‘The Beatles Anthology’: Revisiting why Ringo Starr ‘hated’ the Philippines

MANILA, Philippines – The Beatles Anthology was originally released as a vinyl, CD, DVD box set, and hardbound book volume in 1995. It came 25 years after the band had broken up. And according to the interviews with the group in the new Episode 9, it was better off for it. 

Doing it after some time had passed, the band members said, allowed for perspective. They also — and by this time, it was just the three of them after Lennon’s assassination in 1980 — were in a better mood to talk to each other. 

The acrimony surrounding the band’s breakup would have made it difficult to work on such a project — and 30  years on, the public would have more of an appetite for a retrospective. 

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This new edition of the Anthology has been restored and remastered by the wizardry of Peter Jackson of The Lord of the Rings fame. It was he who created the Get Back movie in 2021 out of the ashes of the previous footage shot for the Let it Be film by another director in 1969. And so 30 years after the first retrospective, we have another one with some more nuance and certainly better picture quality than before. 

There is also the previously mentioned new episode which is essentially a behind the scenes of the making of the 1995 version and now takes on a historical appeal of its own. 

Of particular interest to Filipinos is the fate of the 10 minutes of coverage given to the band’s tour date in Manila in 1966, which was famously, or rather infamously, marked by trouble from arrival to departure, highlighted by an almighty schedule mix-up with Imelda Marcos, then the First Lady of the Philippines.  

To say the band was unimpressed with their treatment would be an understatement, The segment, which had previously been the start of Episode 6 is now at the end of Episode 5. However, it still opens with Ringo Starr saying: “I hated the Philippines,” and it goes downhill from there. There is footage of people burning records towards the end of the Philippine section, giving the impression that it happened in Manila.

The Beatles grace a press conference in Manila in 1966. Contributed photo

Partly for this reason, I was moved to write an account of The Beatles’ 48 hours in Manila in my new book You Won’t See Me: When The Beatles Ghosted Imelda. It certainly takes the official narrative into account, but it also uncovers a lot of new voices along the way —  some of whom give a much more rounded idea of what happened when the band came here and why. 

For one thing, the fans were not unfriendly — quite the opposite. Even after The Beatles’ so-called “snub” of the First Lady, the opinion of fans and many of the older generation stayed firmly on the side of the band — in contrast to the notion that they were an unruly mob. 

Filipino fans scream their hearts out during The Beatles’ 1966 concert in Manila. Contributed photo

As it turned out, the tour of the Philippines was a turning point in the career of the band. It came two years after they had first hit global fame. After charting with “Love Me Do” in 1962, they got a string of UK No. 1 hits the following year, including “She Loves You” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand.” 

They arrived in New York at a time when the United States was still grieving from the assassination of JFK. Their cheerful demeanor at the press conference and subsequent appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, watched by over 70 million, was just what America needed at the time (Their relationship with the US is described in the book Can’t Buy Me Love by Jonathan Gould). The band went on to have 17 No. 1 records in their career — assembled on the compilation album “1.”

The Beatles’ Manila concert press ad in 1966 (left) and the book cover (above) of David Guerrero’s account of the band’s Philippine visit. Contributed photos

 The Anthology is brilliant to watch. But itself illustrates one of the issues with how the story of The Beatles is told and remembered. We tend to take everything at face value without questioning the “official” account. 

There are, in fact, so many books about The Beatles, that there is now a book about the books called The Beatles and the Historians by historian Erin Torkelson Weber. In her view, and I think rightly, she says that what “makes Anthology an invaluable account of the band’s history is also the source of many of its weaknesses.” 

Being an “official” narrative “lessens its status as a truthful account.” For example, it excludes dissenting voices and is also impossible to check. 

But even now, the Filipino fans who watched The Beatles then wish nothing more than to see the two surviving band members come back. Could 2026 — the 60th anniversary year of the visit — see it happen? Many in this country would love, love, love, to see it come true. – Rappler.com 

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David Guerrero is the author of “You Won’t See Me: When The Beatles Ghosted Imelda.” By Penguin Random House Books (Southeast Asia) and available by order at Fully Booked and via Amazon Kindle.