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When Brian Epstein first heard the
Beatles perform, they werefour tough, leather-clad, working-class boys who
smoked and swore on stage—the opposite of Epstein, a sophisticated,
polished, and always impeccably dressed gay man. “They’re awful,”
Epstein told his assistant, “but I think they’re fabulous.” As the
Beatles’ manager, Epstein carefully honed their public image, creating the
now-legendary “Fab Four.”
Epstein was born in
Liverpool in 1934 to a middle-class Jewish family. His father owned several
different retail businesses, including a furniture store and the North End
Music Stores (popularly called NEMS), which sold pianos, radios, and
phonographs.
At school, young Brian was,
according to his own recollections, “ragged, nagged, and bullied,” and
he dropped out at 16. Put to work at the family furniture store, he took
“a keen interest in display work and interior decoration.” But just as
he was settling into the job, he was drafted into the army.
In the service, Epstein was
also harassed. Finally, he was discharged after only 10 months for being
“mentally unfit”—probably a code for “gay.” Returning home, he
began managing a family furniture store.
But Epstein didn’t want
to sell tables and chairs. Stage-struck, he successfully auditioned for the
Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts (RADA) in London. After moving away from
home, he began actively pursuing his sexual desire for other men. In 1956 in
a subway lavatory, he was arrested in an undercover police sting for
“persistently importuning several men for immoral purposes;” he pleaded
guilty and was fined.
Epstein did not do well at
RADA—his instructors cited his physical tenseness as one shortcoming—and
soon he was back in Liverpool, this time as the manager of the first floor
of a NEMS branch. He immediately expanded the inventory into records, and,
when sales skyrocketed, his father promoted him to manager of his own NEMS.
Record sales brought out
Epstein’s distinctive talents. Although he was not fond of rock ‘n’
roll—he liked musicals, a gay friend recalled years later—Epstein was
good at guessing which pop tunes would become hits. He became well-known at
major record companies, which would increase their production of a disc if
they learned that Epstein had ordered it heavily for his store.
In the fall of 1961,
teenagers started coming to NEMS clamoring for a single called “My
Bonnie,” on which a band called the Beatles played and sang backup.
Epstein’s curiosity was piqued, and when he learned that the Beatles were
appearing at The Cavern, a nearby club, he went to hear them.
The place was dingy and
smoky, and Epstein and his assistant stood in back, the only two men in
business suits. What struck Epstein were the Beatles’ humor and charm, and
he knew immediately that he wanted to manage them.
Conversations with the
group resulted in their signing a contract in late 1961.
Epstein dressed the Beatles
in suits, coached them in stage discipline and grooming, and taught them to
take their signature synchronized bow at the end of each performance. “The
myth is that we all hated it,” Paul McCartney has said, “but my memory
is we didn’t mind at all.” The change of image got them better-paying
gigs in classy clubs all over England. As manager, Epstein also did the
dirty work. At John, Paul, and George’s request, he fired drummer Pete
Best in 1962 to make way for the more talented Ringo Starr.
The Beatles knew all along
that “Eppie” was gay. There have been persistent rumors that he was in
love with John Lennon and that the two had an affair during a 12-day Spanish
holiday together in April, 1963 (fictionalized in the 1991 feature film The
Hours and the Times). But Epstein’s intimates maintain those are just
myths.
It took almost two years of
struggle for Epstein to get his “boys” a recording contract. Finally,
George Martin, a producer at EMI, signed the Beatles, largely because of
Epstein’s enthusiasm for them. “He had this unswerving devotion and
faith in them,” Martin said, “that they were brilliant and were going to
conquer the world.”
While “Love Me Do” and
“Please Please Me” were topping the charts in Britain, Epstein began a
campaign to bring the Beatles to America. In November, 1963, he successfully
negotiated a deal with The Ed Sullivan Show. Because the group was unknown
in the States, however, Sullivan only agreed to pay their airfare and a
small fee.
The Beatles’ appearance
on Sullivan’s show the following February made history, and their rise
after that was meteoric. Epstein booked a lucrative American tour, which
included a sold-out performance at Shea Stadium in New York—the first
stadium concert in rock-’n’-roll history.
But in his off time,
Epstein drank and gambled to excess, experimented with LSD, and routinely
popped uppers and downers. In August, 1967, his life ended at age 32 when he
overdosed on sleeping pills, probably accidentally. The Beatles, who were on
a spiritual retreat at the time, were devastated. “He was just a beautiful
fella,” Lennon told a reporter. Although Epstein is nowhere near as
well-known as the four musicians he steered to fame, he was, McCartney now
maintains, “the fifth Beatle.”
For further reading:
• Coleman, Ray. 1989. The
Man Who Made the Beatles: An Intimate Biography of Brian Epstein. New York:
McGraw-Hill.
• Epstein, Brian. 1964. A
Cellarful of Noise. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday.
•
Geller, Debbie. 2000. In My Life: The Brian Epstein Story. New York: St.
Martin’s Press.
Paula Martinac is a Lambda Literary Award-winning
author of seven books, including The Queerest Places: A Guide to Gay and
Lesbian Historic Sites. She can be reached care of Letters from CAMP
Rehoboth or at POcolumn@aol.com.
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