Tom Petty appeared on-screen for just a few moments in 1997’s The Postman, however it might have been simply the expertise he wanted on the time.
Usually talking, the ’90s discovered Petty navigating uncharted waters. His second solo album, 1994’s Wildflowers, was an prompt traditional but life was not all it gave the impression to be. Heartbreakers drummer Stan Lynch, who’d been with the band for shut to twenty years, stop the identical yr. In the meantime, Petty’s marriage to his first spouse resulted in divorce in 1996, and he struggled with a heroin dependancy.
Petty had labored on one other movie, 1996’s She’s the One, the place he shortly composed the accompanying soundtrack and rating. He then launched a complete Heartbreakers album titled Songs and Music From ‘She’s the One.’ The movie starring Jennifer Aniston and Cameron Diaz was poorly obtained. Petty’s album, which additionally included covers of songs by Lucinda Williams and Beck, was not: It reached No. 15 on the Billboard 200.
“I believe individuals have been drastically confused by the concept of a soundtrack album that wasn’t,” Petty advised BAM in 1997. “I do know the document firm was. The movie did not do effectively, however I favored it. It was humorous and it had one thing to say.”
Petty then launched into a 20-night residency in January 1997 on the Fillmore Ballroom in San Francisco, one other adventurous challenge the place the Heartbreakers let unfastened in a means they’d by no means fairly performed earlier than. Along with the hits, they performed dozens upon dozens of canopy songs and invited visitors onstage to carry out. “I needed to play the place there have been no obligations in any respect,” Petty defined.
Obligations have been, as Petty had discovered over time, a part of the worth one needed to pay for being well-known. Nonetheless, it might be inaccurate to explain Petty as disillusioned by fame within the ’90s. He hadn’t been all that eager on it within the first place.
“It is by no means been in my nature to wish to be like a persona or an enormous celeb,” he mentioned. “It is effective in case you do; I’ve nothing towards it. It is simply not in my nature. I’d be delay by that. I do not attend premieres — I truly shrink back from issues which might be gonna put you in that limelight. … We do not do picture shoots in any respect. I simply do not do them. I do not wish to do them. It is effective whenever you’re a boy, however now I really feel ridiculous sitting in entrance of a backdrop and getting all painted up. So, in the event that they wanna get an image of me, get me at work or get me on the go, however I am not gonna do this. The final one I did made me sick; I believe I truly obtained the flu.”
Watch the Trailer for ‘The Postman’
By the latter half of the ’90s, Petty and the Heartbreakers had conquered nearly all there was on the planet of rock ‘n’ roll music, garnering each business success and important acclaim. However that did not precisely equate to whole satisfaction in Petty’s thoughts.
That is when he obtained a name from Kevin Costner, then at work on a movie he would produce and direct himself titled The Postman. Based mostly on the mid-’80s novel of the identical identify, his film takes place in a post-apocalyptic neo-Western world through the then near-future yr of 2013. Costner was to painting a title character who travels the U.S. delivering outdated mail to residents, unwittingly inspiring hope.
Costner’s name additionally occurred to encourage some hope in Petty, who took on a small however memorable function as an area politician. “Kevin referred to as me up and requested me to play the mayor of a post-apocalyptic metropolis, and it was at a time after I actually wanted to do one thing,” Petty advised Rolling Stone in 1999. “I used to be, like, misplaced. The band had stopped touring. I lived alone.
“I wanted to do one thing with my time,” Petty added, “and this sounded excellent, so I took off and went as much as Washington, in the course of the woods someplace, bald eagles going over and freezing chilly in July.”
He was conversant in being on set in entrance of a digital camera. Petty had been doing it for years along with his personal music movies, a job he concurrently loved and located to be one other disadvantage to fame. “We have been round within the days earlier than movies and it was a lot nicer, as a result of individuals made their very own movies to songs of their head,” he advised BAM. “They found you differently: on the stage. I am not attempting to be a purist. I’ve loved making movies and I like movie and I like the entire course of, but it surely’s only a ache within the ass to should [have] one for each launch.”
Petty’s Postman character even bore an eerie resemblance to the post-apocalyptic drifter he’d portrayed in his music video for 1982’s “You Acquired Fortunate,” however engaged on a feature-length Hollywood movie was nonetheless new. “Kevin was the director, and he actually obtained on my case about the right way to do it — ‘We do that totally different than you do music,'” Petty advised Rolling Stone. “I am grateful to Kevin. He taught me, or tried to, a number of issues about the right way to get this or that throughout on digital camera.”
Watch Tom Petty in ‘The Postman’
In Petty’s cameo, the Postman encounters the mayor whereas looking for sustenance. “I do know you,” Costner’s character says to Petty. “You are well-known.” The mayor casually replies: “I used to be as soon as, type of – type of, not anymore.” Later, he insists that the Postman is definitely the well-known one.
Launched on Christmas Day in 1997, The Postman was an epic failure on the field workplace, returning solely a fraction of its $80 million funds. Critics harshly condemned the movie, and it gained 5 Razzie Awards for Worst Actor, Image, Track (for the movie’s whole musical choice), Director and Screenplay.
Costner would go on to defend the movie in subsequent years, whereas expressing gratitude for having made it. Petty’s traces particularly, he later mentioned, have been meant to function a broader metaphor.
“It offers with the character of fame, you understand what I imply? It is a very refined factor,” Costner advised The Each day Beast in 2020. “I believe The Postman truly is type of a really humorous film, whenever you watch it. There’s humor wrapped all over it. Simply dealing slightly bit with the character of fame, and coping with anyone who’s well-known, and him saying, ‘No, you are well-known.’ That is all of the film was attempting to do.”
Not lengthy after the film was launched, Petty obtained therapy for his dependancy struggles, attaining sobriety in time for a tour supporting his 1999 album, Echo, after which married once more in 2001. He went on to land a couple of extra roles in movie and tv, most notably voicing Elroy “Fortunate” Kleinschmidt in King of the Hill from 2004 till the present’s finish in 2009.
Fame, then, did not appear so daunting. Petty and his second spouse, Dana “can have peaceable instances when it isn’t a think about our lives,” he mentioned within the 2005 e book Conversations With Tom Petty. “Actually, more often than not it is like a traditional household. I am working, and we’re elevating a 12-year-old child. It is common spending a big a part of the night attempting to assist [Petty’s stepson] Dylan end his homework. I’ve simply obtained an uncommon job.”
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Odds-and-ends initiatives are sometimes missed however in time a few of them have come to be valued – and in some circumstances, important – components of those artists’ catalogs.
Odd {Couples}: Tom Petty and Dave Stewart
