Elton John biopic Rocketman a brutally honest look at his soaring success and downward spiral
Pop great Elton John knew he would have to show the good along with the bad in new biopic Rocketman, no matter how painful it might be. And he is winning plaudits for his brutal honesty.
Entertainment
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When Elton John agreed to make his biopic Rocketman, he knew he was going to have to show the good and the bad, no matter how painful it was going to be.
In a career of more than 50 years as one of the most beloved and successful musicians of his, or any other generation, the larger-than-life star born Reginald Kenneth Dwight has had plenty of both.
Among the dizzying highs are the 300 million albums he has sold, a string of instantly recognisable hits, more awards than you can count (five Grammys and Oscar and a Tony among them) and a live career that is only now starting to draw to a close with a hugely successful tour of Australia at the end of the year.
The lows included a crippling drug addiction that nearly ended his life, bulimia and mental illness as he wrestled with his sexuality and tried to hide it away from a world that wouldn’t accept a gay rock star.
“It’s a fantasy movie but what happens in the movie is what happened” he says of Rocketman, which was directed by Bohemian Rhapsody’s Dexter Fletcher, co-produced by John’s longtime partner David Furnish and stars Taron Egerton as the flamboyant pop great.
“Success was fantastic and then I couldn’t cope with it and you can’t leave out the bad. David made a documentary about me many years ago called Tantrums and Tiaras which was really, really true to life and I wanted this to be the same.
“This is how my life was, and I didn’t want to cover it and gloss it over. And it’s difficult to watch and it’s difficult to watch because I thought’ God, I don’t want to go back there, thank God I came out of it’. Thank God there was redemption, thank God I had the intuition and the help to get me out of that place.”
Filmmaker Furnish, who has been with John since 1993, pays tribute to his partner’s honesty in having his story told and believes others can benefit from some of the difficult topics handled in Rocketman.
“He is sober now and coming up on 29 years,” Furnish says.
“That is an inspirational thing to share with other people. Addiction and mental illness are big issues that we deal with in our society today and people are ashamed to talk about them, and they think they are fearful things, and actually the more honest and open you are about your own experience, it inspires other people.”
Rocketman, which traces John’s journey from a difficult and largely loveless childhood, through his years as a musical prodigy at the Royal Academy of Music and then his literally glittering musical career has been nearly two decades in the making.
An early version had Justin Timberlake in the frame to play John, Tom Hardy was attached to another attempt about five years ago, before producers finally settled on Fletcher and Kingsman star Egerton, who also does his own singing in the film.
John says the feeling of watching his own biopic was strange, but was astonished and impressed by how completely Egerton disappeared into the role.
“It was odd to see myself being portrayed, but then it was so like myself that I didn’t think it was an actor playing me,” John says.
“Which is the biggest compliment that I could possibly pay him, because it was extraordinary. And his singing and everything about it, I was just absolutely amazed and astonished by the way he acted, because he became me.”
John looks back now on his childhood in conservative 1950s Britain as a time lived in terror, from which music was his escape.
He says his parents (played by Steve Mackintosh and Bryce Dallas Howard in Rocketman) stayed together to avoid the stigma and shame of divorce and for his education — but really only made things worse.
“It was just as hard for them as it was for me,” he says.
“But I was in fear. There’s a scene in the film where my dad says ‘take your hands off the table’. And that was how it was. If I made a noise eating celery, I got told off. So if you are walking on eggshells all your life, you find something that’s comforting.
“I found comfort in music. And my grandmother, I had something to turn to, I had music, and that was joyous. My poor parents just argued all the time and as I say, I’m so glad they did find love away from each other, because if they hadn’t, it would have been awful for them.”
John says he’s determined not to make the same mistakes with his life and family.
He and Furnish have two children together, eight-year-old Zachary and six-year-old Elijah, and he says it’s the love of his family that keeps the occasional “dark side” he still experiences from time to time as a performer at bay.
“When my children are around, I never feel dark,” John says.
“And when I got sober, I wouldn’t have said I would be in a relationship for 25 years, I never thought that would happen. I couldn’t last with any relationship because drugs came into it.
“You can’t have a relationship where drugs and alcohol are in it, it’s impossible. But once I stopped, I have been with him for 25 years, I have an eight year old and a six year old child, I would never have guessed in a million years this would ever happen to me.”
Far from underplaying John’s sexuality, as recent Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody was accused of doing to Freddie Mercury, Rocketman is being celebrated as the first major Hollywood production to show gay male sex on-screen.
John says he fought hard to have it included, arguing that it was essential to show a pivotal moment in his life when he finally consummated his dysfunctional relationship with then-manager John Reid (played by Game Of Thrones star Richard Madden).
“I was desperate to be loved, I was desperate to have a tactile relationship or something,” he says.
“And when they tear their clothes off, that was how it happened. It was in San Francisco actually. I’m so glad it’s in there because I am a gay man and I didn’t want to airbrush it under the carpet. This is who I am and I was so joyous.
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ELTON JOHN ANNOUNCES FAREWELL TOUR
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ELTON BURSTS INTO TEARS AT MOVIE PREMIERE
“And I think that is the fact that it is the first major studio film with a gay love sex scene in it, I am proud of that. But it is part of my story, if I had left it out, I would have felt so stupid and I would have felt I was cheating people.”
WATCH Rocketman opens May 30, with previews this weekend.
Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour will be in Australia from December 2019 to February 2020.
For dates and tickets, visit www.chuggentertainment.com
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