

- #ELTON JOHN THE MEASURE OF A MAN MOVIE#
- #ELTON JOHN THE MEASURE OF A MAN SERIES#
- #ELTON JOHN THE MEASURE OF A MAN TV#
In 2018, the John Lewis Christmas TV ad featured a child actor as a young Elton unwrapping his first piano as his mother and grandma watch. They both supported his dream on some level, much more so his mother, despite Elton never really acknowledging it over the years. His father, Stanley Dwight, had been a trumpet player with the Bob Millar Band, which had a reputation for performing at military dances. In researching the Rocketman true story, we discovered that both of Elton's parents were musical. In the movie, Elton's grandma Ivy is pretty much the only one in the family who supports his dream. Daily Mail Onlineĭid Elton John's parents really not support his dream of becoming a musician? It's true that Stanley was stationed overseas when Elton was very young, but according to Elton's stepmother Edna, his mother Sheila refused to go with Stanley because she thought the other officers' wives were "snobby." Edna says that Stanley kept a photograph of Elton beside his bed and missed him terribly, writing home almost every day.

Elton's claim that his father was absent for his birth is false, as official records reveal that Stanley was home at the time and even registered his son's birth. That isn't the only thing that the family disputes, and it appears many of Elton's beliefs about his father were possibly shaped by his mother's bitterness following the divorce. She says that after that particular concert, they were all invited back to his dressing room, and he and then-manager John Reid came to their house for dinner. However, his stepmother, Edna, says that she and Elton's father went to see him perform "many times," even taking his four brothers on one occasion. For instance, in 2011 Elton claimed that his father had never been to any of his concerts.

Though the public's perception of Elton John's father, Stanley Dwight, has largely been relegated to the negative quotes that Elton has said about him in the press over the years, other family members tell a somewhat different story. Elton even abstained from attending his father's funeral in 1991 because he said he'd be a "hypocrite" if he went. "My dad was strict and remote and had a terrible temper," he wrote in The Guardian in 2019. The portrayal isn't a far cry from how Elton described his father in real life. The attention he does give his son, who was then known as Reggie Dwight, comes in the form of scolding him when he touches his coveted record collection. Rocketman portrays Elton John's father, Stanley Dwight (Steven Mackintosh), as being a disinterested and physically absent parent who leaves his son longing for affection and approval. The Rocketman fact check confirms that he dropped out of the Academy at age 17 to pursue a career in music.

He won a junior scholarship to the Academy and took Saturday classes there for five years. She writes that one of the instructors at the Royal Academy of Music recalled an 11-year-old Elton playing back, without hesitation, a four-page piece by George Frideric Handel that he had just heard for the first time. The real-life version of the scene was described in Elizabeth Rosenthal's book His Song: The Musical Journey of Elton John. He then sits down without sheet music and performs the same piece, stopping at the same point she does. In the film, a young Elton shows up for an audition at the Royal Academy of Music and watches as his examiner plays a classical piece perfectly.
#ELTON JOHN THE MEASURE OF A MAN MOVIE#
Though he did attend AA meetings, these scenes in the movie are fictional and are used as a framing device.ĭid Elton John really audition for the Royal Academy of Music without using sheet music?
#ELTON JOHN THE MEASURE OF A MAN SERIES#
Elton (Taron Egerton), who is wearing a costume of feathery orange wings with horns on his head, bursts into an AA meeting and declares, "My name is Elton Hercules John and I'm an alcoholic, and a cocaine addict, and a sex addict and a bulimic." He begins to tell his life story to a group of non-famous strangers, which anchors the film as it unfolds through a series of flashbacks.
