The Hour

The Beatles are widely known as the most successful band of all time, but few people know the detailed background story of the group, and exactly what happened when they went to Hamburg with ‘fifth’ member, Stu Sutcliffe.

Backbeat, a new stage production based on the 1994 film of the same name, aims to shine the light on the mysterious character, who was a bassist with the band for 15 months, when The Beatles were on the verge of superstardom.

A world premiere, the play hits Glasgow’s Citizens Theatre from February 9 until March 6, and tells the largely unknown story of tragic Sutcliffe, who was torn between his love for a girl called Astrid Kirchherr, and his career with the band.

Explaining a bit more about the story of Backbeat, Andrew Knotts, who plays the role of the young John Lennon said: “The play centres around the early Beatles, and when they went to Hamburg. It’s kind of the untold story really, we kind of know everything that came after with The Beatles because it’s so well publicised…”

He added: “What happened was that McCartney got them (The Beatles) the gig in Hamburg, but they didn’t have a bass player. So John (Lennon) managed to convince his friend Stuart to come along and play bass in the band, so they did that.

“He was never the best musician, his heart wasn’t in it really, and he met a woman called Astrid when he was over there. So the play kind of focuses around the love triangles within it. John wanted Stu to be in the band, and Stu thought only of Astrid and didn’t really want to …”

Stu died after suffering cerebral paralysis aged just 22, the year before Beatlemania took hold. And it’s his sudden, tragic end in life, and the many questions that surround the mysterious character, that have left people wanting to know more about him.

Daniel Healy who plays Paul McCatney in Backbeat, said: “I think the thing about Stuart is he’s sort of an enigma. We don’t really know much about him, we don’t have any footage of him…this image we have in our minds of The Beatles, he’s not really a part of it, but he’s so much a part of the early story. And I think it’s just interesting because he is this enigma, and he was this artist and he was this guy who was completely different from the other guys who went down this path, and I think it’s just really interesting from a real human point of view…”

Backbeat, which charts the full story of Stuart Sutcliffe and the early Beatles, opens at the Citizens Theatre on February 9.