Purple Rain Prince movie

Name: Purple Rain
Director: Albert Magnoli
Genre: Music
Released: 1984-07-27
Cast: Prince

Warner Bros. Pictures

motion picture

Still reigns at 30

Prince laid plans to produce a movie out of a concert filmed during the Controversy Tour. It would contain biographical interludes from his life and would be titled The Second Coming. Over the following year that idea evolved into a full-blown feature movie charting Prince’s quest for stardom and the band rivalry in the Minneapolis music scene, focussed around the real life venue First Avenue. Under the original working title Dreams, Prince’s girlfriend Denise “Vanity” Matthews was to play the lead female character named Nikki. Matthews exited the project around the time that it was retitled, to Purple Rain.

Plans for the movie went into earnest in the summer of 1983 with Prince scoring his breakout success with the album 1999 and coinciding with his approaching contract renewal Warner Bros Records. Prince’s manager Robert Cavallo took the idea to the label, who agreed to indulge him and finance the movie to the tune of $7.2 million. Prince’s two demands was that he wouldn’t sign a recording extension with Warner unless they agreed to the movie, and that his name to be displayed above the movie title on the poster. Casting sprung into motion to find a replacement female lead, which from an audition pool of 700 aspiring actress Apollonia Kotero landed the role. Scriptwriter William Blinn, creator of TV sensations Starsky & Hutch and Fame, took on task after meeting Prince in LA to script the movie’s theatrical storyline. Pre-production began in September, with Prince and the band taking acting lessons three days a week under the guidance of actor Don Amendolia.

Principal photography began in Minneapolis on 1 November 1983, largely at outdoor locations to save budget, and ended on 22 December capturing the live performances at First Avenue. Due to the extreme cold of Minnesota winter, in January production transferred to the Warner Studios backlot at Hollywood to shoot further scenes doubling as the streets of Minneapolis. Although based in fact, the movie contains key inaccuracies on his father scripted for dramatisation; in real life Prince did not have a violent relationship with a suicidal father (renamed Francis L. in the movie) and neither did his father batter his wife, nor owned a gun. In fact his father was teetotal. The storyline draws heavily on the battle of the bands Prince routinely participated during his school band days with Champagne. Prince’s on-screen romance with Apollonia was (loosely) based on his increasing infatuation with Susannah Melvoin.

The actors playing Prince’s parents are the only two professional actors in the movie. The remainder of the cast is formed of Prince’s former girlfriends (Kim Upsher and Jill Jones) and music acquaintances. His tour manager Alan Leeds plays the club’s stagehand. Billy Sparks, cast as owner of First Avenue, was in real-life a concert promoter. And the club’s 6ft tall bouncer Chick Huntsberry was Prince’s actual bodyguard. Prince’s former guitarist Dez Dickerson also returns to make a brief cameo to perform his song (I Want 2 B A) Modernaire, although it was never released as a single.

Purple Rain was directed by Albert Magnoli. A newcomer in the business, having to be persuaded to take on the project, Magnoli rewrote much of Blinn’s original screenplay to give it a grittier storyline. The movie casts the entire lineup of The Revolution, who all receive speaking roles in the dressing room scenes which were shot at the larger backstage rooms of the nearby Orpheum Theatre which doubled as First Avenue, just a block away. The plot stories the struggles of a talented but troubled musical protege named The Kid, striving to secure his billing at the best venue in town. A rival band The Time are fighting for the same slot and the manager, who has only space for one headlining act, must to decide between them. A young woman, Apollonia, low on money and seeking a job arrives in town and steals The Kid’s heart. Sparks fly. Yet The Time’s frontman, Morris Day, enlists her to lead her own girl band, Apollonia 6 – Prince’s real-life spin-off group. While trying to win her back, The Kid’s home life grows tumultuous whilst his parents’ marriage takes a deadly turn. Haunted by his father, a musician who missed his chance of striking the big time, The Kid is spurred on to not let history repeat itself – yet his band The Revolution grows disunited by his single minded ambition. The writing is on the wall but sense finally sense prevails. The Kid unites his band, wows the First Avenue audience and wins his slot at the club and the love of his girl.

The stage performances and front of house sequences were indeed filmed at First Avenue. The movie’s closing numbers I Would Die 4 U, Baby, I’m A Star and Purple Rain are live audio recordings captured at the Revolution’s debut public show at the venue on 3 August 1983 – with the movie scenes lip-synced to these tracks. Purple Rain was a powerful cinematic experience and was universally hailed as the greatest rock and roll movie since The Beatles’ It’s A Hard Days Night of 1964. Purple Rain became a cultural phenomenon and launched Prince to international stardom.

The premiere of the Purple Rain movie took place at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Hollywood on 26 July 1984, as a star studded event televised live on MTV. Released nationwide in 200 theatres on the 27th, box office takings soared to $12.6 million in the opening week. This unexpected success proved the studio’s concerns unfounded that the predominately black cast would limit the movie’s commercial appeal and showings quickly expanded to 917 screens. Purple Rain was critically acclaimed and went on to gross $68.4 million at the box office and became one of the most successful films of 1984, an incredible feat for a black lead. Considering the year 1984 also saw the releases of The Terminator, Ghostbusters, Amadeus, Footloose, Beverly Hills Cop, and Spielberg’s The Temple Of Doom. The accompanying Purple Rain soundtrack, released one month ahead of the movie, won Prince the Oscar for Best Original Score, which he collected on 25 March 1985 at Hollywood’s Music Center in the 57th ceremony of the Academy Awards. The soundtrack produced five hit singles, two number ones, as well as garnered Prince two Grammy awards, two Brit Awards, plus three AMAs in what was the most successful year in his career.

Purple Rain movie was first released on VHS home video on 19 November 1984 and its sales quickly certified Platinum by the RIAA in December 1984. Its DVD debut happened on 25 June 1997 on the day of the album’s thirteenth anniversary. A two-disc Collector Edition followed on 24 August 2007 along with its Blu-ray format debut on 24 July 2007 marking the 20th anniversary. Following Prince’s death in April 2016, a triple-set Blu-ray was issued on 17 October as Prince Movie Collection, a boxed-set packaging all three of Prince’s movies. In 2019 Purple Rain movie was selected for eternal preservation in the Library of Congress National Film Registry in acknowledgement of its cultural significance.

Trivia

The white Cloud guitar which was produced as a prop for the movie was liked by Prince so much he had several other variations built. The Cloud remained his signature instrument right up to the year 2000.

The two-storey 1,348 sq ft white shiplap house featured in the movie as The Kid’s modest family home, 3420 Snelling Avenue, Minneapolis, was actually bought by Prince when it came on the market in August 2015. Paying $117,000 for the 3-bedroom property as a mystery cash buyer, Prince paid $7,000 over the asking price to secure the deal. The property was retained by The Prince Estate following his death in 2016 and in August 2024 listed it on Airbnb fully restored to its Purple Rain glory, complete with contemporary decor and was available to rent (subject to vetting) for a limited run of 25 one night stays.

Principal cast

The Kid: Prince
Apollonia: Patricia Kotero
Morris: Morris Day
Mother: Olga Karlatos
Father: Clarence Williams III
Jerome: Jerome Benton
Billy: Billy Sparks
Jill: Jill Jones
Big Chick: Charles Huntsberry
Brenda: Brenda Bennett
Susan: Susan Moonsie
Kim: Kim Upsher
Stage Hand: Alan Leeds
The Revolution: Wendy Melvoin; Lisa Coleman; Dez Dickerson; Bobby “Z” Rivkin; Matt Fink; Mark Brown
The Time: Garry Johnson; Mark Cardenas; Gerald Hubbard; Paul Peterson; Jesse Johnson

Plot

The Purple Rain movie is about a young black club musician, The Kid, growing up in Minneapolis and struggling to find success with his band The Revolution, and in the backdrop of the violent breakdown of his parent’s marriage, and finding love with the sexy Apollonia Kotero. The owner of the club, First Avenue, tells The Kid that one act must go. The Revolution compete for their place with rival group, The Time, in their bid for stardom. A gritty film, which is very closely based on the experiences of Prince’s real life.

DVD two disc version special features include the documentaries:

First Avenue: The Road to Pop Royalty
Purple Rain: Backstage Pass
Riffs, Ruffles and a Revolution: The Impact and Influence of Purple Rain
MTV Premiere Party
Promotional music videos: Let’s Go Crazy (4:01), Take Me With U (4:46), When Doves Cry (5:58), I Would Die 4 U/Baby I’m A Star (4:41), Purple Rain (7:05), Jungle Love/The Bird (The Time) and Sex Shooter (Apollonia 6)