25th March 2008.
My big screen career has been a severely limited yet highly unusual one. Eagle-eyed horror fans may recall my ‘party-goer with sword’ third from left role in Norman J. Warren’s Terror. I wore a bow tie and a beard for that. Or my cameo in the David McGillivray written The Errand in which my only line as a security guard - “Blue 16 to base’ - got embarrassingly dubbed by someone else. I looked rather fetching in that military-style hat though. Then there was my major starring part in Russell Mulcahy’s Talos the Mummy as the King of Egypt in key flashbacks. I only did that so I could wear an outfit the costume designer found in a dusty box marked Cleopatra at Cinecitta Studios. I knew it would be the closest I’d ever get to Elizabeth Taylor. Sadly I ended up on the cutting room floor. But I’ve been on far worse.
While I’m still waiting for my endless pleas to Dario Argento to kill me in a dazzling set-piece to pay off, and for good friend Buddy (Combat Shock) Giovinazzo to finally get 123 Depravity Street financed (I’m down for a great orgy scene), to date my most notorious appearance has been in The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle. Director Julien Temple gave me a fabulous ‘And introducing’ credit but most people have to ask which part I played because they can’t spot it. I initially auditioned for Russ Meyer opposite Kitten Natividad before Temple entered the picture. I was also down to shoot more with Sex Pistol Steve Jones and late British Sex Queen Mary Millington. However my only remaining scene as a pervy record executive has me wearing a rubber frogman suit in a bath while a topless groupie is trying to hook my genitalia with a fishing line. It wasn’t far from what I was getting up to in my private life at the time anyway and my wages paid for a New York trip. So I’ll never knock freezing in a tub full of cold water for hours.
 My next big, and deadly serious, screen appearance comes courtesy of those infamous Sex Pistols days too. For October 12, 2008, marks the UK premiere of the major feature film Who Killed Nancy? Writer and director Alan Parker’s drama-documentary investigates the facts, the fictions and the sensations surrounding the deaths of punk icon Sid Vicious and his much-maligned girlfriend Nancy Spungen in the late 1970s. Fusing interviews with friends, family, key insiders and witnesses from the night Nancy was murdered at the Chelsea Hotel in New York with unseen film footage, dramatic reconstructions and a punk rock soundtrack, Parker’s film should be the last word on a very heated and long debated subject. Film festivals should be already putting this one on their radar.
Parker and I go back years now. He’s interviewed me on numerous occasions for his many books (e.g. ‘Sid Vicious No One Is Innocent’) and TV documentaries (“Never Mind The Sex Pistols’) mainly because I’m one of the few still alive willing to talk on the record. I’ve discussed everything with him about those amazing times. From ‘Let it Rock’ fashion and my Gay Cowboy T-shirt arrest to the ‘God Save the Queen’ boat party and the NYC Max’s Kansas City heroin scene. Determined as I am that the truth about my good friend Sid doesn’t get altered by the passage of time and people with fanciful memories (they know who they are!), Parker is as tireless in trying to get the facts straight. That’s why I was happy to be interviewed again for a film I hope will shine the best light on what Sid was really like and put an end to the ridiculous speculation than he could ever have murdered Nancy. He just wasn’t that sort of person.
But then John Simon Ritchie was never the villain painted by the media. Nor was he the drugged-out idiot many believed. He was a terrific guy, funny, articulate and warm. One year he was the only person to remember my birthday and popped around, we lived close by each other, with a hand-made greetings card. I still have it as a memento. His band persona of Sid Vicious was exactly that, a public image. Parker has a knack for reducing me to tears on film by dredging up all the happy, sad and painful memories about our friendship. I’ve always been very clear over the fact I liked Nancy too (the reason I helped director Alex Cox on Sid and Nancy). I’m expecting to be a wreck after watching Who Killed Nancy? His pointless death still gets to me even after thirty years. I couldn’t rush to his side and offer support when he needed it the most. It just wasn’t as easy to get to New York in those days.
Parker filmed my interview in an art gallery right next to the launderette where Sid, Nancy and I would do our washing. Another local pal often joined us, Pete Meaden, famous for discovering The Who. The sole remaining survivor of that foursome - the three others all died within six months of each other – I never fail to think about them every time I pass it. Or how amazing it is that I’m still here to talk about it. Which is the main reason I continue to do so.
Until next time…
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