Today in rock history, the Beatles announced the title of their upcoming movie "A Hard Day's Night". To be honest, the world hardly took notice. Back then, putting a rock star in a movie invariably meant a "B" movie, a low budget quickie with little plot and a quick run through the theater circuit. Even the Beatles themselves were skeptical (we're not actors!) and almost turned the project down. And the budget was modest as well, 200,000 pounds British.
It's entirely possible, that if United Artists hadn't hired Richard Lester to direct the movie, the Fab Four might have turned the whole idea down. But the boys were huge fans of Lester, admiring his library of movie credits as well as his work on a British TV series called "The Goons". Coupled with a screenplay depicting one frantic/normal day in the lives of the Beatles, the project forged ahead. After the boys recorded six new songs specifically done for the film, the movie was placed on a tight, 8 week shooting schedule, and the rest is history.
A year later, on 4/13/65, the Beatles won two grammy awards. One award was for Best New Artist... the other was for Best Performance By A Vocal Group for the song "A Hard Day's Night".
Over time, the movie has come to be recognized as the most important and accomplished pop musical in history. And interestingly, the movie accurately depicted what the group put up with during the height of "Beatlemania". And though the Beatles went on to do four more movies; Help, Magical Mystery Tour, Yellow Submarine and Let It Be, Beatle fans still prefer A Hard Day's Night nearly two-to-one as their best big-screen endeavor.
