Paramount Pictures
Elton John has made it known that he didn’t want his biopic, Rocketman, to sugarcoat his life — namely when it came to drugs and sex. But there was one debaucherous scene that almost got cut by director Dexter Fletcher, according to HuffPo.
The scene, set to “Bennie and the Jets,” features Taron Egerton‘s Elton amidst a nightclub crowd of half-dressed men and women in sort of a metaphorical orgy. The full sequence originally ended with a suggestive scene where Elton gets into bed and is drenched with bottles of champagne.
Fletcher wanted to cut the scene entirely, but Elton’s husband, David Furnish, convinced him to keep it by suggesting a few changes. Fletcher ultimately cut in fleeting scenes from Elton’s childhood to convey more of his inner turmoil and trimmed the ending.
“Elton had reached a point where he was kind of on self-destruct, almost,” Fletcher explains to HuffPo. “There was kind of this shallow attempt to throw himself into a lot of meaningless one-night stands that he would access through this crazy, hedonistic world. I wanted to create that, but I didn’t want it to be gratuitous and just be that for that’s sake.”
Fletcher says Elton was pleased with how everything turned out.
“I think Elton is completely enamored of it, as much as myself,” he says. “I hope so. He’s never said anything to me but wonderfully complimentary things about any of the film. He said to me, ‘It’s the film I wanted to be made,’ so I can’t get a better compliment than that.”
Rocketman is in theaters now.
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