How John Lennon and Yoko Ono staged a ‘Daytime Revolution’ by taking over a talk show: ‘They were all scared to death’ of her
nypost.comJohn Lennon and Yoko Ono co-hosting a daytime talk show for a week — a veritable Kelly Ripa and Mark Consuelos.That’s exactly what happened 52 years ago when the erstwhile Beatle and his wife brought peace, love and counterculture to Middle America on “The Mike Douglas Show.”Just months after “Imagination” was released, that radical week — with five shows airing Feb.
14-18, 1972 — saw Lennon and Ono chatting up guests that they had selected to spread their utopian vision in the final years of the Vietnam War.It’s a memorable moment in time that is revisited in the new documentary “Daytime Revolution” playing in theaters on Wednesday, which would have been Lennon’s 84th birthday. (The film will continue its run at New York’s Quad Cinemas through Oct.
17 before its DVD/Blu-ray release on Nov. 26.)“The idea that this insane cavalcade of radical politics and radical music could find a safe harbor on a mainstream American talk show with a host so willing to meet the craziness halfway was really the point of making the movie,” director Erik Nelson told The Post.“John and Yoko wanted to reach Middle America.
They wanted to communicate this optimistic message … It really was peace, love and all that stuff.”With that message in mind for the week, guests included everyone from consumer advocate Ralph Nader, Black Panther Party chairman Bobby Seale and Yippies activist Jerry Rubin to rock pioneer Chuck Berry, comedian George Carlin and avant-garde musician David Rosenboom — who hooks Lennon and Ono up to electrodes to improvise on his keyboard from their brainwaves.There’s even a macrobiotic chef, Hilary Redleaf, who leads a cooking segment, and a medical discussion with biofeedback researcher Dr.
Read more on nypost.com
