THE FIFTH BEATLE GRAPHIC NOVEL TRAILER

The Fifth Beatle graphic novel trailer:

In early 1967 Beatles manager Brian Epstein was about to board a plane from New York to London when he had a strong feeling the plane was going to crash. His escalating drug habit and nonstop work regime had pushed him to the edge of sanity. As he boarded the plane, certain of his impending death, he passed a note to Nat Weiss, the Beatles’ legal representative in the U.S., that read, “Brown paper jackets for Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” His life was flashing before his eyes, yet his final words aimed to protect the Beatles from the possibility of getting sued for the controversial album jacket, which features photographs of famous people, at that point without their permission. “Even on the brink of a nervous breakdown,” wrote Johnny Rogan in Starmakers and Svengalis, “his devotion to the Fab Four was all-consuming.”

As can be seen in the new the graphic novel The Fifth Beatle: The Brian Epstein Story by Broadway producer Vivek Tiwary, Epstein’s love for the Beatles was the secret behind his incredible accomplishments with them. Although The Fifth Beatle is a graphic novel, beautifully illustrated by Andrew Robinson and Kyle Baker, its real power is as a primer for personal and professional success. “I really think that the heart of the Brian Epstein story is that it’s worthwhile to chase your dreams,” Tiwary told me. “No matter how crazy they may seem, no matter how many people may laugh at you, if you believe and you persevere and you fight for it, you can make your dreams come true.”

Tiwary became interested in Brian Epstein more than twenty years ago as a business student at Wharton. “I wanted to be an entertainment entrepreneur. Thinking that Brian and the Beatles were the team that wrote and then re-wrote the roles of the pop music business I thought I should study the life of Brian Epstein. I wanted to find out, how did he get the band a record deal when no one wanted to sign them? How did he come up with the suits and the haircuts? How did he convince Ed Sullivan to book them when a British band had never made an impact in the States? That’s what I wanted as a young business student.”