Why Ringo Starr Said the Beatles' 'Magical Mystery Tour' 'Wasn't My Movie'

In an interview, Ringo Starr said John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison had more of a role in crafting The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour than he did. However, Ringo did help create a great scene in the film. During an interview, Ringo discussed what it was like constantly being portrayed as the clown of the group.

Ringo Starr made George Harrison look like a cat for The Beatles’ ‘Magical Mystery Tour’

During a 1981 interview with Rolling Stone, Ringo discussed the creation of Magical Mystery Tour. “Magical Mystery Tour is not my movie,” he said. “John, Paul, and George wrote more of it than I did, but I shot a lot of it.”

Ringo took responsibility for an interesting visual moment from the film. “There’s a scene with George where I put him in my living room and projected slides on him. It’s nothing new. It was done back in 1926 or so. 

“But I happened to be a camera buff, and I had all these funny lenses, and I think it came out fine,” he added. “Naiveté isn’t so bad, really.” It appears Ringo was talking about the scene of the film in which George performs “Blue Jay Way.” In it, the “My Sweet Lord” star has an image of a cat projected onto his face.

While he was creative, Ringo Starr said he had a reputation of a ‘downtrodden dummy’

While Ringo was very creative, he still had an image problem. “You see, what I have to combat is the original image of me as the downtrodden dummy,” Ringo explained. “It’s still in everybody’s minds. You don’t know how hard it is to fight that tag. I’ve been caught in this trap for almost 20 years now. 

“But it hasn’t ruined my life,” he added. “I know what I am, I know what I can do. But what am I going to do, take out a newspaper ad or a billboard and say, ‘I’m not really like that?’”