NORTH AMERICA, 1965


QUESTION: Were you worried about the oversized roughnecks who tried to infiltrate the airport crowd on your arrival?

RINGO: That was us!

QUESTION: How do you add up success?

BEATLES: Money.

QUESTION: What will you do when Beatlemania subsides?

JOHN: Count the money. I think much about the future. I don't really give a damn. Though now we've made it, it would be a pity to get bombed. It's selfish, but I don't care too much about humanity; I'm an escapist. Everybody's always drumming on about the future, but I'm not letting it interfere with my laughs, if you see what I mean.

QUESTION: What is your opinion on the atom bomb?

PAUL: It's disturbing that people should go around blowing up, but if an atom bomb should explode I'd say, "Oh, well." No point in saying anything else, is there? People are so crackers. I know the bomb is ethically wrong, but I won't go around crying, I suppose I could do something like wearing those "Ban the Bomb" things, but it's something like religion that I don't think about. It doesn't fit in my life.

QUESTION: Are you in any danger during your concerts?

PAUL: I was got once by a cigarette lighter. Clouted me right in the ye and closed my eye for the stay. In Chicago a purple-and-yellow stuffed animal, a red rubber ball, and a skipping rope were plopped up on stage. I had to kick a carton of Winstons out of the way when I played. And I saw a cigarette lighter go flying past me in Detroit's Olympia Stadium.

QUESTION: Don't you worry about all that?

PAUL: It's okay, as long as they throw the light stuff, like paper.

QUESTION: Would you ever accept a girl in your group if she could sing, play an instrument, and wear the Beatle haircut?

RINGO: How tall is she?

QUESTION: Beatle-licensed products have grossed millions and millions of dollars in America alone. Beatle wigs, Beatle hats, Beatle T-shirts, Beatle egg cups, Beatlenut ice cream ...

RINGO: Any time you spell beetle with an "a" in it, we get some money.

QUESTION: What are your favorite programs on American television?

PAUL: News in Espanol from Miami. Popeye, Bullwinkle. All the cultural stuff.

JOHN: I like American TV because you can get eighteen stations, but you can't get a good picture on any one of them.

QUESTION: Is the place, you were brought up a bit like Greenwich Villiage?

GEORGE: No, more like the Bowery.

QUESTION: Do you get much fan mail?

RINGO: We get two thousand letters a day.

JOHN: And we're going to answer every one of them

QUESTION: Do any of you have ulcers?

GEORGE: None that we've noticed.

QUESTION: How come you were turned back by immigration?

JOHN: We had to be deloused.

QUESTION: Who in the world have the Beatles like to meet more than anyone else?

RINGO: Santa Claus.

QUESTION: Paul, you look like my son.

PAUL: You don't look a bit like my mother.

QUESTION: Why aren'y you wearing a hat?

GEORGE: Why aren't you wearing a tie?

QUESTION: Is it true that on one flight the stewardess broke up a pillow fight amoung you guys and got clobbered on the head?

GEORGE: I'm not really sure where she got hit. She did make us break it up, though. Remember that house we stayed in at Harlech?

PAUL: No. Which one?

GEORGE: Yes you do! There was a woman who had a dog with no legs. She used to take it out in the morning for a slide.

QUESTION: Do teenagers scream at you because they are, in effect, revolting against their parents?

PAUL: They've been revolting for years.

JOHN: I've never noticed them revolting.

QUESTION: Do you have any special messages for the Prime Minister and your parents?

JOHN: Hello, Alec.

GEORGE: Hello, Mudda.

RINGO: Hello, fellas.

QUESTION: Do you really use four-letter words on the tourists in the Bahamas?

JOHN: What we actually said was, "Gosh."

PAUL: We may have also said,"Heavens!"

JOHN: Couldn't have said that, Paul. More than four letters.

QUESTION: Why don't four of the Beatles ever sing together?

GEORGE: Well, we try to start out together, anyway.

QUESTION: What does each Beatle consider to be his most valued possession?

JOHN: Our lives.

QUESTION: What do you do with your money?

RINGO: We bury it.

GEORGE: We hide it.

PAUL: We don't seeit. It goes to our office.

JOHN: We pay a lot of taxes.

QUESTION: What are your feelings on "hints of queerness" American males found in the Beatles during the early days of your climb to popularity?

PAUL: There's more terror of that hint of queerness - of homosexuality - here than in England, where long hair is more accepted. Our whole promotion made us look silly, but we've had a chance to talk to people since then and they can see we're not thick little kids.

QUESTION: Do you wear wigs?

JOHN: If we do, they must be the only ones with real dandruff.

QUESTION: How do you feel about teenagers imitating you with Beatle wigs?

JOHN: They're not imitating us because we don't wear Beatle wigs.

QUESTION: Where did you get that hairstyle.

PAUL: From Napoleon. And Julius Ceaser too. We cut it any time we feel like it.

RINGO: We may even do it now.

QUESTION: Are you wearing wigs or real hair?

RINGO: Hey, where's the police?

PAUL: Take her out!

GEORGE: Our hair's real. What about yours, lady?

QUESTION: What would happen if you all switched to crew cuts?

JOHN: It would probably be the end of the act.

QUESTION: What do you think of the Vietnam War?

JOHN: We think of it every day. We don't like it. We don't agree with it. We think it is wrong. But there is not much we can do about it. All we can do is say we don't like it.

QUESTION: What is your opinion of Americans who go to Canada to avoid the draft?

JOHN: We're not allowed opinions.

PAUL: Anyone who feels that fighting is wrong has the right not to go in the army.

© THE LOST BEATLES INTERVIEWS