I don't know if anyone has talked about this, but I thought it was fascinating. This guy wrote a screenplay for the Beatles at the request of Paul McCartney and Brian Epstein. I was watching the bio about the guy tonight. Interesting. I never knew about this or him, but I'd love to read that script! I wouldn't mind seeing the Jagger film either. Too bad it was never done. Apparently the chauffeur sent to pick him up for a meeting to discuss the Beatles project discovered the bodies of Orton and his lover who had murdered him. Why do the Beatles always seemed to be linked with tragedy?
Orton was a hot young property in the London theater world at the time, and particularly now that the Beatles were in an experimental art phase, of sorts, Epstein thought he might be the perfect author for the third film. Another reason, actually, is that McCartney was a fan of Orton's work, and had invested a thousand pounds in one of Orton's plays, "Loot." Orton's diary entry for January 12, 1967 notes that Walter Shenson called his agent and said that he had a script, which he characterized as "dull," and wondered if Orton would have a look. Orton agreed, and read it by the 15th, when he wrote in his diary:
"Like the idea. Basically it is that there aren't four young men. Just four aspects of one man. Sounds dreary, but as I thought about it I realised what wonderful opportunities it would give."
He then details some of his ideas of what he would do with the story. After a meeting with Shenson on Jan. 16 (he later met with Epstein and McCartney), he set out to write a new script, which became "Up Against It." Actually, as Carr points out, "Up Against It" used some fairly old ideas: part of it was from a novel Orton wrote in 1953 with Kenneth Halliwell (his lover, who murdered Orton and committed suicide on Aug. 9, 1967) called "The Silver Bucket," and part came from Orton's 1961 novel, "The Vision of Gombold Proval," which was published posthumously as "Head to Toe." He delivered a first draft on February 25, apparently knowing full well it would be rejected. He expected the reason to be that "the boys, in my script, have been cauth in-flagrante, become involved in dubious pllitical activity, dressed as women, committed murder, been put in prison and committed adultery." (Diary, Feb. 11, 1967).
McCartney's assessment, quoted in Carr, was different: "The reason why we didn't do Up Against It wasn't because it was too far out or anything. We didn't do it because it was gay. We weren't gay and really that was all there was to it. It was quite simple, really. Brian was gay...and so he and the gay crowd could appreciate it. Now, it wasn't that we were anti-gay -- just that we, The Beatles, weren't gay."
Once it was no longer a potential Beatles film, Richard Lester was brought in to transform it into a film featuring Ian McKellan and Mick Jagger, but that version of the project was shelved after Orton's murder on August 9.
From Orton:
"I was approached to do a film script for the Beatles. I said it would have to be an absolutely original script. Paul McCartney said do whatever you like. I said that means you'll never be able to do it. He said as long as it's good, that's all right. So I did the script and I was very pleased with it and my agent was very pleased with it and she's not an easy woman to please. Well, we sent it away and didn't hear anything for over a month, then we finally get this little note from Brian Epstein, that it wasn't suitable for the Beatles. Well, what did they want? They got a brilliant script. There were, of course, certain things. Because all teenagers were supposed to imitate the Beatles I mustn't have the Beatles doing certain things. I wrote a story, but actually as it turned out, by page 25 they had committed adultery , murder, dressed in drag, been in prison, seduced the daughter of a Priest, I mean the niece of a Priest, blown up a war memorial and all sorts of things like that. I can't really blame them but it would have been marvellous. I only wrote it because I wanted to, I don't have to be careful about what I write. The fact that Brian Epstein says it isn't suitable doesn't worry me, I'll do it an sell it to someone who will. I mean, I hadn't used any foul language. I hadn't gone as far as I can go if I really wanted to. I was very good on that. Oscar Lewenstein thought it was the best thing I'd written and he has every intention of doing it."
At 11.40am, a chauffeur arrived at their London flat to take Orton to a meeting about his script Up Against It, written for Walter Shenson, producer of A Hard Day's Night and Help! Shenson felt Orton's dark farce style would be ideal for the Beatles, but the sexual anarchy of the script caused consternation; it required the fab four to dress as women and end up in bed together with the heroine. Had it been completed, it would have given him arguably the most remarkable theatre-to-film strike rate of any playwright.
