By all accounts, John Lennon loved New York, the city he and Yoko Ono, his collaborator and second wife, called home after leaving post-Beatles mania London in 1971. So enamored was Lennon of the Big Apple, that he told his wife he should have been born there. So, it seems fitting that on the 70th anniversary of his birth, PBS’s American Masters should pay tribute to one of New York’s most interesting immigrants.
To Lennon, New York was freedom-freedom to walk into a clothing store and, without any commotion, try on and buy a fur-collared coat with his American Express card and to live in a “two-room” apartment in Greenwich Village. In New York, the couple wasn’t bothered by people the way they were in London, a place where “people felt that John was crazy” explains Ono.
As for Ono’s London experience, she had been repeatedly described in the British press as being “ugly”. In a video clip of a rather strange appearance by the couple on a talk show, Lennon repeats the description several times with his wife sitting next to him. Lennon goes on to explain that typically the British press would use the word “unattractive” instead of “ugly”, making their attacks on his wife seem even harsher – and to him, inexplicable.
The couple escaped this abuse by becoming refugees in New York, an act Ono describes as having “incredible romanticism”. Upon their arrival, they immediately got in touch with anti-Vietnam war activists Jerry Rubin and Abbie Hoffman, who capitalized on the opportunity to use the former Beatle to reach millions of other activists through his appearances on television.
LENNONYC explores Lennon’s life as the front man for the peace movement, his successful fight against deportation by the U.S. Department of Justice, and his feeling of defeat when Richard Nixon was re-elected president by a landslide in 1972.
By 1975, Lennon had put his career on hold to become the primary caregiver of newborn son Sean, while Ono managed the family’s business affairs. The documentary includes poignant, never-before-seen home movies of Lennon's interactions with his son. But the retreat from the music industry ended in 1980, also the year Lennon died, with the production of Double Fantasy, an album that included both his and Ono’s work.
LENONYC reveals an artist who seemed to have had no concern for what others thought about him and refused to be creatively pigeonholed. The documentary was produced with the full co-operation of Yoko Ono, who gives onscreen commentary, although Sean Lennon does not. It also contains never-before heard studio recordings as well as never-before-seen concert outtakes.
Shortly before his death, Lennon told friends he was looking forward to a trip to England to reunite with friends and his Aunt Mimi, whom he hadn’t seen for a long while. But his murder on a cold December night, which shocked fans around the world, precluded his ever leaving the city he described as “the greatest place on earth.”
LENNONYC airs in the US tonight at 9 ET.
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