23.1.15

PETE, ME & TOMMY


This photograph, taken by Bob Gruen, has just surfaced of your man at Just Backdated with Pete, taken at the party following the New York premiere of the Tommy movie, in the subway station at 57th Street at Sixth Avenue, on March 18, 1975, and elsewhere on the blog there’s a pic of me at the same knees-up with Moonie and Annette, his main squeeze from 1974 onwards. As I mentioned there, I could never figure out why it was held in a subway station.
        
“So Pete, this Tommy movie. What do you reckon?”
         “Well, it’s a form of expressionism.”
         “Expressionism?”
         “It expresses deep emotions.”
         “Indeed it does, but don’t you feel that the literal interpretation employed by the film’s auteur distracts from the fundamental essence of the original work, and in this respect negates the essential truths that Tommy’s challenges convey. The essence of that truth is surely fundamental to the realisation of Tommy’s plight. A key aspect of the film is the presence of negativity, the impact of Cousin Kevin and Uncle Ernie for example, in what is essentially a positive statement designed to accentuate the successful transportation of Tommy back into the sensual world. If the ultimate absence of Tommy’s confusion brings to him a realisation of our own state of mind, then the essence of Tommy lies in his fundamental ability to confront the essentials in life, that is the need to hear, speak and see. Is this the essential truth behind the work and has not that truth been submerged in this figurative cinematic interpretation?”
         “Er, no. Not really.”

(In homage to that scene in Kids Are Alright, where PT is interviewed by a German journalist.) 

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