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Tom Snyder may not have been the fabled fifth Beatle
(there's debate about who truly belongs in that category
everyone from the late Neil Aspinel, the late Stu Sutcliffe,
George Martin and former Beatles drummer Pete Best) but
he was always a ball to watch on TV. I miss Tom Snyder.
His full bodied laugh, wry sense of humor and often ofbeat
questions made late night TV less of a wasteland than it
is now it also made him an easy caricature for Dan Ackroyd
to do a parody of on "Saturday Night Live" (it was done
with love though). Shout! Factory has released another set
of interviews that Snyder did in the 70's this time with
most of The Beatles entitled "John, Paul, Tom & Ringo" (what?
He couldn't interest George in an interview?). Actually,
this set should have been called "John, Paul, Angie and
Ringo" because it also includes a vintage interview with
Angie Dickinson of "Police Woman" fame. Snyder's one flaw
as an interviewer was the fact that he liked to talk about
himself so much but it also was part of his charm because
he made no bones about the fact that he was who the audience
was tuning in to see. ***
This is the second set from Shout with Snyder and it's
quite good. The first interview is from December 9th 1980
the day after John Lennon was shot and killed outside the
Dakota Apartments near Central Park in New York. Snyder
re-ran the last TV interview that Lennon gave which was
from 1975 and it focused on his deportation woes. Lennon
was made a target of the FBI and the Nixon administration
during his years as an anti-war protester and because of
his outspoken radical politics. The fact that Nixon, J.
Edgar Hoover and the FBI went after Lennon speaks volumes
about the paranoia of the period but, more importantly,
about how important he was seen by the political powers
at the time as a potential agitator. ***
Synder interviewed producer Jack Douglas (the last
person to work with Lennon and, aside from Yoko, the Dakota
doorman and his assassin Mark David Chapman to see him alive)
in footage surrounding the vintage interview discussing
the making of the album, Lennon's hopes for the future,
etc. ***
Less enlightening is Snyder's interview with Paul,
Linda McCartney, Denny Laine and Lawrence Juber (the latter
two members of McCartney's band Wings) who were about to
perform in England in 1979 and who had just released their
latest album "Back to the Egg". Because the interview was
done by satellite it made it difficult for Snyder to draw
McCartney out but, more importantly, McCartney has always
been an expert PR man and can avoid certain questions skillfully
(something that he doesn't do as often now but during the
Wings years he would avoid some painful questions related
to Lennon, Harrison and Starr as well as discussions of
The Beatles years). We do, however, get to see a vintage
clip of the band playing "Spin It On" McCartney's hard rocking
response to New Wave which was in full bloom in 1979. ***
Starr's interview with Snyder is done in Los Angeles
as part of a promotional push for the album "Stop and Smell
The Roses" a fine album that has sadly been out of print
for the past decade. Snyder is on his game here asking several
penetrating and interesting questions (defining the difference
between Ringo Starr and Richard Starkey Ringo's, i.e., the
difference between the stage persona of Ringo and the real
person). Less than a year after Lennon's death its clear
that Starr is uncomfortable discussing Lennon's murder and
Snyder doesn't push being acutely aware at how emotional
Starr is. Other interviewers might have pushed, prodded
and tried to elicit tears for ratings. Snyder clearly respects
his subjects privacy which can be a good and bad thing as
a result he carefully tip-toes where others might tear through
a garden of invasive, painful questions. ***
The last interview is with Angie Dickinson which was
also on the same show that Ringo appeared on (November 25th,
1981). Dickinson was on the show to promote her new TV show
(which tanked) called "Cassie and Company". Few Beatles
fans will watch this although it is an interesting interview.
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Image & Sound:
As expected the vintage video looks mushy with soft
images and colors bleeding. It doesn't look bad considering
the age of the video. Audio comes across clear and clean.
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