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Go E-Mail Alice
Not all the participants in the Sgt. Pepper movie
are unwilling to talk about the experience. Alice Cooper,
about to embark on a tour, was gracious enough to answer our
e-mail of infrequently asked questions (that's IFAQ in
e-mailese) concerning his involvement in this historically
bad film.
New Times: How many days of shooting were
involved for your part as Father Sun?
Alice: It was a three-day shoot including time to
record the track. The crazy thing about it was that I was in
the hospital at the time undergoing treatment for
alcoholism. They arranged for a three-day pass for me to
leave the hospital to do the filming.
NT: Were there other people supposedly
involved with the project before you agreed to do it that
pulled out before cameras rolled?
Alice: Not that I ever heard.
NT: Did anyone working with you on the film
or the set voice the opinion that this movie was going to be
a bomb?
Alice: Not at all. Robert Stigwood was coming off
the success of Saturday Night Fever, and the Bee Gees
and Peter Frampton were huge.
NT: Were there too many drugs on the set to
make such an assertion?
Alice: Again, I was becoming clean and sober at
that time, so I wouldn't have known.
NT: Were there more drugs on the set of
Sextette?
Alice: Now that movie, I was very drunk for
that.
NT: Did you feel it would be a bomb?
Alice: No.
NT: Was the mustache you sport in the film
a pre-emptive strike at damage control?
Alice: They wouldn't let me have razor blades in
the hospital. Too many crazy people running around.
NT: Did you attend the première in
New York City?
Alice: Yes. The Beatles were suspiciously
absent!
NT: Do you believe that business about a
Sgt. Pepper curse and that everyone's chart success
was immediately impacted by it, even George Burns' film
career?
Alice: I had a hit single the year after.
NT: Do you feel bad that there isn't a
20th-year rerelease of the film, à la Grease,
and if there was, would you go to that première?
Alice: Who even knew that it was 20 years besides
you!!!
NT: Was Pepper a worse film than the
Village People's Can't Stop the Music?
Alice: Who even knew that there was a Village
People movie besides you!!!
NT: Could a cast of dancing and singing
midgets have saved Pepper from disaster?
Alice: Maybe Steven Spielberg could have pulled it
off.
NT: Did the experience of the movie affect
your enjoyment of Beatle music?
Alice: That could never happen.
NT: Was George Martin a sympathetic
producer?
Alice: He was great. When I did the first take of
the song, I did it in my best John Lennon impersonation.
George said it was fine, but then told me to do it like
Alice Cooper would do it. He seemed really happy with
it.
NT: Whenever the Alice Cooper box set comes
out, will "Because" be on it?
Alice: Yes.
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