George Harrison in the Spotlight: The Dick Cavett Show (1971)

This week, HBO will air George Har­ri­son: Liv­ing in the Mate­r­i­al World, a two-part doc­u­men­tary ded­i­cat­ed to The Bea­t­les’ gui­tarist who long played in the shad­ow of John and Paul. While George slips back in the spot­light, we should high­light his vin­tage inter­view with Dick Cavett. Record­ed 40 years ago (Novem­ber 23, 1971), the con­ver­sa­tion starts with light chit-chat, then (around the 5:30 mark) gets to some big­ger ques­tions — Did Yoko break up the band? Did the oth­er Bea­t­les hold him back musi­cal­ly? Why have drugs been so present in the rock ‘n roll world, and did The Bea­t­les’ flir­ta­tion with LSD lead young­sters astray? And is there any rela­tion­ship between drugs and the Indi­an music that so fas­ci­nat­ed Har­ri­son? It was a ques­tion bet­ter left to Ravi Shankar to answer, and that he did.

The rest of the inter­view con­tin­ues here with Part 2 and Part 3. Also, that same year, Cavett inter­viewed John Lennon and Yoko Ono, and we have it right here.