Neville reached out to McCartney to propose the film, Neville said he was a “bit of a fan,” McCartney said. From there, McCartney “kind of just trusted him.”
He noted that there were some “embarrassing” moments he had considered cutting, referencing the archival footage of him and Wings dressed up as clowns during “Mary Had A Little Lamb (Desert Video).”
“I don’t know how (the other members) forgave me,” McCartney laughed, recalling how the video embarrassed “the hell out of” his band members. Neville ultimately persuaded the musician by emphasizing how even these moments are “part of the journey.”
After he spent five years creating the film, Neville showed the work-in-progress to McCartney and his daughter Mary McCartney at Abbey Road. While Neville recalled the screening as the “most nerve-wracking moment” of the project, his worries were soon allayed after McCartney’s playful, yet heartfelt, response. At the end of the screening, the singer stood up to give Neville his notes — only to reveal a blank piece of paper.
For both artists, the most challenging aspect of the film was its emotional weight. This film also told the story of Linda — McCartney’s first wife and Wings member who passed away in 1998 — and fellow Beatle John Lennon, who was killed in 1980.
“It was very hard, and at the same time glorious, to see (Linda) and to see her humor,” McCartney said. He also appreciated that Neville “very sweetly” emphasized his friendship with Lennon, as two musicians who “really loved each other.”
In an attempt to capture the voices of those who had passed, Neville included voiceovers from Lennon’s son, Sean Ono Lennon, and spoke to McCartney’s children about how to “give Linda as much of a platform for us to understand her and really appreciate her in a way that I haven’t really seen before.”
During a screening of the final film for both his and McCartney’s families, Neville recalled two stand-out reactions from the singer’s grandchildren: “One was ‘I’d never heard my grandmother’s voice before!’ and the other was ‘Grandpa went to jail?’”
“That’s true,” McCartney quickly quipped.
The evening finished with a discussion of McCartney’s current work, as well as how his tastes and style are constantly evolving. “I don’t have one little field of interest, I like the best in every field,” he said.
McCartney’s next album, “The Boys of Dungeon Lane,” will be released on May 29. He noted that the upcoming record will have “quite a bit of nostalgia on it” as well as “love songs” dedicated to his wife Nancy Shevell, who also attended the screening that night.
“It’s just great fun to still be able to do things like that,” he said of his new music. “If I didn’t do it as a job, I would still do it as a hobby because it’s just in me, and I just love it.”
McCartney concluded the night by rolling up his pants to reveal bright yellow and blue socks. “They’re yellow submarines,” he said as the room thundered with applause.
Ann Gray Golpira is a Section Editor covering Arts & Culture. She is from Norfolk, Virginia and plans on concentrating in both International and Public Affairs and Anthropology. Outside of The Herald, you can find her writing, recording and producing her original music.
