The Edge, Dave Letterman and Bono. (Disney)
When the Covid-19 pandemic hit, musicians all around the world all had to find something to do. They couldn’t go about their normal lives–much like everyone else–as touring and promotions were largely halted. Some artists wrote and recorded new albums, some took to online performances, and one of the biggest rock bands in history did the one thing they had avoided for decades: they looked back.
For some time now, U2 has been working on a retrospective new album titled Songs of Surrender. The set, which arrives on March 17, features reimaginings of some of the band’s biggest and most beloved hits. This project isn’t about remixes or making these songs relevant to a younger, new audience. Instead, it’s about the original songwriters re-examining these smashes, remembering what inspired them, and deciding what they mean now.
Once the band had gone through this experience, they realized that the process itself was worthy of sharing in addition to the music. So once again, U2 decided to embark on an adventure they’d put off for far too long: Filming a documentary.
“It almost felt like Bono and Edge had gone through this experience together,” explained Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming, with Dave Letterman producer Justin Wilkes in an interview about the documentary. “And what came out the other side was them wanting to tell a story.”
Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming, with Dave Letterman drops March 17 on Disney+–the same day as the album it highlights. If the legendary band is going to give fans a retrospective album and film, why not base it in their homeland, and have it come out on St. Patrick’s Day?
The visual part of this chapter of U2’s career began when Bono himself emailed David Letterman. The two had met and gotten to know one another throughout the years, as the group performed on The Late Show many times, even once with a residency to promote a new album. He invited Letterman to Dublin for his first-ever visit and explained that the band had this new, special album coming. They wanted to tell their story, and they wanted the host to be a part of it. They knew it would include some kind of performance and a lot of opening up, but what else?
Wilkes explained that a day before Bono’s email was forwarded to him, he had spoken to someone at Disney+. They were brainstorming music content that could be created, and they both dreamed that one day they could do something with U2. It was an easy sell for the streamer, and Wilkes knew Morgan Neville, the Emmy, Grammy, and Oscar-winning director of films like 20 Feet From Stardom, would be the perfect fit.
“I got to make that great producer phone call where I was like, ‘Morgan, I got something for you and before you tell me how busy you are and all the things you’re doing, I’m just gonna say these two names and I’ll just leave it at that,’” Wilkes shared with a smile. After saying only “U2” and “David Letterman” – two of Neville’s favorites, he was in.
While the band and Letterman had ideas about what they wanted to convey, the early discussions were extremely vague, which allowed for everyone on board to try things. “You’ve got Bono and The Edge, you’ve got David Letterman, and you’ve got a concert piece. What are you gonna make?” Morgan Neville stated during an interview that this was the question posed to him when he was first introduced to this idea. “In the beginning, they said, ‘We can do whatever.’”
The film Bono & The Edge: A Sort of Homecoming, with Dave Letterman was proposed mere weeks before it was filmed in December. Up against an extremely tight timeline, they decided to make a documentary that would see Letterman getting to know the city that made U2. With the band themselves providing suggestions and essentially curating the trip, it would all culminate in an intimate concert that allowed the band to showcase their reworkings.
Neville, the director, said that as they were developing the idea, they kept going back to the three pillars of this film: songwriting, the relationship between The Edge and Bono, and Ireland. The resulting movie is an incredible insight into the creative thought process harnessed by some of the most successful musicians of all time. Bono and The Edge open up like never before about songwriting, how religion has impacted their work, and their legacy. Neville explained that the main reason U2 did this was not to promote an album, but because it provided the opportunity for them to “think about and talk about songwriting in a way they’ve never talked about it before.”
“One of the digs against U2 through time is that they’re a band that’s more about sound than songs, which I don’t think is entirely true,” Neville admitted, before continuing, “I think [what] this process can do is it can reveal something that maybe was even a little buried in production, but when you strip it raw there’s a different kind of power there.”
The revelations sprinkled throughout the documentary aren’t just about songs and lyrics, though. In one particularly candid moment, Bono admits that his headline-grabbing, politically-connected activism has strained his relationship with his bandmates. “I’ve never seen an interview like this,” Wilkes commented about the rocker’s willingness to lower his guard and simply talk. “This is just the most honest, low-key, self-deprecating…just genuine” he added with a smile.
The concert featured in the film is somehow both out-of-this-world incredible and understated. It’s a few dozen people in a room listening to a rock band pare hits down and rebuild them again into something familiar but new. “The idea was more, ‘Let’s make you feel like we’re just documenting this thing that just happens to be happening,’ versus, ‘Now we’re at the concert and now it’s gonna be presented to you,'” Wilkes revealed.
In addition to a proper concert, U2 also visit a local pub in the film, where they, and fellow beloved Irish musicians–such as Glen Hansard and Dermot Kennedy–just have fun in a jam session of sorts. Again, on the outside, it looks simple and even common, but it is actually far from that. Of all the things he witnessed while making this film, Neville revealed that those performances in the pub will remain with him “the rest of my life.”
Neville and Wilkes shared a favorite story from the production, one that isn’t clear to anyone watching. At one point, Letterman visits Dublin’s Forty Foot–essentially a beach in the city. Later, Wilkes and Neville tell Bono that while there, the cold ocean waves splashed the host, which the rocker found amusing. The next day, Bono and The Edge played for Letterman a song they’d stayed up all night writing about that experience. Later, they shared with him a fully produced version–and incredible gift from the 22-time Grammy winners. Letterman was so touched, he insisted on flying himself back to Dublin in January to earn that song. The film concludes with him taking the plunge into the freezing waters, thus fully becoming the Forty Foot Man that Bono sang about in a tune that might never see the light of day.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/hughmcintyre/2023/03/15/how-u2-and-david-letterman-made-a-documentary-in-only-a-few-weeks/