Freda Kelly has an amazing story to tell—one she’s now sharing after breaking 40 years of silence.
In 1963, when The Beatles were playing a steady gig at the Cavern Club in Liverpool, Freda Kelly was a just a 17-year-old in the audience. She often admired them during her lunch break from working in a secretarial pool. Plucked from the crowd by their new manager Brian Epstein, Freda became not only band secretary but was also accepted as a member of the extended Beatles family by the lads and their parents.
As international stardom exploded for the Fab Four, Freda became determined to answer every fan letter with authentic signatures. In addition, she made every effort to honor the crazy requests sent in by the fans. Occasionally, she enlisted help, but her assistants would take shortcuts that Freda could not condone. She fired the lot of them when one attempted to pass off her own locks of hair as one of the band member’s. In contrast, Freda regularly chased the Beatles down to obtain signatures and even got one of them to sleep on a pillow and mailed it back to the fan.
When Brian Epstein and The Beatles moved their Apple records to London, Freda stayed behind in Liverpool to please her disapproving and ailing father. She continued to run The Beatles fan club and newsletter long-distance for years, although after Brian Epstein’s death, she did hop on the bus for the “Magical Mystery Tour.”
In 1974, two years after the band’s breakup, Freda just decided to dissolve the fan club by sending a letter to the fans via the newsletter, and that phase of history simply ended.
Freda distributed most of her Beatles collection to some fans and stored only four boxes of personal memorabilia, which was left untouched for years up in her attic. Remarkably, she never spoke to her two children about her life with The Beatles, but after the death of her son and the birth of her grandson, she felt her story should be told. As Kelly says, “Who knows how much longer I’ll be here, and I want my grandson Niall to know what his Granny did in her youth. I want him to be proud.”
So, last year director Ryan White obtained both access to her surprising story, as well as the chance to examine her rare and valuable treasure trove. She opened up to White because he is the nephew of one of her friends, Billy Kinsley of the Merseybeats. The film began production after raising $50,000 on Kickstarter. The charming finished product seamlessly blends Freda’s oral story with public audio clips and her amazing collection of never-before-seen still photos.
The 18 songs in the movie’s soundtrack reflect popular 60s music (“Love Letters”) and original versions of songs that were later covered by The Beatles. Amazingly, director Ryan White was able to obtain the rights to four Beatles tracks, including “I Saw Her Standing There” and “Love Me Do.” These songs required signoffs from the Paul, Ringo and the estate of John and George, as well as the record labels. “I feel like the luckiest filmmaker in the world in that I kept getting yesses, figuring I would get a no (in the next round),” White says. “It really is a testament to Freda. Time after time, people were drawn into Freda’s story and the way she lived her life, never cashed in on the Beatles, never sold them out.”
Everyone of course has one question: Was Freda ever more than an employee? Although she admits to crushes on the lads that rotated daily, from Paul to Ringo to George to Paul, she’s still not saying if anything ever happened. That’s how dedicated to The Beatles’ image she is. The movie leaves you wanting more: more anecdotes, more photos, more dirt. Freda says she’ll never have to tell her story again, but it seems she’s opened a can of worms. This is a touching story of intense loyalty.
The movie opens in theaters on September 6.
Karen Henry is an Associate Editor at LA YOGA who volunteers in a variety of capacities for nonprofit organizations and artists around Los Angeles. She practices yoga as a counterbalance to her daily impact sports and is a mother of four grown children who also practice yoga . Now, she’s working on teaching yoga and joy of life to the grandkids!