Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson has directed the music video for “Now and Then,” the final song from The Beatles. The song drops Thursday, November 2, at 10 a.m. ET, with the video to follow on Friday, November 3, at 10 a.m. ET.
Jackson, who also directed the Emmy-winning docuseries The Beatles: Get Back, says he was at first reluctant to take on the project.
“I thought my next few months would be a hell of a lot more fun if that tricky task was somebody else’s problem, and I could be like any other Beatles fan, enjoying the night-before-Christmas anticipation as the release of a new Beatles song and music video approached,” he explains, noting the idea of making the clip “produced a collection of anxieties almost too overwhelming to deal with.”
Jackson says his biggest worry was that there wasn’t enough authentic footage to use for the video, but his fears were unfounded. Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr shot new footage of themselves performing, and Apple had video of Paul, Ringo and George Harrison working on “Now and Then” in 1995. Plus, Sean Lennon and Olivia Harrison sent him unseen home movies, and Pete Best provided some never-before-seen footage.
“To be honest, while we hope we’ve given The Beatles a suitable final farewell, that’s something you’ll need to decide for yourselves when it’s finally released – only a few days from now,” Jackson says. “Having got to the end, I’m very happy I’m not waiting for the release of somebody else’s ‘Now And Then’ music video. I have genuine pride in what we made, and I’ll cherish that for years to come.”
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