'Performance? I still don't fully understand it' – behind the scenes photos from the cult classic

Fifty years since the making of Mick Jagger’s identity-bending film, producer Sandy Lieberson and author Jay Glennie share exclusive pictures and stories

When Mick Jagger’s first feature film, Performance, was unveiled in 1970, the reviews were less than kind. “You do not have to be a drug addict, pederast, sadomasochist or nitwit to enjoy Performance,” opined the New York Times, “but being one or more of those things would help.”

Yet in the 50 years since it was finished (it took a couple of years to see the light of day, so horrified were Warner Bros with the result), it has become the definition of a cult classic. Two films in one, it begins as a British gangster movie with hallmarks that would go on to define the genre. Halfway through, Jagger turns up as the washed-up rockstar Turner living in a menage a trois with Anita Pallenberg (Pherber) and Michèle Breton (Lucy). The film transforms itself into a hallucinatory end-of-the-60s trip that, with its exploration of identity and sexual fluidity, seems incredibly prescient several decades on.

As a new book celebrating the film’s fifth decade is about to be released, featuring previously unseen photos and interviews with Jagger and director Nicolas Roeg, author Jay Glennie and Performance’s producer Sandy Lieberson talk us through the film’s myths and legends …

Sandy Lieberson: I’d never produced anything before. Donald [Cammell, co-director and screenwriter] was a novice director, and Nic (Roeg) had never directed either, although he was already an outstanding cinematographer. We were experimenting and that turned out to be a good thing, because if you know too much you have more caution. The fact is, we had the freedom to be playful and try something different to make it unusual.

Jay Glennie: Warner Bros were expecting a swinging London-style film, like A Hard Days Night, with a full album by the biggest rockstar on the planet, Mick Jagger. Ken Hyman, the head of Warner Bros at the time, told me that this was the complete opposite of what they were expecting.

SL: There was a real closeness between Nic, Donald and myself. I didn’t realise at the time, but Donald was a depressive. He would have bouts of really deep depression. Nic understood the process of film-making and the industry – he was part of it. Donald was always an outsider and that made it harder for him.

SL: Originally, we had more of the gangster movie. It was deeper, darker and certainly more violent. And it was more profound about the London scene at that time. It explored the underworld’s homosexuality, mixed up with all the violence.

JG: The cast was authentic. John Bindon (Moody) was a real-life criminal as well as an actor. One morning, he came on set shaking this matchbox at people. Apparently, he’d got into a fight, bitten some guy’s finger off and put it in the matchbox. That was the kind of thing going on around this film.

SL: There was about another 10 or 15 minutes of interesting material, but that was what we had to cut at the insistence of Warner Bros to get Mick on the screen earlier. It all got lost, unfortunately.

JG: That first part of the film has influenced so many film-makers. Sexy Beast wouldn’t have happened without Performance. Mick said that it’s one of Martin Scorsese’s all-time favourite films, and you can see that in his work.

JG: James [Fox] was an Eton schoolboy who had to turn himself into a chap. He went away, learned to box, cut his hippy hair off and had suits made at Cecil Gee the tailors. He wouldn’t tell me this, but a few of the guys said he’d been out on a few gigs with the real chaps around east London, to get himself in the right frame of mind.

SL: Most people would have thought he was wrong for the part. They hadn’t seen him in that kind of role before. But he was totally committed and changed his entire body for it.

JG: James left the industry for 10 years after Performance. He was undergoing a religious conversion during the filming and I think the content of the film helped speed that up. Lots of drugs and sex – he realised that wasn’t the life he wanted to lead. Nowadays, though, he says it’s his greatest performance. He had to transform himself into a chap, and then turn himself into a hippy. As an actor, you rarely get to explore that kind of arc.

SL: I knew before I saw Mick on screen that it would work. But once I saw him in character it really became clear that it was going to be exciting and interesting to have him in it. We were a bit nervous because he was surrounded by people telling him: “Why do you want to be a movie actor? Why do you want to be in a film with a novice director?” We were worried he might have second thoughts. He wasn’t due on set for a few weeks, but we got him to come down early anyway and filmed him for a day, spray-painting a wall and various bits and bobs. That way he could see how good he looked on camera, and it kind of committed him emotionally and intellectually to the film. It was a deliberate ploy.

JG: Warner Bros had financed this movie with Mick in it, and an hour into the movie he still hadn’t appeared! So they had to splice that scene at the beginning when he was spraying the walls – just to show that he was going to be in the movie.

SL: There was never a moment without some form of tension between ourselves and Warner Bros. For all the talk of excess and inexperience, it came in on budget and we were only over schedule by about four or five days.

JG: This dropout character wasn’t Mick at all – a more dedicated guy you couldn’t wish to meet. So he wasn’t playing himself, and he apparently worked hard on the role.

SL: Mick can be hard as nails, but there’s something sensitive within him. He wanted to explore himself, whether he had the ability to do something besides rock’n’roll, and acting was the closest thing for him to venture into. He was no problem at all, cooperative, supportive … When we had problems, he stuck with us and didn’t run away. And he’s really proud of the film.

JG: Mick wasn’t forthcoming on how “method” the sex scenes were between him and Anita (Pallenberg). He laughed when I asked, and said “Let’s just leave it at the word mythical … and let legend take hold.” I also asked lots of the other cast and crew, and they all said that it was about as method as you can get.

SL: I have no idea and I wasn’t interested. You get interested and you get in trouble! Whatever they were doing was between them … I never asked.

JG: Michèle Breton was so young. I interviewed Linda DeVetta, the makeup artist on the film, who said that maybe she wasn’t looked after. There wasn’t the safety net there is around actresses now. She was part of Cammell’s love of threesomes in real life, and there she was on screen portraying that, and it must have messed with her mind. It was basically her first film and thereafter she was never seen again. As for Anita, she’s said before that she thought she was keeping her drug habit from everyone. But she obviously wasn’t. Performance must have messed with her head too – she’d previously had a relationship with Cammell, was shooting sex scenes with Mick Jagger and going back home to Keith Richards every night.

SL: Anita collaborated with Donald on the script. She was a very powerful personality and had no fear at all. She was a powerful figure both on and off the screen. She had opinions and contributed bits and pieces towards the atmosphere and mood of the film.

JG: Despite working on the script, even Anita wasn’t aware that there was a whole gangster part to the film at the start until she saw it!

SL: Identity was at the core of the movie. The movie really explores sexual identity and that makes people nervous.

JG: Caroline Coon’s Release charity had helped Mick with the Redlands drug bust, so as a thank you he organised the London premiere as a charity event, not realising it was going to be two years hence. People paid on the strength that Mick was going to be there with his new wife Bianca, but Mick never turned up! Caroline said she was literally pushed against a wall by various celebrities and screamed at … In the end, Mick’s PR had to pay for them all to go out for an afterparty and dinner. Surprisingly, Keith and Anita did turn up – so there was Keith watching his partner and Mick on screen.

SL: There were a few good reviews but, in general, the bad reviews weren’t just bad, they were horrendous. That was terribly disappointing. It was like they had a vendetta against the film and what we were trying to say with it. That initial response from people is where all the emotion goes. But still it’s wonderful that people love to talk about it 50 years on. You go to a Q&A and people will tell you things about the film that you’d forgotten, or didn’t think about, or they’ve completely made up! It’s generated an audience that have embellished it and feel committed to the film. I’m pleasantly surprised by that.

JG: I asked Nic how it felt that his films never got huge opening weekends. And he said very quietly: “Lonely. It makes you feel lonely.” It took time for people to catch up and understand Performance. I’ve seen the film millions of times and I still don’t fully understand it!

• You can order Performance – The Making Of A Classic by Jay Glennie via Coattail Publishing here

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