Toomorrow's Girl in $3 million failure
From Bruce Conway in London
Toomorrow - the pop group created to take up where the original Seekers left off - has broken up, and Australian member Olivia Newton-John has branched out on her own.
The shock developments were disclosed in London this week.
Toomorrow was the brainchild of Harry Salzman, who makes the James bond movies, and Don Kirshner, a creator of the Monkees and the Archies.
The group was launched last August with one of the most intensive publicity campaigns the international pop scene has ever known.
The campaign included a full length film featuring the group, which was made up of 20 year old Olivia and three American boys.
Salzman and Kirshner sank about $3 million into the project, and a spokesman for the two mean admitted to me that almost all this money had been lost.
He described the group’s failure as “a great shock and a great disappointment.”
He was unable to say why it hasn’t “taken off.”
“It’s a $64,000 question,” he said, “and no one seems to have the answer.”
Despite the terrible blow Olivia’s spirits remain high. When I called her at her manager’s office near Piccadilly Circus, she was enthusiastically immersed in plans for the future.
“I’ve got two records coming out,” she said. “One is a double with Cliff Richard called Don’t Move Away, and the other is a solo to be chosen from three songs I have in mind.”
“I’ve already appeared on one of the Cliff Richard Shows on BBC television and I’m booked for another one of his shows next month,” Olivia said.
Why did she think Toomorrow has failed? “I really don’t know the answer,” she said, “But there were lots of reasons I think.”
“One was a reaction against Don (Kirshner) trying to recreate his successes with the Monkees. You see the public was blinded with science over the Monkees, then found out that they were fakes because they didn’t play their own music and because half the vocals weren’t theirs either.”
“I don’t like to say it but I think we were also badly handled. For instance, we weren’t given enough time to establish ourselves before the film was released - and who’s going to see a film about a group nobody has ever heard of?”
“It just didn’t make sense. I think it would also have been better if there hadn’t been such secrecy about the group before it was launched,” Olivia said.
“While we were making it the Press was banned from the set. It seemed a good idea in theory, but it didn’t work in practice, because by the time all the publicity began it was too late.”
“The disc jockeys were also against us. One of them made it quite clear how he felt when he said that although our record was very nice and had a good sound, he would not be playing it because people in Britain liked to see pop groups work their way up from the bottom.”
“So you see, we didn’t really have much of a chance,” she frowned.
“Even before the launching I think that in our hearts we feared the whole thing would bomb out.”
“I was tied up with the group for about 2 and a half years, even though it existed publicly for only a few months.”
“The worst moment was when we were told it was all over. We’d felt it was coming but it was still a shock.”
Did she feel bitter? I asked, “No, not all all,” Olivia said emphatically.
“It was a great experience. I’d always had it easy before - particularly in Australia - and this isn’t good for an artist in the long run.”
“Being with the group taught me how to take a few knocks.”
“I also did a lot of travelling, which was something I might not have done normally, and I have managed to save a bit of money, so I’ve got no real complaints.”
Read more about the Toomorrow movie.