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BALLROOM BOOM’s UK Premiere announced
After recent sellout screenings in New York and Toronto, Dublin-based Sideline Productions and Ireland’s pubcaster RTE are delighted to announce that the UK premiere of Ballroom Boom, the award-winning feature doc fronted by U2’s Adam Clayton, is confirmed for the Electric Ballroom in London on Monday, April 20th.
This release follows a slew of international festival nominations and awards at Chicago, Austin (Texas), and New Orleans.
Ballroom Boom relates the phenomenal and unique story of the Irish showband, and some 60 years before U2’s residency at The Sphere in Las Vegas, Irish showbands were packing out ballrooms in Sin City, New York, Boston, and Chicago, managed by the colourful Irish-born promoter Bill Fuller, who once owned over twenty ballrooms worldwide—including The Fillmore West in San Francisco and, his first, The Electric Ballroom in London. The ballroom is now run by his daughter Kate, who talks to Adam on camera about her father’s extraordinary life, and as dancehalls sprung up in other major British cities, Irish emigrants gave birth to an extraordinary generation of talent, including Mary O’Brien AKA Dusty Springfield; three of the Beatles; Oasis (Liam and Noel Gallagher); Johnny (Lydon) Rotten; and all four members of The Smiths.
Established in 1939, The Electric Ballroom is therefore a fitting venue to host the UK premiere on Monday April 20th, at a special charity screening.
KATE FULLER adds, ‘When Billy suggested screening the film in the Electric Ballroom, it just made so much sense. My father, Bill, opened this venue as a dancehall for the Irish community in London after WW2, and it hosted so many visiting showbands during the 1960s and 1970s. In the 1980s it was the venue of choice for emerging Irish bands, including U2, so it will be both fitting and an honour to have Adam Clayton and many of our London Irish music community at the screening’.
Ballroom Boom is produced and directed by Billy McGrath, who previously has helmed screen projects with U2, The Boomtown Rats, Clannad, David Bowie, Paul Cleary, The Pogues and the World Cup Irish soccer team of Italia ’90.
Kate will join Adam Clayton in a post-screening Q&A chaired by Billy McGrath.
All profits of the London screening go to icap a registered charity providing specialized, culturally sensitive counselling for the Irish community in Britain.
Full details here
PIC—Charles Hendy (The Mary Wallopers) interviewed Adam Clayton on his RTE 1 radio series celebrating Irish showbands.