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Richard Curtis owes movie ideas to The Beatles

Richard Curtis wouldn’t have written any of his films were it not for the music of The Beatles.
The 62-year-old screenwriter – who is known for his hit romantic comedies ‘Four Weddings and a Funeral’, ‘Notting Hill’ and ‘Bridget Jones’s Diary’ among others – recently penned Danny Boyle’s latest film ‘Yesterday’ which follows a struggling musician Jack (Himesh Patel) as he wakes up to discover he’s the only person who remembers The Beatles.
The ‘Love Actually’ writer confessed that was it not for the iconic 60s band, he "wouldn’t have written all of my romantic movies" and insisted his latest film is the "perfect" combination of his romantic style and love of music.
Speaking to BANG Showbiz, he said: "I think without the Beatles I wouldn’t have written all of my romantic movies. So it was kind of perfect access of my romance and the people who inspired it.
"It was so fun to write about The Beatles because whenever I got out of ideas I could go to their catalogue and everything would get three times better.
"My world without the Beatles in it I would never have got any presents as a kid because that’s all I asked for."
The ‘About Time’ creator went on to praise Danny, 62, as well as cast members and Himesh Patel and Lily James – who plays Jack’s childhood friend Ellie Appleton.
He said: "I love Lily I did Mamma Mia [Here We Go Again] with her and she’s just a total joy, Himesh Patel thank god he exists because it was gonna be really hard to cast the lead in this movie.
"And Danny Boyle is a very good director, my last movies were all directed by me, not such a good director, I wanted a proper director this time."