August
22, 2005
Back
in late February, when I first began working on Lennon, I was approached
by a freelance writer for an online rag called Ear Candy, which covers
new music stories and uncovers old ones. He wanted to do a piece on the adventures
of a virtually unknown musician who suddenly got a job understudying in a Broadway
show about John Lennon. What the hell, I thought? Should be a fun read. So after
Lennon's San Francisco run ended in May, I returned to Austin and did
an interview. No big deal.
The piece didn't come out until this month. When it did I got a little surprise. The magazine's editor had interviewed May Pang for this month's issue as well. During the editor's interview with her, he used an excerpt from my article to make a claim about our show that wasn't true. I was embarrassed. I'm not going into all the details, but I'd said something that had to do with improvements we were making to the show, and the editor chose to misuse what was said in order to establish a talking point. Thing is, he hasn't seen the show, but has already formed an opinion on it based on what he has read, regardless of whether it's truthful or not.
I shouldn't be surprised, really. That sort of thing happens every day in the world of journalism. All of us who've ever taken a writing class are taught to establish a position on a subject and illustrate that position by whatever means available. Some go about it less honestly than others (Bill O'Reilly does it almost daily). So why should I care? Well, no one likes to be misrepresented, for one. But what bugs me is that it's not just me that's misrepresented, it's the show. It's everyone I work with and everyone I care about. And it's May Pang, who deserves the truth rather than distortion.
Gimme Some Truth.
John Lennon was big on truth. Big on seeking it, big on telling it. He didn't
always get his facts completely straight or his timeline correct. He didn't
always remember the details - hell, he couldn't remember the words to his own
songs. But he always made sure that his point was clear (especially after the
Jesus controversy), and as he grew older and wiser he spoke with the bigger
picture in mind, with the higher truth, from his higher self. And he insisted
that it is everyone's responsibility to do the same, to seek the higher truth
within themselves, to find out what is real inside us and what isn't.
That is the whole idea behind Lennon. The rest is just details.