Michael Caine names The Rolling Stones song that embodied the 1960s
As one of Britain’s most revered acting legends, Michael Caine has led a career defined by unwavering commitment and a stern, no-nonsense demeanour. His journey to stardom began with several television projects and low-budget films during the 1950s. However, it was his breakthrough role in Cy Endfield’s seminal work, Zulu, in 1964 that propelled him into the spotlight.
Through the latter half of the decade, Caine became increasingly sought after following praised appearances in Alfie, Gambit, The Italian Job and Battle of Britain. He was soon associated with the tough hero image, like Clint Eastwood, but would later realise astonishing versatility.
As a flourishing star of the 1960s, Caine circled classy London clubs with the era’s most distinguished celebrities, including members of The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. “I knew all The Beatles, all The Rolling Stones,” Caine told Rolling Stone in 2019. “I knew everybody in the music business, and we spent our lives in discotheques. I drank alcohol quite heavily for some time. But I never did any drugs.”
When Caine says “never”, he obviously refers to hard drugs, such as cocaine and heroin, because he did have a one-off fling with Mary Jane. In the depths of the psychedelic era, the actor managed to refuse marijuana when the likes of Keith Richards, Brian Jones and John Lennon lit up. Still, curiosity got the better of him on one occasion with fellow actor Richard Harris, whom many will remember as the actor behind Albus Dumbledor in the first two Harry Potter movies.
“I was at a party with Richard Harris, and I said, ‘I’ve never smoked marijuana,’ and he said, ‘Well, smoke one,'” Caine recalled of his first and only time with the drug. “I smoked the marijuana, and I must have been terribly tense because I laughed for five hours. I couldn’t get a taxi home because I was standing at one o’clock in the morning on the pavement trying to wave a taxi: ‘I’m not picking him up, he’s nuts or drunk.'”
In 2017, Caine released a documentary titled My Generation, a fond return to his experiences through the transformative decade. While promoting the feature on Rolling Stone TV, he noted the period’s sense of liberation.
“In one word, ‘freedom’, it was freedom to do what we wanted to do and be who we wanted to be because it’s very difficult to explain to someone who’s not English the class system that existed in the ’60s,” Caine said. “The reason we made the film is because we broke it down.”
Caine and the interviewer discussed the documentary’s opening track, ‘Waterloo Sunset’ by The Kinks, as highly apt. Caine added that The Rolling Stones’ 1969 hit ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’ was a perfect summary of the decade. “That’s what we were told, ‘You can’t always get what we want,’ and we said, ‘Really? Yeah? We’ll show you,’ and we got what we wanted.”
Listen to The Rolling Stones’ classic Let It Bleed closer, ‘You Can’t Always Get What You Want’, below.
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