How much did the cooperation of Atlantic Records and Ahmet Ertegun mean to this project?
You couldn’t do a film without Ahmet’s cooperation, which Susan Lacy and Phil Carson secured before we started filming. Remember, he was alive and well during filming. You could not possibly do this without Atlantic Records total, unadulterated, 100 percent cooperation. Ahmet was and is Atlantic records. Partners came and went, but Ahmet was the steady hand and the soul of the company. Q: Describe your last interview with Ertegun. A: Fortuitously, I did my very last interview with Ahmet about a month before he fell backstage at the Rolling Stones concert. I was not planning on doing my final interview until almost the end of the film. But we had been trying to get Ahmet to work with a new artist named James Blunt and he happened to be coming to town for a very large tour beginning at Radio City Music Hall and wanted to get together with Ahmet. I flew in from London just for that interview. Since I had a camera crew I thought I would flesh out my final interview with Ahmet. I had only 1
