George Harrison Once Escaped a Press Mob at Maxim’s Restaurant in Paris by Jumping Down the Laundry Chute
In 1970, George Harrison tried to have a press conference to promote his friends in the Paris sector of the Hare Krishna Temple. However, all the media wanted to ask him about was The Beatles’ current tensions. Then, George found himself back in Beatlemania as the press got out of control. He had to escape down a laundry chute.
The Hare Krishna Temple made sure never to misuse George’s friendship
A couple of years after legendary sitarist Ravi Shankar gave him the tools to start his spiritual journey, George became friends with the members of the Hare Krishna Temple, whose guru was Bhaktivedanta Swami, a.k.a. Prabhupada.
George met Shyamsundar, a devotee of the Haight-Ashbury temple, at The Beatles’ Christmas party in 1969. He told George he and the other devotees were living in a warehouse in Covent Garden and hoped to establish a temple in London.
Suddenly, George made it his mission to help them. He produced their album The Radha Krishna Temple and published Prabhupada’s KRSNA Book. After everything George did for them, the devotees made sure never to ask George for help again.
In Here Comes The Sun: The Spiritual And Musical Journey Of George Harrison, Joshua M. Greene wrote, “George appreciated that the devotees did not misuse his friendship. Prabhupada’s London group made no public announcements concerning their time with him and never exploited his affection.
“We never even accepted taxi fare,” one devotee said. “That discretion motivated George to focus the spotlight on them and lend a helping hand whenever possible,” Greene continued.
However, George’s next favor to the devotees didn’t exactly go to plan.
George Harrison had to escape a press mob by jumping down a laundry chute
In 1970, Shyamsundar got a call from a friend from Paris. French police had arrested devotees who’d been chanting in the streets. He told George, and the situation once again spurred into action.
“Well, why don’t we go over there and tell them?” George asked. “I’m still one of the Fab Four. They’ll listen to me, won’t they?” Greene wrote that a Beatle hadn’t been to Paris since the band performed there in 1965 and that the press would have a field day. However, George still organized a press conference at Maxim’s Restaurant in minutes.
“We’ll hold a press conference, get all the reporters to come,” George said. “‘Look here, Krishna is God, we’re all his servants, why not help out?’—all that bit.”
When George arrived at the restaurant, “the room went silent,” Greene wrote. “He looked around at the stunned assembly and called out, ‘Hare Krishna.’ There were shouts, screams, and a mad rush toward the lone Beatle. The devotees quickly guided him into a small room and slammed the door against flashing bulbs and grasping hands. George smiled and said, ‘Welcome to Beatlemania. I used to do that dash twice a
day.'”
When the press started filing into the room, one asked, “How did you begin the Beatle hairstyle?” Another asked, “Are the Beatles breaking up?” George tried interjecting, “This isn’t about the Beatles. This is about Krishna—”
Still, a reporter continued, “Are the other Beatles coming to Paris?” Then, George raised his voice: “The International Society for Krishna Consciousness wants to start a new temple here and they need your—”
Suddenly, the door was knocked off its hinges and crashed to the floor, with reporters and photographers falling in a heap. “More reporters circled around back and began pressing against the other door, which groaned and bent inward in a U-shape,” Greene wrote.
“George’s purpose in convening the conference mattered not at all to a press corps with its own agenda, and there was no point in raising his voice any louder. They had no interest in what he had come to say. Looking for an exit, Shyamsundar spotted a small hatch in the wall and opened it. A laundry chute led down two floors to a mound of dirty linens.
“George jumped down the chute with no more hesitation than a child coasting down a playground slide” just as the second door in the room crashed with another pile of the press. George and Shyamsundar ran to an alley as the media followed them down the chute.
George ran from the press like he was back in ‘A Hard Day’s Night’
Suddenly, George found himself back in Beatlemania or filming a scene from The Beatles’ film A Hard Day’s Night. When George and Shyamsundar entered the alley, a taxi was waiting, and they hopped in. Then, to George’s amusement, the driver didn’t recognize him.
Then, the press mob hit the car. The devotee got out to try and push the media away, but they jumped in front of the car “desperate to keep their celebrity victim from driving off.” With Shyamsundar back in the taxi, the driver realized he must’ve had someone famous in his charge and sped off.
Surprisingly, George and his friend laughed during their hasty exit. George hated Beatlemania. It made him feel paranoid about being murdered. He hated that fans and the press wanted a piece of him. His nervous system had been compromised because of it.
So, he couldn’t have found his situation in Paris that funny. It would’ve been more like George to have been aggravated and irritated that the press had once again shown their true ugly colors. They didn’t care that he was holding a press conference about the Hare Krishna Temple. All they wanted, as usual, was a piece of a Beatle, and it didn’t matter which one.
Maybe George laughed at the situation because he couldn’t be angry anymore.
