David Bowie: The Last Five Years (2017) Movie Script

[bright tone]

- ♪ Something happened

on the day he died ♪

♪ Spirit rose a meter

and stepped aside ♪

♪ Somebody else

took his place ♪

♪ And bravely cried ♪

Always remember that

the reason

that you initially

started working

was that there was

something inside yourself

that you felt that

if you could manifest it

in some way,

you would understand

more about yourself

and how you coexist

with the rest of society.

♪ How many times

does an angel fall ♪

♪ How many people lie ♪

♪ Instead of talking tall ♪

People have either

really accepted what I do

or they've absolutely

sort of pushed it

away from them.

I guess that's what I am,

you know?

But I would love to feel that

what I did

actually changed

the fabric of music.

[rock music]

♪ ♪

Even though I seem to

superficially change

such a lot,

a style does come through.

[electronic music]

By virtue of the fact

that I'm getting older,

it's given me quite a scope

on what I can draw

from within my own

catalog of albums.

♪ ♪

♪ Look up here ♪

♪ I'm in heaven ♪

♪ I've got scars

that can't be seen ♪

♪ ♪

'Allo, 'Allo,'Allo!

It's your lucky day!

♪ ♪

♪ Where are we now? ♪

- I think that David's music

is totally autobiographical.

He's telling you everything

if you just know

what to look for.

- ♪ The moment you know ♪

♪ You know you know ♪

- He was a kind of

provocateur.

- ♪ Where the fuck

did Monday go? ♪

- He offered an alternative

to people,

and that, to me,

is a great artist.

You know?

Someone who can

offer that for generations

to come.

♪ ♪

- This is one human being

who has single-handedly

changed

basically the course

of my life,

and you can't say that

about most people.

[rock drum music]

[rock music]

♪ ♪

- ♪ Loving the alien ♪

♪ Watch that man ♪

- ♪ Oh, honey,

watch that man ♪

- ♪ Blue, blue,

electric blue ♪

♪ That's the color

of my room ♪

♪ I'm looking for a vehicle ♪

♪ I'm looking for a ride ♪

♪ I'm looking for a party ♪

♪ I'm looking for a side ♪

♪ We can be heroes ♪

♪ Just for one day ♪

[music fades]

[cheers and applause]

[rock music]

♪ ♪

I've this poetic, romantic,

kind of juvenile idea

that I would be dead by 30,

but suddenly you're 30

and you're 40.

Then you're 50 and 57,

and all that,

and it's a new land,

you know?

- Sure.

- I'm a pioneer.

♪ Got your mother

in a whirl ♪

♪ ♪

♪ She's not sure

if you're a boy or a girl ♪

♪ Hey, baby ♪

♪ Your hair's all right ♪

♪ Hey, baby,

let's stay out tonight ♪

- It's a big tour

you're starting now, isn't it?

- Yeah, it's gonna go on

for months and months,

but, uh, I think

we're up for it.

- How do you feel

right now?

- Pretty relaxed, you know.

Uh, I enjoy the songs a lot,

so, uh, I'm gonna...

I'm gonna have a good time.

[laughs]

♪ You're ♪

♪ ♪

- You know, I'm gonna

be honest with you.

The happiest I've ever seen

that man

in 42 years that I spent,

on and off, with him,

was that tour.

I...I'd never seen him

like that before.

- ♪ You're ♪

all: ♪ Rebel, rebel ♪

- ♪ Put on your dress ♪

all: ♪ Rebel, rebel ♪

- ♪ Face is a mess ♪

♪ You're a ♪

all: ♪ Rebel, rebel ♪

- ♪ How could they know? ♪

all: ♪ Hot tramp,

I love you so ♪

- ♪ You bet ♪

- At a certain time

in your life,

you get to a point where

you do feel freer

and you don't really care

what people...

[laughs]

Think, and you can be yourself

and you can laugh at things

and you can not take things,

maybe, so seriously.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Hey, baby,

let's stay out tonight ♪

- When it came to

the "Reality Tour,"

I think he had decided that

he was gonna take down

that kind of

screen, if you like...

- Thank you!

- And be David Bowie,

not in a cheesy way,

but he...he allowed more access

to himself.

- On guitar,

from Dublin's fair city,

Gerry Leonard.

[cheers and applause]

Actually, he's...

he's actually from

Tunbridge Wells,

but he always gets

the good applause

when I say that.

I'm not really very keen

to put on

much of a theatrical show,

you know,

in terms of big sets

and elephants and fireworks

and things like that.

Of course, it doesn't mean that

I won't go back on my word,

because that's, you know,

part and parcel

of what I do for you,

as part of

my entertaining factor

is lying to you.

♪ ♪

- His sense of humor was on.

He always had one anyway,

but publicly,

he didn't show it as much.

You know what I mean?

There was that

serious artist thing

going on, you know,

during some of the tours.

The "Reality Tour"

wasn't like that,

because there was some nights

I was falling down laughing

for some of the shit

that he would say or do

or that happened.

- These must be my albums

that nobody ever bought,

so they've gotten

really cheap.

Look, they got "Lodger"

and "Tin Machine,"

Isn't that because...

- We're at some truck stop

in Montana,

and I'm at...

you know...you know those

machines that you never win at

where you put in the quarter

and then the claw comes down

and it picks up

the stuffed animal?

- Yeah, good boy.

- Oh!

all: Oh!

- I do, it, and I actually get

the thing out of it,

and it's the...

but it's the two of us.

It's this competition

of who's gonna get

the stuffed animal.

- I think it's kind of

a 50/50 thing here,

so I'll take that one...

- Oh, cut...

it was Cat's money.

That's just not the David

that I had known

in early years.

- [laughs]

- That's brilliant.

- Some of the fun and games

that were going on...

I think that really was

who he was, you know?

The real David was the one

that you saw

at the time of

the "Reality Tour."

He was...he's just...

he was always funny.

He always had

a funny sense of humor.

- [squawks]

- He was always joking

about things.

- [squawks]

- All right.

- Oh, you're doing your bird.

- Dun-dun-dun-dun.

- Guess the movie.

[laughter]

- There was a sense

that David looked

as young and as youthful

as ever on that tour.

[cheers and applause]

It did seem like he had

the gift from the gods,

you know?

That...that he was never

gonna get old.

- ♪ Never ever, ever

gonna get old ♪

♪ ♪

[cheers and applause]

That's a lie,

but it's only a little lie.

- He looked so good

and youthful

at the same time

and one night, I said,

"You look really good

in that suit,"

and for some reason,

the way I said it...

he said,

"I'm happily married."

[laughs]

So I didn't realize what I...

[laughs]

how I was saying that.

But yeah,

he just looked great,

all the time.

[chuckles]

- ♪ Billy rapped all night ♪

♪ About his suicide ♪

♪ Kick it in the head

when he was 25 ♪

That's just speed jive.

♪ Don't wanna stay alive ♪

♪ When you're 25 ♪

- Playing

"All the Young Dudes,"

that's such...

like an anthem, really.

In a way,

it was almost like church,

you know,

when you really do feel like

you have this congregation

of people

and everyone's singing

and the whole place

is swaying.

all: ♪ All the young dudes ♪

- Yeah, you in the back!

all: ♪ Carry the news ♪

- In the St. George T-shirt!

all: ♪ Dudes ♪

- ♪ Carry the message ♪

♪ One more ♪

- It was just a...

an incredible connection

to the audience,

I think, for that show,

for pretty much

the whole show.

all: ♪ Boogaloo dudes ♪

♪ Carry the news ♪

♪ ♪

- He just got into

tunnel vision,

like he was gonna make this

not just successful,

but just be prepared

to play it,

because it was a lot of music

every night.

We would go in

2 1/2-hour sets,

and, you know,

you have to really

be physically capable

to handle that.

[somber music]

♪ ♪

- Going on tour

excited him very much,

but, uh, he said to me,

flat-out,

"I'm tired,"

so I think, um,

he fulfilled

all his wishes and dreams,

and maybe he got

a little over-saturated

in the touring.

♪ ♪

- We got to Prague,

and then, during a show,

David was sweating profusely

and unable to sing.

- And then he started

to hunch over.

He looked over,

and I looked over at him,

and I went, "There's something

really wrong."

I said...

and I went, like...

and I signaled

to his floor manager,

and I went,

"Boss, you're not okay."

- The security person ran out

and took him off the stage.

Just took him away.

- It was a little mysterious

to everybody

as to what it might be,

because it really did

come out of the blue.

- I just was thinking,

"Okay, he's seeing the doctor.

Maybe they've

given him a shot, or whatever."

Then we got ready to go

to the Hurricane Festival.

[cheers and applause]

- We'll leave this one for you,

for me, for my band,

for our families.

Thanks very much.

- We played the entire set,

and it seemed, you know,

normal.

Not as...quite as...

as energetic

and as charged

as the performances before.

♪ ♪

- ♪ But I'll drink

all the time ♪

♪ ♪

♪ 'Cause we're lovers ♪

♪ ♪

♪ That is a fact ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Yes, we're lovers ♪

- We finished the show...

- ♪ And that is that ♪

- And then it seemed like

David was in a lot of pain

and obviously

something was wrong.

- They sent an ambulance,

and took him away.

We went back in the vans, um,

with the band,

and he went off

in an ambulance that night.

- I think we were told

that, um,

he had a mild heart attack

and that his life

wasn't in danger,

but that was it.

We were going home.

[desolate ambient noise]

[distant sirens wailing]

- He said he

wasn't gonna work for a while

and, uh, he wasn't sure

if he'd ever record again,

or tour again.

He just wanted

to take time off.

[horn blaring]

[traffic rumbles]

♪ ♪

- I think any kind of

unexpected thing,

like a heart attack...

it makes you

reevaluate things, and I...

but I never thought

he'd stop working.

♪ ♪

- We would exchange emails

about things that were

interesting to each other

or relevant,

but there wasn't

a lot of contact.

♪ ♪

- It's hard to figure out

David,

you know, and I stopped

trying to figure him out.

Just hope the phone

would ring,

and/or get an email from him,

and I did.

[bright drum music]

♪ ♪

[rock music]

♪ ♪

- Having not heard from him

for a while,

I suddenly got an email

to see if I was available

to come and play on the album.

I received, then,

an email from the management

about the fact that

if I was going to do this,

it would have to be secret,

and if I

said anything about it,

I would be in big trouble...

[laughs]

Legally.

♪ ♪

- I got an email,

really out of the blue,

from David.

"Do you want to come

and work on some new songs

for a week?"

Uh, "P.S.,

uh, keep schtum."

♪ ♪

- Once we got to the studio,

one of the first things

he did

was hand out NDAs to everybody:

these papers to sign.

It's the first time

that I'd ever been asked

to do something like that

for him.

♪ ♪

- The hours were very short,

compared to normal.

By 6:00, that was it,

no matter what,

and some days,

even earlier than that.

That was not the David Bowie

that I ever worked with before.

Ever.

I've never seen that.

He would go in there

and stay there until

he was spent or done,

but this was like a...

"Mm. I'm leaving.

6:00. See you."

♪ ♪

- He really wanted

no pressure on him

to release an album.

There was no press release

saying

"Expect a Bowie album

on this date."

This way, he could finish

every song to perfection.

[ethereal music]

♪ ♪

[indistinct chatter]

- I'm much more interested

in the process of life

and what is it that we're...

we're uncovering

with our every move?

The celebrity side of it...

I couldn't give a sausage.

[laughs]

[rock music]

♪ ♪

- ♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪

♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪

♪ Stars are never sleeping ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh,

ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪

♪ Dead ones and the living ♪

♪ We live closer

to the earth ♪

♪ Never to the heavens ♪

♪ The stars are never

far away ♪

♪ The stars are out tonight ♪

- David!

Mr. Bowie! Mr. Bowie!

David, can you wave?

- ♪ The stars must stick

together ♪

- "The Stars Are Out Tonight"

song

is about David's attitude

towards celebrities.

He's had a good dose

of other people's celebrity,

which, uh,

he found distasteful.

♪ ♪

- There were definitely

things on his mind

and he'd been

ruminating over,

and it was all coming out now.

It was like

he was birthing the stuff.

♪ ♪

- He was trying

a lot of things.

He had to flex his muscles,

to get back in shape,

like a runner,

or an athlete.

That's what he had to do.

You know, we just would throw

these songs at the musicians,

and they haven't

heard them before.

So we have David Torn

on this track.

For instance, the intro...

if I play David Torn...

[looping music]

♪ ♪

And that's his role in this,

you know.

- I had this loop...

something like this going,

which sounded like this,

and I was moving it

in and out

while the...

while the whine was happening.

♪ ♪

- And I remember also

that he was changing his vocal

over the chords

to create different sections,

so we kind of had the idea

to, uh,

put some little

different guitar riffs

to kind of signify

the changes over that.

[smooth guitar music]

♪ ♪

- I put Torn and Leonard

together...

Torn and Leonard.

♪ ♪

Very complementary.

♪ ♪

[music stops abruptly]

Okay.

[funky bass guitar music]

♪ ♪

- It's that kind of...

almost a Motown kind of...

I don't know where that

kind of comes from.

- Very Motown-y, yeah.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Sugar pie,

honey bunch ♪

- But he never said

anything about doing that.

- That's right.

- We kind of assumed.

- If you've got a smile,

you're going in the right

direction, you know?

If you get that

kind of, like,

you're just like, "Oh, no,

I wasn't thinking that at all."

You know?

- And it made me think

of another song

which is a David song,

which was, uh,

"China Girl."

[drum music]

- David would come

to the studio with

pages full of lyrics,

and start scratching them out.

Up until the last minute,

he would keep revising,

and sometimes,

he would come in and

just re-sing one line.

["The Stars" playing]

♪ ♪

- "Stars Are Out Tonight."

I think that's

one of my favorite songs

on the record, actually.

I think that song was a...

for lack of a better word,

a good piss-take...

[laughs]

In a way,

on...on what fame has become,

which just is

out-of-control machine.

♪ ♪

- You know, David had great,

grand ideas.

To become well-known,

famous,

was for him, initially,

was to have the resources

to realize what his ideas were.

He really does come from

that spirit.

Um, he just didn't

want to be famous per se.

[cheery rock music]

♪ ♪

- ♪ Da-da-da-da ♪

I just wanted to make

a really big name for myself.

I wanted to make a mark.

♪ Just look through

your window ♪

♪ Look who sits outside ♪

- David had quite an edgy

personality.

He was intrigued by

edgy stuff.

He wanted to do

many things.

He loved the idea of theater.

He loved the idea of acting.

He loved the idea

of working with actors.

- ♪ Ah ♪

♪ Beautiful baby ♪

♪ And my heart's aflame ♪

♪ I'll love you till Tuesday ♪

♪ My head's in a whirl ♪

♪ And I'll love you

till Tuesday ♪

- He loved the idea of

working with musicians.

Being one himself,

he always

was looking right and left,

or over his shoulder,

uh, at what might be,

or what...

"What could I do next."

[electric guitar music]

- It took me all the '60s

to try everything

that I could think of

to find out exactly

what it was

I wanted to do anyway,

but just about

the end of the '60s,

it just started

to come together.

♪ Strange games

they would play then ♪

♪ No death for

the perfect men ♪

♪ Life rolls

into one for them ♪

♪ So softly ♪

♪ A super-god cries ♪

Through circumstances,

I'd run into a drummer

called John Cambridge,

and Tony Visconti

and Mick Ronson,

and we'd put together a band

called Hype.

It was probably

my first costume band.

As far as I'm aware,

that was the very first

so-called "glam rock" gig.

♪ No pain of flesh ♪

♪ No power too great ♪

- Hype was very important

to David's development.

This was the only way

he could see

at that time

that he could, uh,

be famous,

become famous,

and become...

become well-known,

and it wasn't quite

the right incarnation,

because he was not yet

dyeing his hair orange,

and he hadn't taken on

the Ziggy persona yet.

- ♪ And he was all right ♪

♪ The band was all together ♪

♪ Yes, he was ♪

♪ All right ♪

♪ The song went on forever ♪

♪ And he was ♪

♪ Awful nice ♪

♪ Really quite out of sight ♪

And he sang...

- ♪ All ♪

- ♪ All night ♪

♪ All night long ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Ooh, how I sighed ♪

♪ When they asked

if I knew his name ♪

♪ Oh, he was ♪

- ♪ All ♪

- ♪ All right ♪

The real characterization

really didn't kick in

till the Ziggy.

I mean, I was always

quite a shy kid,

and I didn't come alive

on stage.

I just got even shier,

but I found I didn't

get so shy

if I sort of adopted

a character,

so it was a convenience

as well as a very bright

theatrical idea.

[laughs]

♪ Didn't know

what time it was ♪

♪ Lights were low ♪

♪ I leaned back ♪

♪ On my radio ♪

♪ Some cat was laying down

some ♪

♪ Get it on

rock and roll ♪

♪ He said ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Then the loud sound

did seem to fade ♪

♪ Came back like a slow voice ♪

♪ On a wave

of phase haze ♪

♪ That weren't no DJ ♪

♪ That was hazy cosmic jive ♪

[plucky piano music]

♪ Uh-huh ♪

♪ ♪

♪ There's a starman ♪

♪ Waiting in the sky ♪

♪ He'd like to come

and meet us ♪

♪ But he thinks

he'd blow our minds ♪

♪ And there's a starman ♪

♪ Waiting in the sky ♪

♪ He told us not to blow it ♪

♪ 'Cause he knows

it's all worthwhile ♪

♪ He told me

let the children use it ♪

♪ Let the children lose it ♪

♪ Let all the children boogie ♪

- Have you always wanted

to be a star?

- Yeah.

It's more than being a star.

What it is, really,

is I want to be

productive.

I'm not content to be

just a rock-and-roll star

all my life.

I am trying to be one

at the moment,

because I need it

for a particular reason,

so I can get off

and do other things.

♪ There's a starman ♪

♪ Waiting in the sky ♪

♪ He told us not to blow it ♪

♪ 'Cause he knows

it's all worthwhile ♪

♪ He told me ♪

♪ Let the children use it ♪

♪ Let the children lose it ♪

♪ Let all the children boogie ♪

♪ ♪

- You could feel that David

wanted to be

the greatest artist

and the next Elvis Presley.

You could feel it from

every pore of his body.

♪ ♪

He would bring me

up to his suite

and we would watch

Elvis Presley videos

and Frank Sinatra,

and we'd have discussions

about it,

and he would do certain moves,

and does this seem right

and natural, all that.

I mean, he was interested

to look at those people

and set such icons

as his goals.

- Oh, yes,

David wanted to be famous.

David wanted to be an icon

like he is now.

He would say things to me

like

"You have to be someone that

"thousands and millions

"of people

"want to listen to

and...and believe in."

[foreboding music]

♪ ♪

But he once said, too,

that being super-successful

was like living

in a goldfish bowl,

and it was for him,

because people became

totally obsessed with him.

- ♪ Fame makes a man ♪

♪ Take things over ♪

Do you know that feeling

you get in a car

when someone's accelerating

very, very fast,

and you're not driving,

and you get

that thing in your chest

when you're being

forced backwards,

and you think, "Ooh,"

and you're not sure

whether you like it or not?

It's that kind of feeling.

That's what success was like.

The first thrust

of being totally unknown,

to being what seemed to be

very quickly known.

It was very frightening for me.

♪ Fame puts you there ♪

♪ Where things are hollow ♪

♪ ♪

- I'm not sure if

he can handle it consistently,

because it is a

demanding mistress

that doesn't take "no"

for an answer

and is on-call 24 hours,

and so it makes you

a little bit more paranoid

than you used to, doesn't it?

And now we're being

looked upon

as we have to

deliver something.

The minute you go outside,

"Ooh, let me look

a certain way.

I'm famous now."

- ♪ Fame ♪

- ♪ What you need

is in the limo ♪

- ♪ Fame ♪

- ♪ What you get

is no tomorrow ♪

- ♪ Fame ♪

- ♪ What you need

you have to borrow ♪

- ♪ Fame ♪

♪ ♪

- ♪ Fame ♪

- ♪ Mine, it's mine ♪

♪ Is just his line ♪

♪ To bind you to crime ♪

- ♪ Crime ♪

- Do I have to do it

for, uh...

- Because this rock-star

thing...

you once described it as being

a "dreadful existence."

- In a sort of, um,

a very luxuriant

mental hospital...

- So you can rehearse in...

- Where you're sort of

put in a padded room

and meals are brought to you,

and the only time

you're sort of let out

on your lead

is when you're supposed to go

and earn money for

just about everybody else

except yourself.

♪ Is it any wonder ♪

♪ I reject you first? ♪

♪ Fame, fame, fame, fame ♪

♪ Fame ♪

♪ Is it any wonder ♪

♪ You're far too cool to fool ♪

♪ Fame ♪

- ♪ Fame ♪

- Did David enjoy

being a star?

I would say

what he said to me.

"It's great

"when you want to get tickets

for a concert,

"when you want to get backstage

and see your friends,

"or if you want a good table

at a restaurant,

but the rest of the time,

it's a pain in the ass."

And I think that's

pretty much a verbatim quote.

I watched him deal with it

too many times.

That was his view on it.

- I didn't...we didn't...

- I find this

an incredible intrusion.

Fuck off.

- That's the...you know

that's the only bit

we're gonna use, don't you?

- Yeah. [laughs]

I know when to pick me lines.

[laughs]

[rock music]

Yeah, that's better.

♪ ♪

- Once he experienced

the fame,

and all that comes with that,

I think he was

done with it.

[laughs] And he was

done with it,

and I think he realized

he made a deal with the devil

and it'd be

the rest of his life

trying to undo that.

♪ ♪

- Happy hump day, Phil.

- Ha! I didn't get humped. You?

- Yeah.

- Some people, huh?

They just get lost.

- Well, it's more exciting

than anything we've got

around here.

- Well, I wouldn't say that.

We have a nice life.

- We have a nice life.

- The idea that he had for

"The Stars Are Out Tonight"

video

was that

there were celebrities

that were stalking

normal people

to study them,

and then he whipped out

the photograph

of Tilda Swinton,

and I was like,

"Okay, that's fantastic."

You know, him and Tilda

were to play the normal couple.

[light rock music]

David really wanted to play up

the androgyny card,

because, you know, I mean,

he is the androgynous being

that we've grown up with.

♪ ♪

So I cast boys

in the girl's parts

and girls in the boy's parts.

- ♪ Are never sleeping ♪

- At that stage,

I think he was

able to definitely

sit back and reflect on

what fame meant,

and I think that song,

in a way,

is kind of like...

that's why it's

"the stars are never

sleeping."

It's like,

you can't escape it.

- ♪ They know just what

we do ♪

♪ That we toss and turn

at night ♪

♪ They're waiting to make

their moves ♪

♪ For the stars are out

tonight ♪

- ♪ Tonight ♪

- Eventually,

the celebrities...

they are in their home.

And when they come

into the home,

there's a transfer

that happens...

♪ ♪

And now, the normal people

are dressed like celebrity,

and the celebrities

have succeeded

in becoming the normal people.

You know, as an artist,

you collect things,

and he's had years of

not having to put things out,

and so he's collecting things

he wants to sort of

hold up a mirror and say,

"Hey, look at this over here.

Look at this over here,"

and, you know, comment on it,

but make it, you know,

in an artistic way.

♪ ♪

- ♪ The stars are out

tonight ♪

♪ Living ♪

♪ ♪

- Do you ever look back?

- Uh, only with

fond amusement,

you know, 'cause I've done

such a lot of work in 40 years

and it's only recently

that maybe I've started to

write in a kind of, uh,

autobiographical way,

and this maybe something

to do with age

and the way that one matures.

♪ ♪

- Then...

♪ ♪

I don't recall

David on the sessions

really talking a lot about

being old.

I think maybe

he would joke that

he would wear his slippers,

you know.

He had his slippers

brought down,

and he would pop his slip...

you know,

when he got to the studio,

he would pop his slippers on.

We made a few jokes

about that.

- ♪ Where are we now? ♪

♪ Where are we now? ♪

♪ ♪

- So David came in

with a piano demo

[piano and guitar music]

This was the DB piano...

David Bowie piano.

♪ ♪

It's got a combination

of piano

and strings on the patch.

I couldn't

take the strings off,

so those strings are

him playing at home.

♪ ♪

- We found

this kind of atmosphere

in the demo.

The next time we played that,

it was when we went

in the studio

and Zack was there.

♪ ♪

- I should add the drum.

♪ ♪

- David's instruction,

I remember,

specifically was,

"One...

One."

He just said,

"Emphasize the one,"

so...

[drum music with

strong first beat]

♪ ♪

- If I add David,

it's practically it.

♪ ♪

That's...

- ♪ Where are we now? ♪

♪ Where are we now? ♪

♪ ♪

♪ The moment you know ♪

♪ You know you know ♪

- Out of the blue,

he called me up

and said he'd like

to talk to me about something.

He explained this situation,

that he had been secretly

working on this track,

and I was like,

"Oh, that's fantastic."

You know,

"What do I have to do with it?"

and he goes, "Well,

I'd like you to make

the video for that."

♪ ♪

Oh, that's quite a task,

you know?

I was thinking

this big-budget video,

you know,

and I was thinking,

"God, to do this justice,

"you know, it has to be this

"momentous video, you know,

"that's gonna break the silence

of all these years," you know,

and David said,

"No, I want to do it, like,

"in your studio.

"It'll be these figures.

Very simple, rough."

["Where are we now?" playing]

♪ ♪

- These figures were

something I was making

like, fairly exclusively,

and did a number of exhibitions

of them,

and David, of course,

loved these figures.

You know.

- ♪ Just walk in the day ♪

- I did a rough sketch,

and I was like,

"This is what

you had in mind, right?"

This rough-hewn stretched face,

you know.

It's not very flattering,

but that's exactly

what he wanted

to look actually beyond

what the years

had done to him.

It's a strange...

you know, through the...

Here, he's leaving.

He's had enough.

[laughs]

He's like,

"Stop going on about my face."

- ♪ Where are we now ♪

- So the idea was that

he wanted all this stuff

in the studio situation,

and we kind of arranged things

around

and we talked about

transparency

and reflection,

and as this was

coming together,

I said to him, "You know,

people can read into

every part of this."

- This one is perhaps the most

deliberately

a nostalgic look into his past,

and, um, he's talking about

all the old places...

- Yeah.

- That he frequented in Berlin,

and it's deliberately sad.

He's in the latter part

of his life.

Those days are gone.

- Yeah.

[melancholy rock music]

♪ ♪

- Berlin was the first freedom

I'd had from

all the so-called

trappings of, uh, celebrity

and, uh...and my own problems.

Really, I'm quite fond of

that freedom that it gave me.

♪ ♪

I put myself in

a very anonymous situation

in a quite working-class part

of Berlin, Turkish area,

and started to live

a different life,

and I tried to distance myself

from the very drug-oriented

lifestyle

that I'd been leading.

♪ Had to get the train ♪

♪ From Potsdamer Platz ♪

It was just a tremendous

place to be,

and the music was

some of the most rewarding,

for me as an artist,

in my life.

♪ ♪

♪ I ♪

♪ ♪

♪ I will be king ♪

♪ ♪

♪ And you ♪

♪ You will be queen ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Though nothing ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Will drive them away ♪

♪ ♪

♪ We can beat them ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Forever and ever ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Oh, we can be heroes ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Just for one day ♪

♪ ♪

♪ I ♪

♪ I can remember ♪

- ♪ I remember ♪

- ♪ Standing ♪

♪ By the wall ♪

- But you can't read

"Where Are We Now?"

as just a nostalgic story

about Berlin at all.

You know?

But I mean, really,

it's much more

how memories

affect the way

we move forward or not.

[somber music]

- The Song for Norway

T-shirt...

I said, "That's very cheeky,"

and he goes, "I know."

It was something like that.

And, uh, he never explained

why he wore it.

♪ ♪

- The name is

Hermione Farthingale,

and I absolutely adored her.

I mean, she was the real

first love in my life,

and she was a ballet dancer

and, uh, a very good

l...singer,

and, uh, she played

a little bit of

bed/sitting room guitar.

You know, that kind of

folk guitar that every girl

could...that looked beautiful

could play in those...

I don't know why,

but all the beautiful girls

could play a little bit of

acoustic guitar.

She was doing a film

called "Song of Norway,"

and she fell in love

with one of

the actors on it,

and she left me for him

God, I didn't get over that

for such a long time.

It really broke me up.

- I did see David when

he'd just separated from her,

and he was very, very upset.

I think it was also

he was working with her,

so it was a double thing

that he'd lost his girlfriend

and he'd lost someone in his...

in his, uh, band.

I don't know which one

was the worse,

to be honest, but, uh,

yeah, it hit him

pretty hard.

[rock music]

- I think he wanted to

release something

that would cause

a lot of ripples

and, uh, question marks

all around,

and he was able to get that

with this.

♪ ♪

- ♪ As long as there's sun ♪

♪ ♪

♪ As long as there's rain ♪

♪ ♪

♪ As long as there's fire ♪

♪ ♪

♪ As long as there's fire ♪

- I knew this was

about Berlin,

and I thought it was

really, really sweet

and quite nostalgic,

but, uh,

the thing that really

made me teary-eyed

was when I saw

the video for it.

Oh, my gosh.

You know, I thought,

"I'd never expect him

to look back.

You know, this is

a new thing for him."

[rock music]

♪ ♪

[horn honks]

- I think, because of

my orientation

towards the apocalyptic,

I think it rather hones that

low-level anxiety,

especially the...you know,

the event of a new child.

My daughter really sort of

focused my

fears and apprehensions.

I mean, what a disappointing

21st century

this has been so far,

you know?

♪ ♪

- I have to say,

this track has swagger.

All this loose playing...

it's all on purpose.

But we didn't want it

to get too fancy,

and it had to sound like

a bunch of high school kids

playing their instruments.

♪ ♪

Very, very cheesy-sounding,

but perfect for this song,

because of the lyrical content

of the song,

about this, you know,

person called Valentine

who, uh, is a mass murderer.

♪ ♪

- I mean, "Valentine's Day,"

from a musical point of view,

that's...that is way old.

That's like, old-school.

All those chord changes,

that whole thing.

but if you listen to

the lyrics,

there's subject matter there.

- ♪ Valentine told me

who's to go ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Feelings he's treasured

most of all ♪

- There had been

a number of incidents

prior to creating this song

that had moved him.

I think he was really troubled

by this trend of

people going and shooting kids.

- ♪ The teachers

and the football star ♪

♪ ♪

♪ It's in his tiny face ♪

♪ ♪

♪ It's in his scrawny hand ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Valentine told me so ♪

♪ He's got something to say ♪

♪ It's Valentine's Day ♪

- But he really wanted

to bring the audience

into the mind of that killer,

and, uh, that transition

from sort of

the David that we know

to this other character

that he was inhabiting

in this song

was, uh, very shocking,

really.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Valentine told me

how he'd feel ♪

♪ ♪

- ♪ Ooh ♪

- ♪ If all the world ♪

♪ Were under his heels ♪

- Being right there

in front of him

and seeing him pull this

out of himself...

you know, it was a...

it was quite terrifying

to watch.

- ♪ His tiny face ♪

♪ ♪

♪ It's in his scrawny hands ♪

- I really wanted to introduce

a weapon into the video,

and David was really

against it.

He didn't want any guns,

he didn't want any blood.

[laughs]

But he was very much aware of

making a statement about

gun control,

and the importance of that,

in his own style.

- To defeat

the divisive forces

that would take freedom away,

I want to say

those fighting words...

♪ ♪

"From my cold, dead hands."

[cheers and applause]

- ♪ It's in his scrawny hand ♪

♪ It's in his icy heart ♪

♪ It's happening today ♪

♪ Valentine, Valentine ♪

- He was very interested

in society.

You know,

what makes people operate,

what makes societies operate,

and that was one of his

less cryptic

and more straight-up lyrics

that he's ever written.

[desolate music]

- I'm not an original thinker.

What I'm best at doing

is, uh, synthesizing

those things in society

or culture

refracting those things

and producing

some kind of glob

of how it is that we live

at this particular time.

[slow rock music]

♪ Pushing through

the market square ♪

♪ So many mothers crying ♪

♪ News had just come over ♪

♪ ♪

♪ We had five years left

to sigh in ♪

♪ ♪

♪ News guy wept

when he told us ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Earth was really dying ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Cried so much

that his face was wet ♪

♪ That I knew

he was not lying ♪

♪ ♪

- He let you know

something's not right here.

So that's the best I knew.

He didn't come up

with the solutions,

but at least he could express

and others could resonate

with that.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Girl my age

went off her head ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Hit some tiny children ♪

♪ ♪

♪ If the black hadn't've

pulled her off ♪

♪ ♪

♪ I think she would have

killed them ♪

I'm not a Dylan

and I'm not a...

I'm not somebody who can

sit down

and stoically write

a clear picture

of what's happening,

but I can leave

a very strong impression

of how I feel about it.

♪ Five years ♪

- ♪ Five years ♪

- ♪ Do-do-do-do, yeah ♪

- ♪ Five years ♪

- ♪ Do-dun-a-ga-da-he-eh ♪

- ♪ Five years ♪

- ♪ Didn't hear ya ♪

all: ♪ Five years ♪

- ♪ That's all we've got ♪

- ♪ Five ♪

[cheers and applause]

[electronic music]

♪ ♪

- It's very hard to

not continue to re-address

the same subject matter

endlessly.

I mean, I have a certain niche

that I work in,

A lot of it, until recently,

tends to be about alienation

and, uh, being on the

outside of things.

♪ It's the darkest hour ♪

♪ You're 22 ♪

♪ ♪

♪ The voice of youth ♪

♪ The hour of dread ♪

That tends to be where

I feel more comfortable

as a writer,

but I think one keeps

re-addressing that situation

and trying to express it

in a different way.

I guess that's what I do.

♪ Love is lost ♪

♪ Lost is love ♪

♪ ♪

- When I spoke to David

on the phone,

it was definitely,

"Don't say a word about this."

In fact, we even

had a code word for it,

so if anybody

intercepted the phone calls,

they wouldn't know

we were talking about,

um, the album.

So the album was actually

code-named "the table."

[laughs]

♪ ♪

There was a lot of discussion

about

what the album would be called

at the time.

It was quite gratifying

to know that

not even David Bowie

has everything planned out.

♪ ♪

So it was possibly even called

"Love is Lost."

♪ ♪

Possibly going to be called

"The Next Day,"

possibly called

"Where Are We Now?"

- ♪ Say hello

to the lunatic men ♪

- The thing that started

the concept for the design

was this photograph.

It's from the '70s

and he said,

"I want to do something with

this photo

for the cover,"

which I found quite puzzling.

He was looking back

on his life,

even looking at that image,

I really struggled with

using the image,

and then it took Bowie

to say "Jonathan,

"why don't you just

turn the image upside-down?"

And within that moment,

he subverted

his whole history

[rock music]

So the process was to go

through every record cover,

every printed image of him,

and see how we could

subvert it.

♪ ♪

The cover of "Heroes"

really had

that youthful image of Bowie

looking forward to the future,

and the square obliterates it.

It's existentially

talking about

someone who's coming

closer to the end

of their life

and looking back

on the past.

I really wasn't sure about it

at the time,

to the point, in fact,

where the night before

it was sent off

to the record company,

I wrote to him and said,

"Are you sure?"

And he actually said to me,

"No, this is...have faith,

Jonathan.

"This is a good idea.

It's an original idea."

- ♪ I'd rather be high ♪

- I think he was subverting

people's expectation

because of the years away,

so he could play

with his image.

He wasn't a young man

desperate to be original.

He was someone

who lived life

and was not up for

playing the game

of being in the media

all the time.

[foreboding music]

♪ ♪

Bowie was incredibly happy

that we'd managed to

keep this thing secret

all this time.

We had accomplished something

unique

in a time when everybody

knows everything.

He was quite attracted to

all the furore

around an album being released,

but he wanted to play it

the right way.

[somber music]

- ♪ Then we saw ♪

- Hello, David Bowie's

back in sound and vision,

with his first new album

in a decade.

- He hasn't performed

since 2006,

and has rarely been

seen in public

since then,

but now he's back.

- But after a bout of

ill health,

it was thought he had retired.

Wrong.

- His new album,

his first in ten years,

shot to the number one spot

last weekend.

In fact, it's the fastest-

selling of the year so far,

having shifted

over 100,000 copies

in less than two weeks.

- ♪ The night was always

falling ♪

♪ The peacock in the snow ♪

♪ ♪

♪ And I tell myself ♪

♪ I don't know who I am ♪

♪ ♪

- He just stopped

giving interviews

many years ago,

and, um,

this is something that

he needed to do, I think,

for himself.

He couldn't...he couldn't

have his life examined

any longer.

He didn't want

any speculation about his life.

♪ ♪

[rock drum music]

♪ ♪

- I think it's

terribly dangerous

for an artist to fulfill

other people's expectations.

If you feel safe

in the area

that you're working in,

you're not working

in the right area.

Always go a little further

into the water

than you feel you're capable

of being in.

Go a little bit out of

your depth,

and you don't feel that

your feet are

quite touching the bottom,

you're just about

in the right place

to do something exciting.

[jazz piano music]

- The way David works.

He just keeps evolving,

evolving, evolving.

David's always looking

for that new element

and unique musicians

to be the carriage

for his new ideas.

♪ ♪

Maria Schneider is

an amazing jazz composer

and how she could've been

off my radar,

I don't...I don't know,

because,

uh, she suddenly appeared

in my life through David.

And when I heard

her compositions,

it was everything

David and I loved

about big band music:

that it was discordant

and strange and ethereal.

[melancholy orchestral music]

♪ ♪

- Out of the blue,

David called.

I said, "Hello?"

[laughs]

Then...and then

proceeded to start

to talk to him about

the idea, uh, that he had

to collaborate on a song.

[dark jazz music]

♪ ♪

David brought a little demo

of "Sue,"

so I listened to it

and immediately heard this:

[plays piano piece

with quick bass]

I said, "Where do you want

this to go?"

So it's...

it's pretty bright...

you know, sounding,

and he said, "Oh,

I want it to be really dark."

So then I started

playing around with

ways in which I could

make that...

[plays discordantly]

That melody dark,

and I just fooled around

over here

and then I looked at him

and I said,

"Okay, let's try this."

- Maria Schneider said,

"You have to listen

to this guy, Donny McCaslin."

Donny had a band.

[plays scales on saxophone]

This band were

trained jazz musicians,

so we had more colors

to the palette.

[energetic drum beat]

- Then I just worked on it

on my own a little bit.

And then David came over,

and then I presented him

with all these sketches

of ideas

and said, "Okay,

let me play you

lots of different things,"

and he would either say,

"Yeah, yeah, I r...

Oh, I really like that."

You know, if it had got

a real reaction of him...

from him, then I said,

"Okay, maybe that's

the direction,"

so I just kind of

tried to feel him out.

[jazz music]

♪ ♪

- It was adventure.

Adventure, adventure.

Let's try this, let's try that.

Let's make it as far-out

as possible.

Let's go somewhere

no one's ever gone before.

You know?

♪ ♪

- I mean, recording it

was, like,

six hours or something...

- Yeah.

- So he comes out,

then he lays down

the vocal for the whole song,

seven, eight minutes,

so he's been in the studio

all day long...

- Just sitting there.

- You know,

we're just sitting there,

listening...you know,

taking this all in,

goes out, a little

one-two-three on the mic,

and then, boom.

- ♪ Sue ♪

♪ ♪

♪ I got the job ♪

♪ ♪

♪ We'll buy the house ♪

♪ You'll need to rest ♪

♪ But now we'll make it ♪

- So I remember

doing this interview

with Tony Visconti.

The interviewer asked us both,

you know, what was David's

relationship to jazz music,

something like that,

and Tony's response was that

he thought that that influence

had always been there

in David's music,

but it was just sort of

underneath the surface,

and that now, it was just,

you know, out there.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Sue, I pushed you down ♪

♪ Beneath the weeds ♪

♪ Endless faith ♪

♪ In hopeless deeds ♪

- Of course, when this thing

was released,

there were

all sorts of comments.

Some people were just

absolutely hating it

and some people

were loving it

and some people

didn't know what to think.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Good-bye ♪

- This is David Bowie.

He's not gonna pigeonhole

even himself.

Imagine how ridiculous

he would have looked,

you know, if he kept

dyeing his hair orange

and he was 65 years old

with orange hair

and platform shoes, you know.

He was smart.

[dark piano music]

♪ ♪

The radical shift between

"Sue" and "The Next Day"

is like when he did the, uh,

ambient music

of "Low" and "Heroes"

with Brian Eno.

- ♪ Dun-dun-dun-dun.... ♪

[imitating early piano playing]

[laughs]

Oh... And he'll play that

again.

♪ Dun, dun, dun, dun ♪

Oh, wow, I'm feeling low.

[bright '80s music]

Brian Eno's methodology

is a little bit different

than any methodology

I've ever encountered.

That's not rock and roll.

Rock and roll is, "Hey, man,

I got this great riff.

Listen to this."

[imitates electric guitar]

You know?

But when you start

experimenting

with soundscapes,

which is what they were doing,

it makes other things

come to light.

David was listening to

a few German bands back then

that were at the epicenter

of electronic music,

and I think that the

elec-tronic-al part

was too much.

That's why he had a R&B, a...

a black rhythm section,

being, "You want a machine?

Let me give you a funk band."

[energetic music]

But I'll add

all the electronic stuff

on top of that.

Otherwise, he might

take the chance of

sounding like European

electronic music,

which he did not

want to reproduce.

♪ ♪

- I'd gotten into the idea

of real experimentation

in music,

with the new sounds of Europe

and it was this kind of

hybrid thing

that appealed to me so much.

The idea of mixtures

has always been something

that I've found

absolutely fascinating.

♪ Blue, blue, electric blue ♪

♪ That's the color of my room ♪

♪ Where I will live ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Blue, blue ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Pale blinds drawn all day ♪

♪ Nothing to do,

nothing to say ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Blue, blue ♪

♪ ♪

♪ I will sit right down ♪

♪ Waiting for

the gift of sound and vision ♪

- I was just amazed that

David was the kind of person

that he was,

because I wasn't expecting

that.

I was expecting something

sort of

superhuman, strange,

walking in

and he presented himself

so normal.

As a matter of fact,

the doorman from downstairs

called me and said,

"There's a...what?

What's your name?

Oh, David, here to see you."

And I thought, "Oh, dear."

[energetic jazz music]

♪ ♪

Can I just stop a second?

Did I just say he was normal?

There's really nothing normal

about David Bowie.

You know?

But anyway...

♪ ♪

[quiet drum music]

♪ ♪

[tranquil rock music]

- When I was around 17, 18,

what I wanted to do,

more than anything else,

was write something

for Broadway.

I wanted to write a musical.

Had no idea

of how you did it

or how musicals were

constructed,

but the idea of writing

something

that was rock-based

for Broadway

really intrigued me.

I thought, "That would be

a wonderful thing to do."

♪ ♪

- When we first talked

quite quickly

he said,

"I wanna do a musical,"

and I said, "Great,"

and he said, "All I know

"is that it's called Laz...

"it's gonna be called

'Lazarus,'

"and it's based on

the character I played

"in 'The Man Who Fell

to Earth'

in the movie,

Thomas Jerome Newton."

♪ ♪

- Thomas Newton is an alien.

He can't get home.

He's relegated to this Earth.

He is in the world,

but not of it.

♪ ♪

- Outsiders,

marginalized people,

people that don't belong,

that are disp...

that feel displaced,

not at home,

even when they have a house,

like Newton.

Rich, you know, on Earth,

but lost on Earth.

It resonated with him.

♪ ♪

- My initial reaction was,

"I've got the chance

to do a musical

"with David,

which is wonderful,

but it sure ain't

gonna buy me a yacht."

- [distorted]

♪ Oh, say, can you see ♪

- That was my amused comment

to myself,

but he said,

"I want to see this,"

you know, "I want this on."

- Okay.

So, uh, thank you very much,

Sophia.

- Just before

we were due to start

a small workshop,

I was asked to go to

David's office in New York

at a specific time,

and when I walked in the room,

David was on Skype,

and then he said, "I need

to explain something to you,

"because I'm not gonna be

"able to be around a lot

"during this workshop.

"Which doesn't mean that I'm

"not gonna be totally involved

in it.

"It just means that I

can't be there sometimes,

"because I'm having treatment

because I have, uh, a cancer."

[classical piano music]

I was shocked,

but his attitude was

that he was gonna be okay.

And that was kind of the end of

the conversation.

- I'm here to get you out

of this apartment!

Get you home to your planet!

I think we should build

a rocket!

[bold rock music plays]

- But of course,

once we started,

sort of, rehearsal,

he was there a lot.

He was sort of in and out

and in and out,

you know, so...

♪ ♪

So he would go,

"Oh, let's remove that

"scene, and can I write a...

can I write a song?

I feel as if I should

write a song here,"

and he was really excited

about that.

♪ ♪

- He was ill, and, um,

he said, uh,

writing the musical

was on his bucket list.

You know, getting

finally writing a musical

and all that.

So that's the only time

he got a little bit, you know,

sentimental, maybe,

like I've got to do

these things.

- Stupid animal!

Stupid creature!

- Why don't you tell me

what's going on?

- Because I can't.

- I think that David

intended it to be a play

that's supported by music,

rather than a musical

that's supported by dialogue.

- ♪ But the film is a saddening

bore ♪

- It's about as far from

a typical West End

or Broadway show

as you could get.

He wanted this to be

an art piece.

- ♪ As I ask you to focus ♪

♪ Sailors fighting

in the dance hall ♪

♪ Oh, man, look at

those cavemen go ♪

♪ It's the freakiest show ♪

- I'd heard that he wanted

to do a musical since...

someone said the mid-'70s

or something or other,

and I thought, "Oh, God,

"we're beginning something

that feels

"very, very close to his heart

and his head

and where he's at."

[crescendoing rock music]

♪ ♪

- ♪ Ronda ♪

I really had it in my mind

to do a musical of "1984."

It was a book that I'd loved

all through my youth,

but of course, I didn't really

take into account

the second Mrs. Orwell,

who, when she got wind

of what we were doing,

absolutely put her foot down

and said,

"Not having

rock-and-roll people

"work on my late husband's

great piece of work."

And I thought, "Oh,

sorry,

I'll do me own version then."

- That's a naught.

- 2015!

- This is the beginning

of a film

called "Diamond Dogs,"

and I've put naught in here

because I didn't know

what year it's set in.

- Wanting to do something

like write a musical

for "1984"

and then not being able

to do it,

via the album "Diamond Dogs,"

kind of gelled into this thing

that we later toured

in America.

- [singing]

- David had the idea of

using dance and mime,

uh, with two vocalists,

myself being one...

- ♪ Jean Genie ♪

- And Gui Andrisano,

who had been a child star.

♪ ♪

It kind of worked with

the input that we had

from Toni Basil,

in terms of choreography.

- But when I met him

the first day

in his hotel suite,

the set was there.

The set was already

a little mock-up set.

- ♪ We feel that we are paper ♪

♪ Choking on you nightly ♪

♪ They tell me,

son, we want you ♪

♪ Be elusive,

but don't walk far ♪

♪ For we're ♪

- He had the cityscape

and a set list.

So for me,

the set list was my thread

of what ideas

I could come up with

in collaboration with him

to make this theatrical piece

happen.

- ♪ But I love you ♪

♪ In your fuck-me pumps ♪

♪ And your nimble dress

that trails ♪

♪ Oh dress yourself ♪

- At that time,

there was not

really a lot of rock stars

that focused on theatricality.

A lot of them thought

it was corny,

or they were afraid

to approach it.

So I knew he was

a great performer,

extremely theatrical,

that would just always be

outside the box,

always be walking on the edge.

♪ ♪

- ♪ In the year

of the scavenger ♪

♪ The season of the bitch ♪

♪ Sashay on the boardwalk ♪

♪ Scurry to the ditch ♪

♪ Just another future song ♪

♪ Lonely little kitsch ♪

- "Diamond Dogs" was

probably the most difficult

one to choreograph,

because

we were on long pieces of

rope.

and the idea was to

tie him down

without fully disabling him

and, uh, tripping him up.

♪ ♪

- ♪ There you go

Whoo ♪

♪ Call them the diamond dogs ♪

It was hideously pressurized

for me.

I had these awful tensions

and stresses

but the physicality

of performing a show like that

was alarmingly strenuous.

♪ Oh, honey ♪

♪ You're so bad ♪

- "Diamond Dogs" is

a series of vignettes

of what could happen

when society breaks down,

so it was more sketchy,

rather than a story

from beginning to end.

♪ ♪

- I started getting into

the idea of writing

a kind of a non-narrative

that just had situations

within it

and the audience kind of

joins up the dots

their own way, in the way

they want to make it.

They'd remake the material

they're offered.

♪ Just one day, I say ♪

♪ Oh, honey ♪

♪ You're so bad ♪

♪ Best I ever had ♪

♪ ♪

- He brought me another song

to work on.

And I said to him,

"I would love to do this,

"but I just...I can't, David.

I'm recording an album

with my own band."

♪ ♪

And then, I said to him,

"I think you should do a

record

with Donny's group."

He said,

"Really, you think so?

You think they'd want

to do that?"

and I said, "You kidding me?"

and I said, "I think

it would be amazing."

♪ ♪

- I got an email from him

and...

basically saying that

he would really like to record

different tunes with us.

There was a sentence

that he said...

something like, you know,

"It would be my dream

"to record a few songs

with the Donny McCaslin group."

I think that that sentence

was kind of, like, wow.

[melancholy music]

♪ ♪

Whatever he was going through,

health-wise, at the time,

one thing that was

really inspiring

was how, from the first day,

the first note, he was just

totally in it.

- By the time I joined

you guys,

I was not aware of anything,

and I was actually...

even being ignorant

of all this,

I was struck

by how healthy and energetic

and in great spirits he was.

[uneasy orchestral lullaby]

♪ ♪

- So David had a lot of

vocal ideas

that needed to be done.

We have him singing this.

- ♪ In the villa of Ormen ♪

♪ In the villa of Ormen ♪

♪ Stands a solitary candle ♪

♪ Ah, ah ♪

♪ In the center of it all ♪

♪ Your eyes ♪

- Now, the reason

it sounds so good

is that's just one David Bowie

singing,

but with his voice put up

a fifth interval.

- ♪ On the day of execution ♪

♪ ♪

♪ On the day of execution ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Only women kneel and smile ♪

♪ Ah, ah ♪

♪ At the center of it all ♪

♪ Your eyes ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Your eyes ♪

- He asked me if

I would be interested

in perhaps putting

some images to this song,

and then began, you know,

a couple of months of

a very interesting

collaborative process.

He would send me drawings

that he would literally say,

"Do what you want

with these drawings,"

you know?

He would have this character

that he drew

with the man

with sort of gauze,

you know, across his face,

with two buttons for eyes,

and we named him "Button-Eyes."

♪ ♪

And he also sent me an image

of a spaceman

with a skeleton inside.

- ♪ Ah-ah-ah ♪

- To me, it was 100%

Major Tom, you know?

A character that he had,

you know,

revisited and used

over his career.

- Major Tom, for him,

was like some sort of talisman

or something.

He was really along

for the ride with David,

and the idea of space,

I think, represented...

maybe it represented freedom.

[acoustic guitar music]

- Major Tom

still means a lot to me.

It was the first time

I'd been able

to create a character

that, uh, was very credible,

and I think for any writer,

that's a high point.

He preceded all the others,

and I suppose one has

his special place for him.

I do.

♪ Ground control

to Major Tom ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Ground control

to Major Tom ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Take your protein pills ♪

♪ And put your helmet on ♪

- What is it with spaceships?

- Well, it's...it's

an interior dialogue

that you manifest physically.

[saxophone music]

It's my little inner space,

isn't it?

Writ large.

I wouldn't dream of

getting on a spaceship.

It would scare the shit

out of me.

[laughs]

I have absolutely no interest

or ambition

to go into space whatsoever.

I'm scared, going down

the end of the garden.

[rock music]

♪ Though I'm past

100,000 miles ♪

♪ I'm feeling very still ♪

♪ And I think

my spaceship knows ♪

♪ Which way to go ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Tell my wife I love her

very much ♪

♪ She knows ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Ground control

to Major Tom ♪

♪ Your circuit's dead ♪

♪ There's something wrong ♪

♪ Can you hear me,

Major Tom? ♪

♪ Can you hear me,

Major Tom? ♪

♪ Can you hear me,

Major Tom? ♪

- Major Tom was

a really great device

to keep returning to.

Maybe there was some little,

you know, obviously a bit of,

maybe,

sentimental attachment

to it,

because it represented a lot

in terms of

how he became known to us

and became famous.

- ♪ The shrieking

of nothing is killing ♪

♪ Just pictures of Jap girls

in synthesis ♪

♪ And I ain't got no money ♪

♪ And I ain't got no hair ♪

- [murmuring]

Something please the air.

- ♪ But I'm hoping to kick ♪

♪ But the planet is glowing ♪

♪ Ashes to ashes

and funk to funky ♪

♪ We know Major Tom's

a junkie ♪

♪ Strung out in heaven's high ♪

♪ Hitting an all-time low ♪

[discordant electronic music]

- He just would take

these bits of the past

and fashion the future

out of them,

and Major Tom

was a big part of that.

♪ ♪

And he's been looking for home

for, you know, how long?

50 years or something.

You know, a long time,

Major Tom's been trying to

find peace and rest,

and he found it in "Blackstar."

Major Tom is home, finally.

[sepulchral music]

- "Blackstar," you know...

it's really wildly open

to interpretation.

And, uh, I think

he enjoyed this very much,

like any artist.

Any great artist

wants you to stand back

and look at the work

and analyze it,

and...and feel things from it,

and you might not

feel the same things.

The idea of art

is to stimulate

your own imagination.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Ooh-ooh-ooh ♪

- You know, after a week

or two

of us, uh, having these chats

about Button-Eyes

and the spaceman,

I get a text message from him,

said, uh,

" I need to Skype

with you. Can you Skype?"

And he's saying, "There's

something I have to tell you,"

um, and I said, "Sure."

And then he says,

"I have to tell you that

I'm very ill

and that I'm probably

gonna die."

You know?

You know,

utterly out of the blue.

You know, just like that.

[otherworldly music]

- [low wailing]

- Let this be

only coming from me,

but I think

part of the way I reacted

also was I felt

that when he was saying that,

I thought for a brief second

that he looked scared,

actually.

♪ ♪

And then, a second later,

he would joke about it.

You know.

Over the next

six or eight months,

the disease or illness

was never mentioned,

and he was in no way,

in my mind,

you know, affected

by his illness.

- ♪ Something happened

on the day he died ♪

♪ Spirit rose a meter

and stepped aside ♪

♪ Somebody else

took his place ♪

♪ And bravely cried ♪

♪ I'm a Blackstar ♪

- This is, uh, a tradition

that David and I always had.

Like, how can we mangle

the voice?

Eh, you know,

how can we change it

and make one person

sound like many people

and in many different contexts

and in many different

spatial areas?

- ♪ I'm a Blackstar ♪

♪ Way up, oh, honey ♪

♪ I've got game ♪

♪ I see right so white ♪

♪ So open-hearted pain ♪

♪ I want eagles

in my daydreams ♪

♪ Diamonds in my eyes ♪

♪ I'm a Blackstar ♪

- David is like some, like,

bizarre skeletal choir

doing "I'm a Blackstar,

I'm a Blackstar."

It's this weird thing. It's...

It makes this whole

section very supernatural.

- ♪ Somebody else

took his place ♪

♪ And bravely cried ♪

♪ I'm a Blackstar ♪

♪ I'm a starstar ♪

♪ I'm a Blackstar ♪

- I imagine it must have

been cathartic for him.

He was working tirelessly,

both on "Blackstar"

and on "Lazarus"

at the same time.

Um, perhaps the catharsis

surrounding "Lazarus"

was unique

in as much as its execution

required him

to relinquish control

and allow so many other people

to take it and make it happen.

- Countryside disappears

beneath our feet.

- You know, I mean,

I must say, you know,

there were times

when David and me

would be reading scenes

together.

You could feel him more

in there.

[piano tune]

- This isn't happening.

I'm still inside my head.

- You know, you forget...

you forget that

actually, he's...he's...

of course, we forgot

that he was dying.

- I'm done with this life!

- The cast, of course,

never knew.

Only me, uh, Ivo, and

Robert.

- And so a new universe.

I'll dream big up there.

♪ ♪

And although always

stuck inside my breaking mind,

♪ ♪

I've stepped off the Earth

and into a better place.

- David didn't want "Heroes"

in "Lazarus,"

because "Heroes" had become

like an anthem.

He wanted a song

that would have

sent everyone out,

slitting their wrists.

♪ ♪

Ivo and Enda

persuaded him

that if "Heroes"

was treated, musically,

in a different way,

it would work

for the ending of "Lazarus."

♪ ♪

- ♪ I ♪

♪ I will be king ♪

♪ ♪

♪ And you ♪

♪ You will be queen ♪

- It's a reflective...

it's a beautiful moment.

"Heroes" is melancholy

instead of triumphant.

♪ ♪

- Through his relationship

with this girl,

and her re-awakening him

to his vitality,

Newton is brought back

to life,

that he may ready himself

to die,

perhaps.

Or not. [laughs]

♪ But we could be safer ♪

♪ Just for one day ♪

- In this catharsis moment

at the end with the "Heroes,"

you know, when things

clear up,

he cuts loose everything which

what in a normal life

of a normal human being

is important.

Both: ♪ We can be heroes ♪

- And then he has to let go

every hope,

just accepting,

well, his own death,

at the end.

both: ♪ We can be heroes ♪

♪ ♪

♪ We can be heroes ♪

- So the last thing

that you see is

Michael C. Hall

is still on stage, alive,

but in his mind, he's

flying away into the stars.

That's the last image.

- ♪ Just for one day ♪

♪ ♪

[cheers and applause]

- I didn't expect

David to be there

at our opening night.

We had heard that

he was getting weak,

but he so wanted to be there,

and, uh,

and he turned up,

and he watched it,

and then afterwards,

and he took the bows with us.

It was very, very sweet.

- You know, he got through

the night,

but I really am convinced that

he was fighting death

and he wanted to continue

and to continue

and then afterwards,

we were sitting a little bit,

talking behind stage,

and he said, "Let's start

the second one now,

the sequel"...

[laughs]

"To 'Lazarus.'"

[melancholy piano music]

- The last thing I remember

David saying to me

after, you know, the hugs

and the smiles

and after, uh,

after that opening night

performance,

was "I think it went well

tonight, don't you?"

That's the last thing

I remember him saying,

and I said, "Yeah,

I think it did."

♪ ♪

- After the musical opened,

I got a call saying

"David would love to see you,"

and so I went over

to see him,

and he was in his bedroom,

and we chatted.

It was all very lovely.

Peaceful.

And so then we

walked to the elevator

and he said, "You're a genius,"

to me, and I said, "No, no, no.

"I'm not a genius.

"I'm just the producer.

You're the fucking genius."

And, um,

we had a hug,

I got in the elevator.

That was it.

Last time I saw him.

[light rock music]

♪ ♪

- David said,

"I just want to make

a simple performance video,"

I immediately said,

"The song is called 'Lazarus.'

You should be in a bed."

♪ ♪

To me, that had to do with

the Biblical aspect of it,

you know?

The man who would rise again.

And it had nothing to do

with him being ill.

That was only because

I liked the imagery of it.

You know.

♪ ♪

I found out later

that the week

we were shooting

is when he found out

that this is...it's over,

you know?

We'll end treatments,

or, you know,

in whatever capacity

that means that...

that his illness has won.

♪ ♪

- ♪ Look up here ♪

♪ I'm in heaven ♪

♪ I've got scars ♪

♪ That can't be seen ♪

♪ I've got drama ♪

♪ Can't be stolen ♪

♪ Everybody ♪

♪ Knows me now ♪

♪ ♪

- I've watched him record,

and he's in that song,

in that feeling,

in that moment.

He would stand in front

of the mic,

and for the four or five

minutes he was singing,

he would pour his heart out.

The audio picked up

his breathing

between those lines.

- ♪ Look up here, man ♪

♪ I'm in danger ♪

[audible breathing]

♪ I've got nothing left

to lose ♪

♪ I'm so high,

it makes my brain whirl ♪

♪ Dropped my cell phone

down below ♪

[energetic rock music]

- It wasn't that

he was out of breath.

He was, like, hyperventilating

in a way.

Like, getting...

getting his energy up

to sing this,

to deliver this song.

- ♪ I'll be free ♪

- He was quite stoked.

Like I...like I like to say,

in the zone,

and I could see him

through the window

that he was, you know,

really feeling it

♪ ♪

- ♪ Oh, I'll be free ♪

[audible breathing]

♪ Ain't that just like me? ♪

- A man on top of his game.

It's brilliant,

absolutely brilliant,

and the saddest lyrics

to hear...

hear them now.

- It's nine minutes past 7:00.

Well, the shock news

has only just been

officially confirmed.

David Bowie is dead.

- David Bowie,

rock and roll rebel,

actor, and cultural icon,

has died at age 69.

- We lost David Bowie, uh,

this morning...

um, and it's a big deal.

[rock drum intro]

- ...have the news crews

and fans from all around

the world

leaving full tribute...

- ...In downtown Manhattan,

and you can see behind me...

- He is David Bowie.

- ...Like his life,

has shocked

fans laying flowers

from his...

- Even the

Archbishop of Canterbury

was a fan.

- ♪ Heaven loves ya ♪

[cheers and applause]

♪ The clouds part for ya ♪

♪ Nothing stands in your way ♪

♪ When you're a boy ♪

[upbeat rock music]

♪ ♪

♪ Clothes always fit ya ♪

♪ Life is a pop

of the cherry ♪

♪ When you're a boy ♪

It's been a incredibly

full life,

and, uh, apart from the drugs

in the '70s,

I think little of it

has been wasted

in terms of I've been able to

sort of harness

every moment in a way.

I'm...I'm a really lucky chap.

♪ Favorite things ♪

- And legacy. What...

how would you like

your legacy written?

- I'd love people to believe

that I really had

great haircuts.

[laughs]

♪ Boys ♪

♪ ♪

♪ Boys keep swinging ♪

♪ Boys always work it out ♪

David Bowie: The Last Five Years (2017) - full transcript