Led Zeppelin Gets Feature Doc Treatment From Team Behind ‘American Epic’ – Cannes
Hammer of the Docs? Led Zeppelin is getting the feature doc treatment from the team behind American Epic.
The as-yet-untitled film, which is currently in post-production, comes after the band’s fiftieth anniversary last year. The doc, directed by Bernard MacMahon, will launch in Cannes with CAA representing the U.S. rights and Altitude handling international sales.
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The film will trace the journeys of the four members of the Stairway To Heaven rockers through the music scene of the 1960s and their meeting in the summer of 1968, culminating in 1970 when Led Zeppelin II, with “Whole Lotta Love,” knocked The Beatles off the top of the charts and launched the career of what would become the biggest band in the world.
The doc will feature new interviews with Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, and John Paul Jones, as well as rare archival interviews with the late drummer John Bonham. The film will mark the first official story with no outside voices or conjecture (unlike the Hammer of the Gods book). It will also feature never before seen archive film and photographs, state of the art audio transfers of the band’s music, as well as the music that influenced the band’s sound.
MacMahon was behind the three part American Epic series, which featured the first recordings of roots music in the 1920s. The Zeppelin doc was written by MacMahon with Allison McGourty, edited by Dan Gitlin, with sound supervision by Nicholas Bergh, and is produced by McGourty, MacMahon, Duke Erikson and Ged Doherty. Peter Saraf and Marc Turtletaub exec produce.
Page said, “When I saw everything Bernard had done both visually and sonically on the remarkable achievement that is American Epic, I knew he would be qualified to tell our story.”
Plant said, “Seeing Will Shade, and so many other important early American musicians, brought to life on the big screen in American Epic inspired me to contribute to a very interesting and exciting story.”
Jones added, “The time was right for us to tell our own story for the first time in our own words, and I think that this film will really bring this story to life.”
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