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Little Monsters, Swifties, BTS ARMY, the Beyhive — all formidable fan bases whose collective power to effect cultural and political change I would never underestimate. But I always get the feeling that the phenomenon of Beatlemania was a singular moment; a magnitude and intensity still unmatched today. This summer we’re getting a band’s-eye view glimpse into that experience. Paul McCartney Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm is an exhibition of photos he took during the band’s first trip to the States, showing at the Brooklyn Museum from now until August 18. To herald the opening last week, Paul recorded a sweet message in response to a fan, Adrienne from Brooklyn, who declared her love for him in a CBS News clip 60 years ago. After all these years Paul knows, with a love like that, you know you should be glad.
One lucky fan has finally received a response from Paul McCartney, 60 years after she first professed her love to him.
In a video shared on TikTok and Instagram on Friday, May 3, The Beatles musician, 81, responded to a woman named Adrienne, who declared her love for him in a throwback video surrounded by fellow fans.
“Paul McCartney, if you are listening, Adrienne from Brooklyn loves you with all her heart,” Adrienne says in the vintage clip while speaking into a microphone.
The video then cuts to a present-day McCartney, who says, “Hey, Adrienne. Listen, it’s Paul. I saw your video. I’m in Brooklyn now. I’m in New York. I finally got here. We got an exhibition, a photo exhibition. Come along and see it.”
The music icon was referencing “Paul McCartney Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm,” an archival presentation that opened at the Brooklyn Museum on Friday, May 3, and will be available for viewing till Aug. 18.
According to the museum’s website, the exhibition features more than 250 photographs captured by McCartney on his Pentax camera during the “frenzy of Beatlemania in 1963-64, when the band’s first U.S. tour skyrocketed them to superstardom.”
The caption pointed out the significance of the throwback clip: “60 years after The Beatles arrived in New York on their first trip to America, Paul’s photographic record of ‘Beatlemania’ is now on display at @brooklynmuseum!”
The museum also gave Adrienne another shoutout: “And Adrienne from Brooklyn, if you are listening, Paul McCartney from Liverpool loves you too ❤️.”
Paul McCartney from Liverpool loves you too, yeah, yeah, yeah! I know this is all a plug to see the exhibit, but it is so gracefully done. And people are certainly invested in the story now, of whether Adrienne from Brooklyn will indeed show up. Well, Rolling Stone is 99.99% confident they found the real Adrienne’s family. Adrienne is sadly no longer with us, but the revival of her clip on social media and in Paul’s response has been a treat for her children:
A mother of four from Staten Island, [Nicole] D’Onofrio originally saw the interview featuring the young woman she believes to be her mother while scrolling through TikTok with her seven-year-old daughter. “I was like, ‘Wait a second. Play that again,’” she says. She sent it to her three older siblings, including her brother John. “It looked like her and sounded like her, with that heavy Brooklyn accent,” John, a retired NYPD officer, tells me. “We were like, ‘Oh my God, mommy is Adrienne from Brooklyn.’”
Nicole D’Onofrio and her siblings also recounted to Rolling Stone their mother having Beatles records — including one where she wrote inside a sleeve “Adrienne and Paul” inside a heart — and commemorative Beatles coins in her collection. I hope they go to the Brooklyn Museum, and make another little video in response to Paul.
But wait, there’s more! And it’s an exclusive no other media outlet can give you! Like Adrienne, CB’s mother was in New York in 1964, and she had an amazing fan encounter. From CB:
My mom was 17 in February, 1964 when she skipped school with two friends to get ashes on Ash Wednesday at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City. They were walking past what she remembers as the Park Plaza hotel and there were tons of young girls standing in front. They asked the girls what they were doing and they said the Beatles were in there. They then asked a handsome guy across the street what was happening. He pointed out a woman down the street and said “that’s John Lennon’s wife” (his first wife) and that the Beatles were likely coming down the street to pick her up. A few moments later, a black limo came and my mom and her friend jumped on the hood and started banging on the window. The driver got out and yelled at them to get off the car and they did. My mom said “it was one of the highlights of my life and I’ve thought about it often over the years. If Paul McCartney would call me today I would crawl on gravel to see him.”
[From CB]
Jumped on the hood of the car and started banging on the window… Mama CB, I like your style.
Photos credit: Getty and SKR-LONDON FEATURES / Avalon, STARSTOCK/Photoshot / Avalon, IMAGO/United Archives / WHA / Avalon
Cute story.
Kismet, I like your writing style. Very cute!
I also love Adrienne’s accent! It’s sad she isn’t around to hear her shout-out
It’s a little bit weird his team didn’t try to locate her in advance and find out that she’s already deceased? It is cute until you learn she’s died and then it just seems inadvertently a little bit cruel.
My top celebrity encounter is Sir Paul, ne and my friends were / are fans and we went to his son’s concert at a tiny venue in Brighton and he was there watching him with his wife, Nancy.
Everyone was very respectful and let him watch his son playing without being bothered. After the gig we asked him if we can have a picture and he said yes! His wife Nancy took it for us.
Hey Kismet, you need to change a picture, the picture of the guy in the car is George, not Paul. (With Ringo and Brian Epstein in the background.)
It’s a shame Adrienne has passed away, I hope her family can meet with Paul.
It reminded me of another New York fan that you sometimes see in clips, me and my family loved her! She had painted a large portrait of Paul in an abstract style, growing up out of the ground, it was very good, she was very talented and ahead of her time, it had a Sgt. Pepper look to it. She talks about how she’d love to give the painting to Paul and “speak to him like a decent human being”. 😄 I hear you, sister. I always hoped she at least got her painting to Paul. She ended by saying, “I love all The Beatles but Paul’s my favourite “.