November 9, 1966 – John and Yoko meet for the first time at the Indica Gallery in Mason’s Yard, Duke Street, London S.W.1 for a preview of Yoko’s upcoming exhibition entitled Unfinished Paintings and Objects.

John and Yoko walking with the NYC skyline. ©Ben Ross

March 20, 1969 – John and Yoko are married in Gibraltar. For their honeymoon the couple stage Bed Ins in Amsterdam and in Montreal, where “Give Peace a Chance” is recorded on May 31, 1969.

August 1971 – John and Yoko get an apartment on Bank Street in New York City’s Greenwich Village.

December 11, 1971 – John and Yoko perform at the Ten for Two Concert, a benefit rally in Ann Arbor, Michigan to get John Sinclair out of jail.

March 6, 1972 – John and Yoko are served with deportation orders. The couple’s four year battle against deportation begins.

June 12, 1972 – Some Time in New York City is released in the United States.

August 30, 1972 – John, Yoko and the Plastic Ono Elephant’s Memory Band host the One to One concert at Madison Square Garden, a benefit concert for the children of Willowbrook State School.

John and Elton on stage at Madison Square Garden. ©Bob Gruen/www.bobgruen.com

November 1973 – John and Yoko separate. John goes to Los Angeles, California.

November 2, 1973 – Mind Games is released in the United States.

September 26, 1974 – Walls and Bridges is released in the United States.

November 28, 1974 – After losing a bet that “Whatever Gets You Thru the Night” would never go to number one (it did), John Lennon accompanied his good friend Elton John onstage at Madison Square Garden. John and Yoko claim this concert to be the catalyst for their reconciliation.

January, 1975 – John officially returns to the Dakota and is re-united with Yoko.

February 17, 1975 – The Rock ‘n’ Roll album is released in the United States.

John and baby Sean. ©Bob Gruen/www.bobgruen.com

October 7, 1975 – The New York State Supreme Court votes to reverse John’s deportation order. John wins his battle to stay in the country.

October 9, 1975 – On John’s 35th birthday, Yoko gives birth to Sean Taro Ono Lennon. John begins his ‘househusband years’.

August 4, 1980 – John and Yoko enter the recording studio, New York’s Hit Factory, for the first time in six years to begin work on a new album.

November 17, 1980 – Double Fantasy is released in the United States.

December 8, 1980 – John Winston Ono Lennon is murdered outside of his home in New York City.

Director/Producer Michael Epstein

For the upcoming premiere of LENNONYC for American Masters on PBS on November 22nd at 9p.m. (check local listings), producer Jessica Levin and director/producer Michael Epstein sat down to discuss the making of the film and answer some questions about the creative process. In this interview, they discuss why they chose John Lennon for a profile, what makes the English born artist an American Master, the creative choice to exclude a lengthy discussion of Lennon’s murder from the film, and Yoko Ono’s creative support for the project, as well as what it was like to work with a legendary personality like her. If you enjoyed this behind the scenes look into LENNONYC, check out the full podcast episodes for LENNONYC: Beyond Broadcast (Episode One with Jack Douglas is here and the full subscription feed can be found here).

Download the MP3 of the film maker interview here or listen below.

Highlights from the interview -

On why Lennon is an American Master: “John in New York was always a part of how I saw John’s story… John’s a New Yorker. New York is just the right lens, I’ve said before, to look at John’s post-Beatles life.”

On Double Fantasy: “I really did not connect with Double Fantasy when it came out – I was in high school – they were beautiful songs, but they didn’t have meaning, didn’t have emotion, didn’t connect, because how the hell could they? I was a teenager…. [Double Fantasy] is not for the sixteen year olds… It’s an album that is profoundly important to me as I think it would be to any parent as they get older.”

On why John’s murder isn’t explored in the film: “Chapman killed John for two reasons, one was he thought John had sort of become a phoney… the other was that he wanted to be famous. I didn’t want to give Chapman more fame – another platform, another pat on the back for killing John.”

On Yoko Ono’s participation in the film: “There’s this notion that she’s still a witch, that she broke up The Beatles, that she had John under her thumb and therefore has us under her thumb and that’s just not true.”

Listen below:

Adam Ippolito

Elephant’s Memory was a protest band of the 1960’s and 70’s in New York City’s East Village. The group became the Plastic Ono Elephant’s Memory Band after John and Yoko arrived on the scene in 1972 and asked them to be their backing band. Adam Ippolito played keyboard.

Download the MP3 or listen below.

Each podcast will consist of slightly edited interviews conducted for the film American Masters LENNONYC introduced by Susan Lacy, series creator and executive producer of American Masters and a producer of LENNONYC and Michael Epstein, director/writer of LENNONYC. New “episodes” will post weekly every Thursday until the Thursday after broadcast on November 22. The final episode will be a question and answer session using the best questions submitted by users via email at lennonycpodcasts@thirteen.org. The content will be available here on the American Masters Web site and iTunes. Users can check back in these locations or subscribe to keep up to date with the newest episodes.

Watch a clip from American Masters: LENNONYC. Coming to PBS November 22, 2010