When Ryan White brought his crowd-pleasing Beatles documentary Good Ol Freda to the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival in Durham, North Carolina he had no distribution, but plenty of faith that somebody would help him release his fantastically entertaining recollection of the Fab Four’s miraculous career.
Somebody finally has.
Deadline reports that Magnolia Pictures has acquired the North American rights to Good Ol Freda, the unusual but true story of a teenaged Liverpool gal named Freda Kelly who befriended Brian Epstein and the Beatles in their earliest days, when they were still playing to the lunchtime crowds in The Cavern Club. Kelly was eventually hired as the band’s press secretary, and then became the president of their massive fan club. She ended up staying with the Beatles for 11 years until the group disbanded and went their separate ways.
"The dignity and devotion with which Freda has lived her life inspired me to make this film,” said White in a statement about the acquisition. “I am so thrilled to partner with Magnolia and the amazing team there; they are the perfect company to get Freda’s long untold story out to audiences on a wider scale.”
I’m personally thrilled that Kelly’s amazing story is getting out, because this woman did so very little to boast about the remarkable position she held for years. During a Q&A at Full Frame, White told a story about a SXSW screening of the film when Kelly’s daughter came up and admitted she knew next to nothing about her own mother’s time spent as a close associate of The Beatles. Kelly remains a private person, and believes that the remaining Beatles deserve privacy themselves.
Seek out Good Ol Freda when it reaches theaters later this year.
