Filming “Help!” in Austria • Day 4

On the day that Eight Arms To Hold You was announced as the title of The Beatles’ second feature film, the group appeared in scenes on the curling rink in Obertauern, Austria.

Eight Arms To Hold You was a working title for the film, which was later changed to Help!

The film’s soundtrack was initially going to be titled Eight Arms To Hold You as well. The title appeared on early promotional materials for the “Ticket to Ride” single, which was described as being “From the United Artists release ‘Eight Arms to Hold You’.”

The day-to-day filming activity in the Bahamas is drawn from “The Complete Beatles Chronicle” by Mark Lewisohn.

Apart from skiing sequences, which were filmed when it was snowing, Dick Lester also spent a lot of time shooting the Beatles curling on the lake. For those who don’t know, curling consists of sliding heavy, circular slabs of granite along the ice — you hold them by a handle at the top. It’s rather like playing bowls. The Beatles clearly enjoyed the game as you can see from the photographs in this issue. Once the bowler has started sliding the heavy granite stone along the ice, his teammates are supposed to help its progress by wiping the snow away with special brooms, and it was hilarious to watch the Beatles trying to imitate the technique of the experienced curlers. As usual they kept joking and laughing, and eventually ended up by doing a sort of modern dance on the ice which also looked a bit like a cross between a barn dance and old fashioned ring-a-roses.

Rudolf Aigmüller – From The Beatles Monthly Book – May 1985

It was the first time we’d been to Austria- first time I’d been on skis. I loved that. In one of the scenes, Victor Spinetti and Roy Kinnear are playing curling, sliding along those big stones. One of the stones has a bomb in it and we find out that it’s going to blow up, and have to run away. Well, Paul and I ran about seven miles, we ran and ran, just so we could stop and have a joint before we came back. We could have run all the way to Switzerland. If you look at pictures of us you can see a lot of red-eyed shots, they were red from the dope we were smoking. And these were those clean-cut boys! Dick Lester knew that very little would get done after lunch.

Ringo Starr – From “The Beatles Anthology” book, 2000

When in 1965 did the Beatles arrive at your hotel and how long did the artists stay with you? – @truthaboutthebeatlesgirls on Tumblr:

Gloria Mackh and The Beatles in Obertauern, Austria

Gloria Mackh’s family owned the Marietta Hotel in Obertauern, Austria where the Beatles filmed scenes for Help! and borrowed their Bösendorfer grand piano, which was placed outside in the snow, for the film’s Ticket To Ride segment.

Gloria Mackh had won the title of Miss World in 1964 and went on to participate in the Miss Universe competition. She was asked by her parents to help the English film crew translate for the Austrian crew during production on Help!.

In 2010 Gloria (aka Gigi) was interviewed about her experiences with the Beatles in Obertauern:

When in 1965 did the Beatles arrive at your hotel and how long did the artists stay with you?

The Beatles and the crew were in Obertauern from the beginning of February and furnished the makeup and changing rooms as they saw fit. They stayed until the end of filming in February (sic: The Beatles themselves were in Austria from March 13 to 22, 1965)

How did the evening concerts, in which a Bösendorfer grand was played, come about?

Many evenings turned into Beatles evenings, even if they surely hadn’t been planned in advanced. Again and again there were occasions to celebrate: birthday, engagements or simply a good day of filming were enough to get our “house band” in the mood to celebrate.

How did fans react to the “Fab Four”?

There were about 100 house guests at our ski hotel and in the evenings another 100 from other, surrounding hotels. What happened onstage was mostly so unexpected, impulsive and thrilling that the ski guests, who wanted to spend a cozy evening in our ski hotel, were going wild and neither service personnel nor the boss could calm them down. Since our musical entertainment was always of a high caliber and full of imaginativeness, our reputation now became legendary. In the evenings there was no room, not even standing room. You never knew what the evening would bring.

George Harrison’s birthday was February 25. Did you celebrate it back then in the Hotel Marietta?

Yes, of course George’s birthday*(sic) was celebrated rather merrily. At the time he had his new, pretty girlfriend Pat with him and after filming was mostly in the room with her. Incidentally, Ringo also had his newlywed wife Maureen Cox with him, and he spent most of the time with her.

(*George was in the Bahamas on his birthday.)

What impression did the Beatles leave on you?

I had a lot of good, humorous discussions with Paul and John during breaks in filming while sitting in the snow groomers, and also put them on skis to at least teach them the very basics of this sport. Paul definitely wanted to take me to England with him, yet I had to fulfill my contracts in the US.

* * * *

Photo 1: A romance between Gloria Mackh and Paul McCartney developed while shooting “Help!” in Obertauern.

Photo 2: Smiling, Gloria Mackh watched John Lennon and George Harrison during Eisstockschiessen. Photo 3: During a filming break, Gloria and Paul enjoyed their moments together.

Photo 4: The Beatles dedicated this autograph to the Mackh daughters Gloria, Heidi (the nickname of Nora) and Marion.

Photo captions exactly as posted with full interview at Archived News:

http://www.boesendorfer.com/en/archived-news.html?page=6120

Going further

The Beatles Diary Volume 1: The Beatles Years

With greatly expanded text, this is the most revealing and frank personal 30-year chronicle of the group ever written. Insider Barry Miles covers the Beatles story from childhood to the break-up of the group.

Buy on Amazon

• https://www.beatlesbible.com/1965/03/17/filming-help-19/