Peter Brown & Tommy Nutter
Peter Brown first spied Tommy Nutter in 1967, at a dinner party thrown by Brian Epstein in his Georgian town house on Chapel Street... It was a warm evening, summer, June or July. An intimate sit-down for a handful of people. Peter thought Tommy was remarkably cute, though Tommy, perhaps dazed by his surroundings and the famous host, gave no indication of even noticing Peter.
Afterwards, Brian had a conversaion with Peter in which he made some 'approving comments' about their young guest. It was not that Brian Epstein had any interest in Tommy for himself; despite his stiff-collar demeanour, he preferred rough trade to 'gay boys'. But he knew what Peter liked, and was, in that regard, always encouraging.
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(The day after Brian Epstein's death)
The next day, [Peter] was standing in Brian's drawing room, looking through a window onto a street that had just been swept through by paparazzi, like a flash flood. He had already shared the news with the Beatles, who were still on their retreat in Wales with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Peter was numb, but starting to realise that he would be primary witness at the inevitable inquest. And that the enormous responsibility of running the Beatles' office would now fall squarely on his shoulders.
At that moment, the telephone rang. Peter walked across and picked it up.
'How are you?' asked Tommy Nutter, who had somehow acquired Brian's private number.
'Awful,' Peter said, 'Really awful.'
So the young man from the summer dinner party invited himself over for company and comfort.
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On a Friday in August, Peter was sitting at his desk wrapping up some work when Paul McCartney called him on the telephone. For the previous few days, the Beatles had been working on a new single, an experimental track that had caused tension in the group - McCartney versus Harrison over guitar riffs - and raised the concern of their record producer, George Martin, who'd suggested it might be too long for radio play. Now it was nearly completed, and Paul asked Peter to come round for a first listen.
(Paul and John have Peter listen to 'Hey Jude', which he is impressed by and loves.)
Paul and John told Peter they wanted to go out and celebrate. But Peter demurred; he was to drive out to the country with Tommy for the weekend. Paul told him to call Tommy and bring him along; they had all met him by now, and there was no problem with Peter having a boyfriend.
When Peter called him using the studio payphone, Tommy refused, wilfully non-compliant. He didn't want to go out and celebrate in Soho. It took Paul to snatch the reciever out of Peter's hand and beg him to 'come hear this' before he finally surrended.
Tommy arrived at Trident and was installed in the armchair, told to prepare himself. The song was cued for a second play. As he then listened for the full seven minutes and eleven seconds, Paul and John watched him closely, trying to gauge his reaction.
After it was finished, Tommy remained impassive, unreadable. There was a long pause.
He told them he didn't like it.
The Beatles were 'crestfallen', Peter recalls, until they were informed this was Tommy's idea of a droll joke. Indeed, Tommy would eventually admit that 'Hey Jude' was 'the most incredible song... because we'd never heard anything like that before'. What impressed him was not so much its groundbreaking form, though, as how uncalculated it seemed. In Tommy's view, the Beatles hadn't set out to break the mould; they'd just wanted to express themselves. And expressing themselves - honestly expressing themselves - meant making the song in a way that happened, by the by, to be groundbreaking. 'It just came from within them,' he later said admiringly. 'That's what they wanted to do and they did it properly.'
"House of Nutter - The Rebel Tailor of Savile Row" by Lance Richardson
