Pattie also does all the shopping herself, at a local supermarket. She’d just bought a bar of chocolate, which she said tasted like soap. She’d sent it back with a letter of complaint. She didn’t put her own name on it — she’s at last learned from George to avoid any possibility of publicity. She used Margaret’s. She was hoping for some free bars as compensation.
Of all the wives, she is perhaps the most co-equal with her husband. They’re both very modern in their marriage, the way the magazines are always telling us modern marrieds are. More than the other Beatle wives, she shares her husband’s interests. She was in at the very beginning of the interest in Indian culture and shared all those developments.
But she does retain some freedom and independence on her own, still doing a little bit of modelling work.
Everybody who has been close to the Beatles over the years says that George is the one who has changed most of all. Even fans, who have followed George’s progress over a relatively short time, say he has changed. He was looked upon by many as the most handsome Beatle at one time. Now fans are always complaining about George letting his hair grow too unruly and untidy.
That is a superficial change. The inner ones are much more important. George, through being the youngest, was, for a long time, always considered the youngest in every sense. In comparison with John and Paul, most people who knew all three always looked upon George as just a boy. John and Paul were precocious, physically, sexually, and in their talent. They were writing songs long before George ever thought about it.
George did have a slight inferiority complex, although nothing serious. Cyn remembers him always hanging around when she wanted John on his own. So does Astrid, when she was trying to be alone with Stu.
George wasn’t academic at school and didn’t show many signs of being clever the way Paul did. Taking an ordinary apprenticeship, compared to Paul, the bright sixth former, and John, the art student, made people unfairly think George wasn’t as good as the others.
Julia, John’s mother, was horrified when John dragged along another baby-faced friend to meet her. She’d already thought Paul just a kid.
‘He was a lovely little boy,’ says Astrid, talking of their Hamburg days. ‘He was just little George. We never judged him in any way, the way we used to work out how intelligent or clever Stu, John and Paul were. He didn’t develop as quickly as the others had done.
‘But he wasn’t stupid. No one thought that for one minute. He made lovely jokes at his own expense, sending himself up for being young. I gave them all their Christmas presents one year, all wrapped up. John opened his first and it was an Olympia Press version of the Marquis de Sade. George picked up his and said, “What’s in mine then, comics?”’
George, of course, always had his guitar, if apparently nothing else. He was even more fanatical about mastering it than Paul or John, and was much better than they were. He hardly smiled on stage, he was so busy concentrating. But he wouldn’t try to do anything else for a long time, such as drawing. He thought he wasn’t clever enough.
But now, since the end of 1966, George is the one with so much. He was the first to rise right out and beyond Beatlemania. They all envied him his new passions in life, when they themselves could find so little. He even became the leader in many things. Not by going out of his way to lead, the way John did in the Quarrymen days. The others came to George, following his interests.
George today is the Beatle who needs the other Beatles least. The others admit they all missed each other, during those go-it-alone post-touring months. ‘I didn’t miss them at all,’ he says. ‘But it was great to get home from India and tell them all about it.’
‘George doesn’t miss anyone,’ Pattie says. ‘He’s very independent and he’s breaking out more and more. He’s found something stronger than the Beatles, though he still wants them to share it. He’s the source, but he wants them to join it.’
Because George’s abiding passions in life today are Indian religion and Indian music, all the other trappings of being a Beatle pass over him. Yet at one time, he was the most obsessed by all the money and by the business of being a millionaire. He was the one who cross-examined Brian Epstein on all the contracts.
But he can’t avoid some things like autographs and the telephone. When that happens, he is often the only one who can be rude. He forgets for a minute why it has happened, and is simply irritated by perfect strangers interrupting his life. On the train to Bangor he was very angry when his tea was being spoiled by women asking for his autograph. The others, who were resignedly signing away, had to restrain him and tell him not to get angry, however aggressive the fans were.
George is the one who has an absolute mania about any publicity of any sort. Anything getting into the papers about him personally makes him furious, as Pattie knows if she accidentally causes any.
Even after more than two years of marriage, Pattie is still not used to all the publicity and press attention. ‘I keep thinking, this time it will be OK. No one will know and even if they do, they won’t care. That trip to Los Angeles last year, I thought that would be OK. To my horror, there were TV cameras and hundreds of girls screaming.
‘In 1964 when we went to Tahiti, Beatlemania was at its height and we expected it. So we went to great lengths to go secretly. Neil and I flew first to Amsterdam, under assumed names, then we flew back towards Tahiti to meet George. Even then, people still found out.
‘Things are slightly better today, but it always seems to be worse out of England. You might get on a plane fairly quietly at London Airport, but the English press wire the press at the other end and everyone turns out.
‘At night it’s not too bad. We have come out of a restaurant and walked down a couple of streets without being pursued.
‘But I can’t get over the fans always hanging round the house, even now. They come into the garden and rush around. They even come into the house. They got into our bedroom the other day and stole a pair of my trousers and George’s pyjamas.’
Although George has warned her, she has, on occasions, inadvertently caused publicity. She received a letter through the post one day from an old man asking people to send him used spectacle frames. He said he was getting bundles of them to send to people in Africa.
She thought it seemed a good cause, so she went out and searched round the shops and bought up all the old spectacles she could find. She took out the glass and sent the old man the frames.
‘The next thing there was a story in the Daily Mirror about what I’d done. The old man even wrote and thanked me. He said the publicity had done his work a lot of good. George was furious.’
Like all the other wives, she has come up against physical danger, purely through being a Beatle wife.
The worst time was the Christmas of 1965. They were doing their Christmas Show at Hammersmith. I went with Terry. I scraped my hair back so that I would look completely different and no one would recognize me. I don’t know how anyone did, but a few did and started punching me. They took their shoes off and shouted, ‘Let’s go and get her.’ I was hemmed in and couldn’t get out. They threw things at me and screamed. Terry managed to drag me towards a side exit, with the girls kicking me as we forced a way through. Some followed me out and started kicking me again. I told them to stop. ‘Who do you think you are?’ they said. Then we all started fighting this time. I punched one in the face and Terry got one against a wall and held her tight. They were all shouting and swearing. Luckily, we got away in the end. They were just horrid little girls. They were so tiny, only 13 or 14 years old. I don’t know where they were from.