I was seeing intimate, long-lost footage of the world’s most famous band preparing for its final performance, and I couldn’t stop watching Yoko Ono sitting around, doing nothing. My attention kept drifting toward her corner of the frame. But as the hours passed, and Ono remained - painting at an easel, chewing a pastry, paging through a Lennon fan magazine - I found myself impressed by her stamina, then entranced by the provocation of her existence and ultimately dazzled by her performance.

Why is she there? I pleaded with my television set. The vast set only emphasizes the ludicrousness of her proximity. When George Harrison walks off, briefly quitting the band, there is Ono, wailing inchoately into his microphone.Īt first I found Ono’s omnipresence in the documentary bizarre, even unnerving. Later, when the group squeezes into a control room at the studio, Ono is there, wedged between Lennon and Ringo Starr, wordlessly unwrapping a piece of chewing gum and working it between Lennon’s fingers. Lennon slips behind the piano and Ono is there, her head hovering above his shoulder.

When the band starts into “Don’t Let Me Down,” Ono is there, reading a newspaper. When Paul McCartney starts to play “I’ve Got a Feeling,” Ono is there, stitching a furry object in her lap. She perches in reach of John Lennon, her bemused face oriented toward him like a plant growing to the light. Įarly in “The Beatles: Get Back,” Peter Jackson’s nearly eight-hour documentary about the making of the album “Let It Be,” the band forms a tight circle in the corner of a movie soundstage. To hear more audio stories from publications like The New York Times, download Audm for iPhone or Android.

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