#markkidel

Grant was a private man, he rarely gave interviews. And yet, after taking acid, he personally contacted ‘Good Housekeeping’ magazine to say he wanted to tell the world about this (LSD), that it had changed his life and how everybody had got to take it. Timothy Leary read this interview, his own interest in acid was essentially sparked by Grant. In making his film, Kidel secured access to Grant’s 16mm home movies, together with snippets from his unpublished autobiography. Kidel’s film wraps up with home movie footage from Grant’s autumn years. It shows a father and his daughter, Jennifer Grant lounging in front of the TV and dancing together on the terrace of his home. Grant’s daughter was initially reluctant to give up the film footage. She had a plan, to go on a theatre tour with Gregory Peck’s daughter, talking about their famous fathers. Now, THAT is a show Chapeau! would love to see. For now we have ‘Becoming Cary Grant’. ‘Becoming Cary Grant’ is showing at the Cannes film festival (festival-cannes.com/en) and will be broadcast in the US on 'Showtime' on June 9, 2017. #chapeaulondon #chapeaublog #dedicatedtothethingswelove #wordsandpictures #amazing #london #lifestyle #carygrant #jennifergrant #markkidel #cannes #cannesfilmfestival #becomingcarygrant #film #moviestar #biography #lsd #archieleach (at Cannes Film Festival France)

There was a moment in Elvis Costello: Mystery Dance when the man born Declan MacManus recalled how, starting out in the Seventies, choosing the name Elvis as part of his musical persona was “almost a heresy”. It chimed exactly with my own experience of seeing him for the first time back then when even with the iconoclasm of punk raging all around the chutzpah of claiming The King’s name seemed an extraordinarily ambitious statement of intent (not least for a spotty youth in a bad suit and geeky Joe 90 specs). And yet this Elvis lived up to his own billing, crafting some of the most memorable songs of the late Seventies and Eighties, and gaining a reputation as a great songwriter, collaborator and musical reinventor of both himself and other people’s music.

Extract from "Road Movie: A Portrait of John Adams" , a film by Mark Kidel (2013) | via Calliope Media | John Adams' website: earbox.com