Tim Pope, a prominent video director during MTV’s golden era, became well-known for placing his high-profile clients in precarious and sometimes perilous scenarios. He famously dressed Freddie Mercury as a “giant Mediterranean prawn,” submerged the band the Cure in a flooded wardrobe before sending it off a cliff, and nearly electrocuted members of the Psychedelic Furs.
Reflecting on his unconventional approach, Pope humorously notes, “The essence of my work seems to be sadism.” He muses whether this penchant for discomfort stems from his own experiences of bullying in primary school, or if he is simply predisposed to cruelty. Regardless, this strategy has proven successful for him. His illustrious roster of clients includes icons like David Bowie and Paul McCartney, many of whom were eager to endure extreme measures for their artistic expression. In the introduction to Pope’s lively new memoir, I Shoot Rock Stars, Robert Smith of the Cure expresses fondness for “every moment” spent with Pope, apart from the instances where he found himself submerged in icy, filthy water, suffocated by snakes, or slowly being fed into the mouth of a giant spider.
“That was part of the video for ‘Lullaby,’” Pope chuckles, now a youthful 70, with a playful grin. “I had to maneuver a camera inside Smithy’s mouth, risking his precious little teeth.” Bowie, whom Pope collaborated with in the 80s and 90s, displayed similar trust. “I attached a camera to him and had him lean forward,” Pope explains. “If he had fallen incorrectly, it could have ended badly.” The inspiration for Pope’s memoir came to him after he stumbled upon an old voicemail from Bowie, who passed away in 2016. “It felt as though David was reaching out from beyond the grave since I never had the chance to say goodbye,” he recounts. “I realized I had experienced so many remarkable moments.”
Pope’s journey began at Latymer Grammar School in Enfield, London, where a new film studies class introduced him to renowned directors like Alfred Hitchcock and Roman Polanski, along with the idea of the auteur. He financed his budding interest by delivering newspapers and working at a chip shop, eventually sneaking an 8mm camera into an Emerson, Lake and Palmer concert, tucking it down his trousers at great personal discomfort.
After completing film school, he found himself employed at a company that trained politicians for television appearances, all while moonlighting for record labels, capturing live performances for £100 each. At that time, the number of video directors was limited, and the scene dominated by figures like David Mallet and Russell Mulcahy felt exclusive. His breakthrough came when Soft Cell achieved a global hit with “Tainted Love” and urgently required a video for their next single, “Bedsitter.” “I met an art director named Al McDowell, who later worked with Spielberg,” Pope recalls. “We brainstormed wild concepts, created a storyboard, and once the video aired on Top of the Pops, opportunities poured in.”
Pope’s rise coincided with the 1981 debut of MTV as an international music video channel. However, he rejected the channel’s formulaic directives—such as mandating stars to wear Spandex or featuring attractive women with voluminous hair—in favor of what he termed “defiant individualism.” “Rebellion was in my DNA; I wanted to stir things up,” he states. He shot the video for Soft Cell’s “Sex Dwarf” amid chains, raw meat, and maggots, leading to the police seizing the footage. After the Style Council’s “Long Hot Summer” video featured Paul Weller playfully touching bandmate Mick Talbot’s ear, Weller’s father and manager called to question, “What are you doing with my boy?” Pope recalls another instance where Weller donned lipstick for a different video, indicating a rebellion against the public image imposed upon him.
Rather than conforming to the standard styles of his contemporaries, Pope viewed himself as a “bespoke tailor,” customizing each video to fit the song and the artist’s personality. He directed 37 videos for the Cure, including “Close to Me,” which drew from Smith’s childhood experience of feeling trapped while bedridden with chickenpox. For “The Lovecats,” he discovered a perfect location in a real estate window. “They allowed me to inspect the property and gave me the keys,” he recalls with a laugh. “Next thing you know, I’m inside with the crew, and Smithy and the band are unloading from the van. The neighbors must have been hearing the music from ‘The Lovecats’ reverberating through their walls.” Once filming was complete, he returned the keys, and the video went on to receive worldwide acclaim.
Pope’s frequent collaborators were just as unconventional as he was. He filmed videos underneath a steam train, in a Spanish Harlem brothel, and even blasted Mark Hollis of Talk Talk with an aircraft engine. He drew inspiration from Neil Young’s “emotionally raw real-life personality” to create various fictional characters, including a psychotic drifter and, in “Pressure,” a character who punches himself so hard that he knocks himself out. On one occasion, filming closely resulted in a “raging dent in his forehead like a third eye,” but it produced an incredible shot of the keyboard past the artist’s nose.
He candidly acknowledges a “Spinal Tap period,” featuring a bizarre 75-foot penis on wheels for Hall and Oates, or the “prawn” costume video for Queen’s “It’s a Hard Life,” which prompted drummer Roger Taylor to quip that “no artist has ever looked as silly in a video.” By the late 1980s, Pope was flying on Concorde and mingling with rock legends like Iggy Pop. The chapter titled “Iggy’s ‘Cock’ Moment” highlights an incident where his camera inadvertently captured the rock star’s exposed anatomy during a performance. Pope recounts his adventures with a sense of disbelief: “Lou Reed and David Bowie, and here I am—a boy from Enfield—trying to keep my cool.” His first encounter with Bowie occurred when Iggy mentioned he’d invited “a couple of mates,” who turned out to be Bowie and Mick Jagger. Later, at a concert at Wembley, Bowie introduced him to…
