Yesterday: When a Romcom Shouldn’t Be a Romcom

Jack Barth asks “What if The Beatles never existed?” and Richard Curtis answers “I’m not readin' all that, happy for you tho.”

Picture this: You’re a struggling screenwriter who’s been in the business for years, but you haven’t been able to sell a single script; you’re so down on your luck that one day, you think to yourself “Sh*t even if Star Wars had never been written and I came up with it now, I still wouldn’t be able to sell it.”

And that gives you an idea.

You draft a screenplay about a struggling songwriter who finds himself in a world where only he can remember The Beatles, he steals their songs as a shortcut to the stardom and recognition he’s been craving but — crucially — no one cares, he still fails. You get this screenplay to a production company, and they love the idea and begin work on it, but somewhere along the line, veteran British writer and rom-com GOAT, Richard Curtis hears about your idea and thinks “This is great, but what if it were a romantic comedy… and also mine?”

This is essentially the story behind the 2019 hit movie, Yesterday.

According to Jack Barth, the man who came up with the idea and wrote the original screenplay, Curtis not only took credit for the screenplay (giving Barth only a story credit), but he also gutted the idea and completely changed a core aspect of the original story. Not only did Curtis want to turn it into a light-hearted romcom, but he also decided that the protagonist of Yesterday - named Jack - would not be a failure, in fact, stealing songs from The Beatles would make him the biggest star in the world.

When discussing the ordeal, Barth said something that I find very interesting:

“[Curtis] met Rowan Atkinson at Oxford, he came out of Oxford and immediately rode Rowan Atkinson to huge success in his early twenties. He’s never been knocked out, as far as I know. Why wouldn’t [Jack] become the most successful songwriter in the world?”

What’s important to understand about this quote is that at the age of 62, Jack Barth was perhaps the oldest person ever to have their first screenplay produced. His career as a screenwriter was defined by feeling like he wasn’t being given a shot at the big time; contrast that to Richard Curtis who began working almost immediately out of university and had popular shows like Blackadder and Not the Nine O’Clock News under her belt before he’d even turned 30. To make the contrast even starker, Curtis’ second feature film, released in 1994, was a little-known picture called Four Weddings And a Funeral, a film so unknown and underappreciated that it was only nominated for TWO Academy Awards, several BAFTAs, and a few Golden Globes.

This isn’t to say Curtis hasn’t earned his success or that Barth is an underappreciated genius, I don’t really know or care about either of them enough to even form a hill to die on. The simple point is this, Jack Barth sold his first feature screenplay in his early 60s, while Richard Curtis was an Oscar-nominated, multi-award-winning screenwriter with multiple hits under his belt before he’d even turned 40. The two versions of Yesterday aren’t simply two versions of a film, they’re two completely different worldviews and life experiences battling each other for the right to the story; and of course, the richer man won.

With the way I’ve presented this context, you might think that I dislike Yesterday, or that I’m fully #TeamBarth, or that I’m enraged about yet another example of an Oxbridge oyin bulldozing over people with zero consequence; you might even think that I’m about to start a “#ReleaseTheBarthCut” movement on Twitter. However, the truth is a little more complicated than that:

One — I don’t start hashtags, my Twitter is strictly for pointing out how many Black people Scarlet Witch kills in the MCU and the occasional “Maybe we should have listened to Corbyn” tweet, so I’m insufferable in a completely different way;

Two — I really like Yesterday, it’s something of a comfort movie for me, and one that I’ve watched quite a few times;

Three — as previously mentioned in my Rye Lane piece (go watch and support Rye Lane, it’s 10/10), I love romantic comedies and was basically raised on them, especially British ones;

Four — I really enjoy a significant portion of Richard Curtis’ work (it probably helps that I’ve almost never heard him speak and I don’t know what his views are), he wrote faves of mine such as Blackadder, Notting Hill, Bridget Jones’ Diary, the poorly-aged Love Actually (or should I say Love Guac’tually kekekeke… seriously go watch Rye Lane), as well as one of my favourite Doctor Who episodes, Vincent and the Doctor;

Five, I like The Beatles, I even sat through two hours of that insanely long documentary they had on Disney +.

So with all this in mind, it would seem like I’m #TeamCurtis on this one, right? Weeeell… nah.

I love Yesterday, and I love romcoms, but Richard Curtis was wrong, there is no damn way that Yesterday should have been a rom-com.

So let’s get into it:

The premise of Yesterday is pretty easy to explain, Jack (played brilliantly by Himesh Patel) is a struggling songwriter supported by his manager and best friend… Lily James’ character, I’ll probably remember to put her name here. Jack is about to give up his passion for music, but one day, a mysterious worldwide blackout strikes; in the darkness, Jack is hit by a bus and wakes up in a hospital in a world where The Beatles never existed. Also, things like Coca-Cola, the band Oasis, cigarettes, and the Harry Potter series never existed in this world either so there’s probably less tooth decay, less lung cancer, white people have lost their version of Candy, and the TERFs have lost-

You know what, UK libel laws are mad so I’m not gonna finish that thought.

Jack becomes an overnight sensation thanks to his new setlist, leaving even Ed Sheeran jealous, but is torn apart by the guilt of becoming famous thanks to other people’s work. The film deals with this internal struggle until eventually, he comes clean, faces no legal repercussions because he’s plagiarized work that just doesn’t exist, and enjoys a beautiful life as that guitar-playing teacher you loved (mine was called Mr. Egan).

Now, this sounds like a darn good plot, right? It’s a concept with so much potential to explore things like what Western culture would be like without Beatlemania and other artistic staples; Jack’s struggle with the decadence that comes with success; the pitfalls of the music industry; how the arrival of a newer, better rival derails Ed Sheeran’s career Jimmy Early style (watch Dreamgirls too); how the modern audience would receive The Beatles’ sound; or how the fact that performing a cover of Wonderwall is a pivotal part of Jack’s backstory and there should implications of an Oasis-less world are for him. These are just some things that I can think of off the top of my head, this concept had the potential to really dissect pop culture itself and the nature of fame and clout.

But it instead became a romantic comedy.

The other part of the plot that I didn’t mention is that Lily James’ character is secretly in love with Jack, meaning that with the recent release of What’s Love Got to Do With It? we officially have a “Does Lily James really need to be here?” cinematic universe. Lily James is uncritically supportive of Jack’s dreams, even when he isn’t; she books his gigs, drives him around; and every so often she throws that all-too-recognizable “I’m in love with you but you’re too wrapped up in your own sh*t to notice me, and I’m not going to make it easy for myself or you by simply communicating this” look his way. But suddenly as Jack starts to actually achieve the success that she’s been trying to manifest for him, Lily James realizes that he’s outgrowing her, and she begins to pursue a relationship with him. Her genius tactics involve springing her feelings on him during a farewell party while his family and friends are downstairs, giving him an ultimatum (which she SWEARS is not an ultimatum, we’ll come back to this), and of course, deciding to get engaged to a man who she clearly doesn’t love and telling Jack about it.

And… like… are you sure you don’t want to do the other thing, Richard?

Richard… are you sure?

Mr Richard Whalley Anthony Curtis?

Like I said before, the other, much darker version of this script sees Jack still unable to achieve success even with The Beatles’ discography and dealing with the implications of his failure. I’m definitely on the fence over whether I would prefer this version or not, but I do think it would be a lot better than significant aspects of what we got.

Because my main issue with the romance in Yesterday is this:

It’s trash.

Just straight-up bad, the opposite of good.

Patel and James have decent enough chemistry and I’m not too down on the “Childhood friends grow up to fall in love” romantic trope, but forcing this romance into a film that is so conceptually stacked is just such a baffling decision, I really don’t understand why Curtis thought this was a good idea.

Actually, maybe I do.

When speaking about the film, Richard Curtis said the following:

“I sometimes found when I worked with original material that it doesn’t come from the heart. So I tried to write a whole film that meant something to me, rather than having too much extra information.”

Curtis’ involvement in this film didn’t come from reading the script and loving it; in fact, according to Curtis, he didn’t even read Barth’s version of the original story, Curtis simply heard the idea and loved it (this is disputed by Barth who says that elements of the story and the Harry Potter joke were taken directly from his version of the screenplay).

Richard Curtis couldn’t see the heart in Barth’s version of Yesterday, presumably because it was conceived in the heart of someone he just didn’t understand, a heart that had been hurt over and over by rejection upon rejection. So to inject some of that heart into it and really make it a story that he could empathize with, Curtis gutted the failure, added a shortcut to success, and forced it into the rom-com genre that had proven to be his ticket to fame and worldwide recognition, and it was this version of the film that finally sparked joy in him.

Look, I’ll try to avoid that long segment I tend to do where I use the work of bell hooks to pick apart a love story, the issues here don’t really require all that.

First of all, Lily James’ character is written as someone who is constantly working for the growth of the man she loves, but when he starts to achieve that growth, she panics and almost seems hell-bent on making him suffer for that choice by dumping her feelings on him at the worst possible times. Also, Jack just doesn’t seem all that interested in her romantically at all? Maybe because? He’s pretty distracted? With the actual plot?? The romance is entirely one-sided for the majority of the movie, and that means that when it’s time for Jack to actually face his feelings for her I just don’t care, Jack isn’t interested in putting the work in for this relationship, and Lily James comes off as more as a source of guilt for him as opposed to a real romantic love interest. This part of the plot just feels shoehorned in, as if Curtis isn’t really interested in fully exploring the darker, more conceptual part of it because he wants to get to the romcom bits.

Another reason this romance doesn’t work for me is that Lily James’ character is kind of an emotional terrorist?

At a few points in this film, Madam (I’m just going to call her madam until I learn the character’s name and replace it) makes her feelings known to Jack, and while there could be a genuinely interesting exploration of how she was more comfortable with him as a failure, Curtis doesn’t explore the implications of her actions because that probably wouldn’t be very light-hearted. Madam’s “subtle” attempts to make Jack consider his choice to leave her and pursue his dream are portrayed as romantic and well-intentioned, but it’s just not a good look to be constantly springing your feelings on someone who is clearly going through a massive lifestyle change and is not in the correct frame of mind to deal with those feelings. The film almost tries to have its cake and eat it too by constantly having Lily James say that she wants Jack to chase superstardom and that she’s putting her own feelings aside, but her actions don’t reflect these supposedly altruistic intentions. It’s meant to be an “if you love someone then let them go” type of thing, but it just doesn’t come across that way.

And then there’s the ultimatum.

Aiish.

A lot of this section is dictated purely by my own preference so take it with a pinch of salt.

I hate romantic ultimatums, always have, always will. I think they have no place in a romantic comedy and usually, whenever I hear one, I’m more in favour of the option that will make the ultimatum-giver the least happy. I just finished re-watching Gilmore Girls, and the scene where Lorelai tells Luke “Marry me right now or I’m leaving” raises my blood pressure (Luke and Jess deserved better).

While I sometimes understand the reasoning behind them, they just don’t sit right with me and I just think they’re a manipulative and gross way of entering a relationship. I especially dislike implicit ultimatums, and as Jack is preparing to leave his trip to Liverpool to go back to his lavish lifestyle in the States, Madam tells him that she can’t compete with his new life, that she’s done waiting for him to love her and that he should go pursue his dream and be a rockstar… ooor he could choose not to do that and instead decide to stay and be with her. To me, that is an ultimatum completely lacking in compromise.

It’s important to note that in Madam’s defense, from her POV she’s loved Jack for 20 years, he hasn’t loved her back, and now she realizes that this is her last chance to salvage something with him and that’s enough to make anyone act selfishly and impulsively. But I think I’d appreciate this a lot more if Curtis actually explored the selfishness in Madam’s actions and explored why it’s one or the other. We’re told that Madam can’t go with Jack because she likes her teaching job and her life in their small seaside town but the film makes the emotional stakes unequal by not at least examining Madam’s’ own unwillingness to compromise. It also doesn’t help that she makes a few jokes or small references to him failing in his music career and instead settling for her, it’s pretty passive-aggressive and maybe would’ve been an interesting character arc in a story less overshadowed by its concept.

The only real benefit of the romance plot is that it adds even more stress onto Jack, whose state of mind is crumbling under the weight of his deception. There are so many much more interesting parts of the film that stem from the concept, the consequences of Jack’s lie, and his desperation to keep it.

There are a few fun things that the movie does with its concept. Having people point out the outdated feels that comes from Jack taking songs from the 50s/60s word-for-word (they used Back in the USSR as an example which is hilarious); Ed Sheeran discovers him but is ultimately crushed when Jack surpasses him and beats him in a song-off, stealing his crown as the king of UK urban music (Jack comes with The Long and Winding Road while Ed sings some sh*t about Penguins in the sand who lived in a castle or some Ed Sheeran sh*t); he gets a new eccentric Hollywood manager (played by SNL’s Kate McKinnon who just isn’t giving what she should be giving in this movie), a lot of her humour is just being a shallow American who belittles Jack a lot until he gets annoyed at her and she accuses him of treating her and everyone around them like crap (would have been nice to see this); we also discover that Jack isn’t alone and is being stalked by the only other two people on Earth who still remember The Beatles.

Yesterday is full of so many plot threads that just don’t get enough time or energy, there’s even an absolutely beautiful scene where the two other Beatles fans finally meet Jack, and rather than confront him, they thank him for bringing their music back into the world (they can’t sing) and give him an address.

And that address takes him to the house of John Lennon himself (apparently they just found a guy who looks exactly like him lol).

Because of course, in a world where The Beatles never existed, John Lennon was never murdered, and he gets to grow old and live a peaceful, simple life in a secluded house by the sea, which he is entirely satisfied with.

Seriously. Why is this a romantic comedy?

The ultimate problem that Yesterday has, is that everything that made it such a wonderful, heart-warming, and funny movie stemmed from the concept, but those things weren’t given time to be explored or developed because Curtis wasn’t interested in the concept itself, he didn’t see the vision that Barth saw.

Richard Curtis’ romantic comedies are about love, the pursuit of love, and the effect that this longing for love has on somebody’s life, he’s not all that great at balancing this with other aspects of the story. His 2013 romantic comedy, About Time, has the same problem, it’s a romantic comedy with a cool concept (the protagonist can travel through time) but he doesn’t quite know how to balance the concept with the love story, and both aspects of it suffer.

Also, I think that while Richard Curtis is a master of the (pre-2010) romantic comedy genre, to me, he’s not all that great at writing love. This might seem like a bit of a contradiction. Still, to me, a lot of Curtis’ romcoms are great at capturing cathexis, infatuation, and the initial connection and courting process as opposed to actual romantic loving relationships. In a film like Yesterday where the concept is constantly fighting for screen time with the romance, the lack of a real, substantive love story just highlights how it’s kind of a waste of time.

When I think about the leads in Bridget Jones’ Diary, Notting Hill, and Love Actually, while I’m fully swept up in the sickly sweet peaks and troughs of the romance, I can never really imagine the couples actually being together, helping each other grow, and having healthy, loving relationships. Compare that to other romcoms like let’s saaaaay oh I don’t knoooow, Rye Lane (which you should watch), where we see the characters fall for each other and can absolutely see the potential for that real, healthy, bell hooks-ian love (it also helps that Dom and Yas are young while Curtis’ protagonists are often older and have already done some adulting/growing thanks to lower house prices, public libraries, etc). Maybe the distinction is that Curtis can write cathexis, care, affection, attraction, and trust, which, as hooks (I know I said I wouldn’t, but it’s your own fault for believing me) says in All About Love: New Visions, are the ingredients of love but are not love itself.

“Affection is only one ingredient of love. To truly love we must learn to mix various ingredients — care, affection, recognition, respect, commitment, and trust, as well as honest and open communication. […] When we feel deeply drawn to someone, we cathect with them; that is, we invest feelings or emotions in them. That process of investment wherein a loved one becomes important to us is called “cathexis.” In his book, [M. Scott] Peck rightly emphasizes that most of us “confuse cathecting with loving.” We all know how often individuals feeling connected to someone through the process of cathecting insist that they love the other person even if they are hurting or neglecting them. Since their feeling of that of cathexis, they insist that what they feel is love.”

Yesterday is full of fun direction, great performances (Tamwar is on fire here too ufufufu), and funny jokes. It’s no Rye Lane (which you should watch), but it’s still full of highlights. The problem is that when you take it apart and look at the romantic comedy moments, they’re pretty bad. At the end of the movie, Jack asks Ed Sheeran to invite him on stage, seemingly to perform and steal even more of Sheeran’s fans, but Jack uses this platform to confess his wrongdoings, and he makes the great choice to upload all of his songs to the internet entirely for free (which must be contractually iffy for him?), ruining his own career and finally doing the honest thing.

Oh, and he confesses his love for Madam live on stage, even having the camera cut to her standing backstage without her initial knowledge (can’t stand big public romantic gestures like this). He apologizes to her and asks for forgiveness, before leaving the stage for the final time. Obviously, Madam is elated, she accepts his apology (for what, I don’t know), and literally dumps her fiance on the spot (her fiance just goes “Well I knew Jack was the better man, so I can’t be mad” like… bro??? You absolutely can be mad, have some self-respect).

Normally when discussing the wasted potential of a film, I would suggest some changes that I feel would have made it a more satisfying watch for my own tastes, but I don’t think that’s necessary here. The building blocks of a more satisfying version of Yesterday already exist, they’re literally in the movie itself but just needed time to be explored and to breathe. This doesn’t mean that I totally agree with Jack Barthe — I’m still unsure what the movie would have looked like if movie Jack had remained a failure — but I think Curtis’ involvement and his decision to stray so far from Barthe’s vision ultimately ended up dragging the film down. I honestly can’t help but feel sorry for Barthe, while he did finally got to sell his screenplay, this vision that came from his own life and his own experience was morphed into something it shouldn’t have been, and he didn’t even get the credit he wanted for it.

At the end of it all, I love Yesterday, it will always be a movie that I come back to and really enjoy, but it’s just a shame that we’ll never get to see it fulfill its narrative potential.

To me, it will always be the romcom that should never have been.

Also apparently her name was Ellie? I don’t remember this at all tf.

Originally published at http://jjwi13.wordpress.com on March 22, 2023.