Ron Howard discusses his extraordinary experience working with Paul McCartney
American director Ron Howard has discussed his extraordinary experience making The Beatles documentary Eight Days A Week – The Touring Years, a project in which he worked with surviving member Paul McCartney.
The hit documentary, released in 2016, followed The Beatles’ touring years from 1962 to 1966, including their final full public performance at San Francisco’s Candlestick Park, before they decided to become a studio band taking refuge from the masses.
During a recent conversation with NME, Howard discussed the project in-depth and revealed what it was like to meet music’s biggest living legend. “I really related to and respected Paul McCartney. What a work ethic. He loves it. I feel that way about directing. I feel that way about telling stories.”
The esteemed filmmaker then described the project and remembered how he first fell in love with the Fab Four. “In starting to work on a documentary about their touring years which is what Eight Days A Week was, from the vantage point of having been a director and a storyteller for decades, I was so blown away by the writing,” Howard added.
“There’s the presence that I fell in love with, starting with The Ed Sullivan Show. Of these guys with a different haircut and a great sound and girls going crazy for them, but totally infectious records that you just would play over and over again,” he said. “But what I began to understand was, even in those early records, those first hits, the writing is just brilliant. As they evolved, it became clear to me [that[ you could be in any frame of mind possible within the framework of the human experience, and there’s a song they wrote that will speak to you very, very directly”.
“I don’t care what mood or what you’re going through; that’s the genius of the band and why their music is as relevant, in many ways, as it’s ever been.”
Howard’s latest movie, released in 2022, is Thirteen Lives, which tells the true gripping story of the 2018 mission to rescue twelve young boys and their football coach from Tham Luang cave in Thailand. Watch the official trailer for the movie below.
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