Starring: Peter Frampton, The Bee Gees, Sandy Farina, Paul Nicholas, Donald Pleasance, Alice Cooper, Aerosmith, Billy Preston, Stargard, Earth Wind & Fire, George Burns

As 2025 flits away through our fingers like a fickle moth toward the flame of 2026 – The Deuce – once again and with much thanks – do invite YOU (ALL!!) to, again once again – just sit back and let the evening go… with but one humble request: may The Deuce introduce to YOU –  the one and only… SGT. PEPPER’S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND?!!? The MOVIE!! With nary a Beatle in sight… nor sound!??! “But.. what?? w\Without ANY Beatles?? “How do they do it?,” you ask… The answer is: with those hairy (for the most part) hunks (for the most part) – The Bee Gees!! And that “… Comes Alive!” heartthrob – Peter Frampton!! That’s how! And it’s guaranteed to raise… a smile!!

Well… ok… Some honesty here is duly deserved: there will be a… let’s say: “a moment”… of quite possibly the most painful movie-going you’ve ever experienced – namely: George Burns… More specifically: George Burns “singing” “Fixing A Hole”… horrendously so… and for some demented reason it is this big-eared, belabored debacle with which some sadist felt the film should be… front-loaded!?! Practically diffidently putting its worst foot forward as if in deliberate disregard of garnering any germ of good-will… a song has never felt so long… BUT – be brave! You will be saved! For – the moment those aforementioned hirsute Bee Gees hit the bandstand, the heretofore hairshirt of bad will that’s been brutally beating you into wanting to bolt for the nearest exit all but vanishes in a poof of candy-colored confectionary pop perfection!! Plunging unabashed into an ever-increasing piling on of eye-popping preposterosities and performances that against all odds hit infectiously giddy heights! A toupée‘d Donald Pleasance as a dastardly record exec belting “I Want You”!??! A dream come true!! The Bee Gees doubling (vocally) as the villainous Mr. Mustard’s robot henchwomen – The Computerettes!??! Genius!  And it just keeps getting better all the time! An Earth, Wind & Fire full-stage show of “Got To Get You Into My Life” – just for the heck of it? Hell yeh! Aerosmith’s hit-making heated-up “Come Together” – oh yes we will!! (“Safety” undergarments recommended if embarrassed by such…)  And on a personal confessionary note: Jeff’s 10-year-old-at-the-time-seeing-it self so believed the wonton sleaze of their “Future Villain Band” that he remains Aerosmith-afraid to this day!! And yet – Alice Cooper’s brain-washing Mr. Sun’s “Because” made him a forever fan… go figure! Then – just when you thought it couldn’t last – “Fifth Beatle” Billy Preston with the weather-vane spinning, Heartland saving “Get Back”!! Oh, God! Big-eared cigar-breath troll be damned!

Deemed a disaster of epic proportions upon its release – if not flat-out blamed for the demise of the movie musical genre as a whole (!) – despite being helmed by a veteran music-centric-movie maker, Michael Schultz (of Car Wash, Cooley High, and Krush Groove fame), built and backed by the hit-making RSO records and movie magnate Robert Stigwood (riding high on the likes of Jesus Christ Superstar and Saturday Night Fever... and – oh yeh – just plain high…), “SPLHCB” still reads as understandably fated to flopping from the get-go, having been loosed unto an era of Fab Four fans still fanning the flame of hope for more from The (actual) Beatles – or – at the very least – still deadly serious (nay “snobbish”?) about that which they held so dear and desperate to find the “deepness” they themselves built around… POP SONGS!??! To which The Deuce says: lighten up!! It’s a movie! It’s music! It’s FUN!! It’s friggin’ out-of-its-gourd bonkers!! A fantasia of frothy flippancy free to be but a bedazzling of fleeting moments… what could be called: a SHOW! And one we truly believe you will enjoy! After suffering the endurance test of its egregiously erroneous opening, at least!

It was 20 years ago today… uh… ok – like 47 and some change, actually – when the Cinerama 1 at Broadway and 47th Street ran its Daily News two-page SGT. PEPPER’S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND spread with the invitation: “Tonight, and only tonight, a very Special preview…” – which – 47 and some change years later – The Deuce is extending to YOU! With the greatest of gratitude… You’re such a lovely audience… we’d like to take you home with us – no – we’d LOVE to take you home! If only we had the room! It’s a NYC “bachelor” for chrissakes… could maybe fit like 2 of ya if you don’t mind bumpin’ knees… but – what the heck!?! Why not?!? It is, after all, getting very near the end… of 2025! But with a little help from our friends (and A LOT of help from our Nitehawk friends!) – The Deuce will see YOU ALL in 2026!!