Midas Man

Writer: Brigit Grant

Director: Joe Stephenson

So much has been said, written, recorded and dramatized about the formation and relatively brief career of The Beatles that it is hard to imagine there is any furrow left unploughed, yet Joe Stephenson’s new film Midas Man written by Brigit Grant takes the viewer a few steps back to understand furniture store heir turned pop manager Brian Epstein. An enjoyable approach to the biopic, Stephenson lets Epstein narrate his own story and although his personal life and drug dependency are only fleetingly acknowledged, Midas Man gets to grips with the determination that made stars of more than one Liverpudlian act.

Determined to carve out a corner of his father’s furniture empire, Brian Epstein creates a new music concession selling records by the hundreds until the business grows into one of the most significant music stores in town. Now connect to record producers and production companies, a chance visit to Cavern Club one lunchtime presents Brian with a new opportunity when he sees the potential in a scruffy band in need of his help. But will anyone else agree?

Midas Man takes a jaunty approach to telling its story, letting the character of Brian address the viewer directly and manage the relationship to the material, ensuring it remains largely focused on him, and by default, his management of The Beatles. There is a bit (but not enough) of Cilla and, as Epstein’s success grows, a brief rollcall of other acts, but the primary focus here is the evolution of the Fab Four and the toll their rapid fame takes on them and Epstein. This is exactly what you expect to see, but it is also a shame not to understand more about Epstein’s transition to music manager of other acts with varying fame and their response to his style or feelings of neglect when The Beatles hit the big time and consume his attention.

Of course, another notable issue with the film is no actual Beatles songs can be used due to copyright, so when the various iterations of the band sing – entertainingly performed by Blake Richardson, Jonah Lees, Leo Harvey-Elledge, Campbell Wallace and Adam Lawrence as a bunch of ruffians made good – they only perform cover versions of other people’s hits, while Darci Shaw’s Cilla actually gets to have her own music. It doesn’t detract too much from the story, but it is noticeable. So, while the focus is on Epstein and the film flirts with his homosexual affairs and pick-ups, the determination to fight against the perception of his family and even his class as a well-spoken successful man predominantly managing working class talent – like all representations of this era, it is The Beatles and Epstein’s engagement with them that unfortunately takes over everything else and ultimately defines him.

Jacob Fortune-Lloyd is, however, excellent in the leading role both as the audience’s way into the story and a man who knows he can be so much more than his background suggests, and Fortune-Lloyd finds moments of strain and chaos in the performance that build with the pressure to succeed. There is strong support from an underused Emily Watson and Eddie Marsan as his parents who create context for Epstein’s psychological barriers but the early struggles to prove himself in Midas Man are far more engaging than the montage of later success, and while it is difficult to ever put The Beatles aside in the history of music, Grant and Stephenson needed to do that to get closer to understanding their subject.

Midas Man is streaming on Prime Video 30 October.