LONDON (CelebrityAccess) Abbey Road Studios in London hosted a special preview event March 22 of the upcoming Elton John biopic “Rocketman” that included a 20-minute clip from the film.
In attendance were the star of the film, Taron Egerton, director Dexter Fletcher, musical director Giles Martin, and Rocket Entertainment CEO David Furnish, John’s husband and a producer of the film, according to Music Week. The film is expected to be released in May.
“It’s a very exciting and daunting time but we are incredibly proud,” Fletcher said during a Q&A. “We feel we have something special and magical, something that’s going to elevate all of Elton’s catalog and the man himself and his story, his legend, and his history, and we’re all incredibly proud to be part of that.”
Fletcher replaced director Bryan Singer during the production of “Bohemian Rhapsody.”
Martin added: “[With] a lot of truly great artists the deeper you dig, the more complex and beautiful their work becomes – and Elton is truly unique.
“For me, it’s been a total joy and an inspiration to work with Dexter and Taron because they just go, ‘Let’s have fun!’ We want to push boundaries and do interesting things and the fact [is] it’s a fantasy, so from the word go it was like, every song goes somewhere else. It goes to a three-dimensional space, if you like, and we had the tools to do it. I had to just keep up speed with them really.”
The film began in earnest last year.
“It was just over a year ago, in February of last year, that we recorded two songs with me playing the piano in this very studio, being produced by Giles,” Egerton said, according to Music Week. “That was the start of the journey.”
“That was really the catalyst for making this whole project happen,” Fletcher added. “We knew that something extraordinary had the potential to happen.”
Egerton added: “This is a movie about a great guy and songwriter and it was always the mandate that we would slightly reimagine things and play with things, with Elton’s blessing of course.
“Elton essentially gave me the license to go and make it look quite ugly at times and that was always very important to me. This movie is primarily a celebration of Elton’s life and work and his partnership with Bernie Taupin. But it’s also a story about someone who was not well, becoming well, and that was always what I found most interesting and most exciting about it. I feel that the balance Dexter struck between those two primary aims was really great.”
Meanwhile, as there are reports that the studio is considering removing a 40-second “nude cuddle” that would give the film a PG-13 rating, Fletcher said the film will be “no holds barred.”
“Seeing much speculation about ROCKETMAN!! That’s good! It’s still unfinished so it’s nothing but rumors,” Fletcher wrote on Twitter. “It has and always will be the no holds barred, musical fantasy that Paramount and producers passionately support and believe in. See for yourself May 24.”
h/t Music Week
