What?
Julian, Mother Nature's Son, has every right to be proud of his oft-married mum, who was a nice looking bird back in the day, but wha IS this? She took the stage in Hamburg? SHE managed them and recorded them? SHE wrote the "tit tit tit tit" lines in "Girl?"
As it turns out, the tabloid is hawking a Howl play. Who Howl?
"Howl" was what, a beat poem wasn't it, where a son managed to toss in a line about his mother's "bearded vagina."
Now, to the delight of her son, some guy named Howl, hunting up a Beatles angle to exploit, is offering a play based on the life of Cynthia Lennon, THE FIFTH BEATLE.
Right. Not enough that she herself wrote several books about herself, but didn't have the audacity to make that claim. It's anything for publicity. It's re-writing history. It's spin doctoring.
And having written an entire tome myself on John Lennon, a nationally distributed tribute magazine back in 1980, I think I can throw my tuppence into this and express a slight bit of surprise.
YEAH YEAH YEAH.
Revisionism at its finest. Without Cynthia's love John would've gone "off the rails." You mean the four Beatles were NOT whoring around like mad? NOT banging babes when they weren't bashing about on stage? John was chased but chaste? OK, we'll let that one go.
How about how Cynthia was let go when The Beatles made their way to India? Cynthia was left behind. She was, after all, the girl who got preggers which is why John married her. But she's the Fifth Beatle?
By this logic, how about Jane Asher? She was in the picture with Paul for quite a long time.
Let's not forget Murray the K. Murray Kaufman, who I think was the first to self-proclaim himself "The Fifth Beatle" and popularize this idiot idea, had a lot to do with the hoopla surrounding "The British Invasion." When it came to beating the drum, he did more than Ringo! Murray was carrying on hour after hour for WINS radio. Ringo drummed for a few songs on "The Ed Sullivan Show." (Cynthia died in 2015 and her estate is probably controlled by Julian, who has no reason NOT to be thrilled with an entire play about mum.)
Ah. Mr. Howl could have claimed Ed Sullivan was the Fifth Beatle, but the feisty Sullivan estate would want MONEY.
Quoth Mr. Howl:
“I was told lots of lovely stories, including how Cynthia went out to Hamburg to visit as a naive teenager. The first half of the play is snapshot moments from their lives together, with some original songs. There is a scene in which John is working on the song You’re Gonna Lose that Girl in their home and Cynthia joins him to sing it.”
Ah. There we have it. Joined him to sing it. Surprising she didn't get credit for that on the record label? Lennon-Lennon-McCartney?
Now, what woman's voice was the first to appear on a Beatles album? Oh, Yoko. What woman was actually IN the studio during the making of an entire Beatles album? Oh, Yoko.
Yoko never called herself The Fifth Beatle. I read both of Cynthia's books, and I don't recall her ever making that claim either, or promoting herself that way. Her first book, "Twist of Lennon," made sure to let people know her new married name was TWIST. (She had two other husbands as well, Roberto Bassolini after Lennon, and Noel Charles after Twist).
Even without a "Fifth Beatle" claim, any time Cynthia opened her mouth to an interviewer John was liable to be irked. In 1976, after reading yet another load from her, John sent an "open letter" to her AND to People Magazine, which read in part:
“As you and I well know, our marriage was over long before the advent of L.S.D. or Yoko Ono ... and that's reality!
“Your memory is impaired to say the least.
“Your version of our first L.S.D. trip is rather vague, and you seem to have forgotten subsequent trips altogether!
“You also seem to have forgotten that only two years ago, while I was separated from Yoko, you suddenly brought Julian to see me in Los Angeles after three years of silence.
“During this visit, you hardly allowed me to be alone with him for one moment.
“You even asked me to remarry you and/or give you another child, 'for Julian's sake'! “I politely told you no, and that, anyway, I was still in love with Yoko, (which I thought was very 'down to earth').
“Finally, I don't blame you for wanting to get away from your 'Beatle' past.
“But if you are serious about it, you should try to avoid talking to and posing for magazines and newspapers!
“We did have some good years, so dwell on them for a change, and, as Dylan says, it was 'A Simple Twist of Fate!'
“Love & good luck to the three of you, from the three of us.”
Two years later, and Cynthia was hawking her autobiography, "A Twist of Lennon." But not claiming she was influential in the success of The Beatles.
Mr. Howl boasts that his research includes tracking down one of Cynthia's close friends from her days in Liverpool: Helen Anderson. You MUST know that name? Helen, she'll tell you and any historian, was a "designer" and "recalled making Lennon’s famous cap."
Again, Mr. Howl: “She would have been 80 this year, and I feel she must take her place in the Beatles story now." As long as he has no other bright ideas.
"We got over your adulation
we got over the thought recall
we got over "A TWIST OF LENNON"
I don't want more of the same again...
"Memory Lane" (by the late Mark Kjeldsen, recorded by The Sinceros)
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