HBO gets 'Stoned' with Rolling Stones' Andrew Loog Oldham

Oldham (Credit: Sandy Beach/Old Pro Ltd.)

HBO should have a good one in the works, having optioned the rights to former Rolling Stones producer and manager Andrew Loog Oldham’s two volumes of memoirs, Stoned and 2Stoned. The project will be entitled Stoned and is reportedly a fictionalized version of Oldham’s biographical episodes of high times in the dizzying London cultural scene of the early 1960s.

Oldham, along with fellow music business legend Lou Adler, is executive-producing the project, with a script penned by screenwriter Wesley Strick (Martin Scorcese’s Cape Fear and the upcoming remake of A Nightmare On Elm Street). A pop music publicist prior to hooking up with the Stones in 1963, Oldham produced the band’s first recordings and was their co-manager through 1967. He later founded Immediate, the indie label home for artists including the Small Faces, Rod Stewart, Fleetwood Mac and Humble Pie prior to their major label career successes.

Also a celebrated music producer/manager/entrereneur, Adler founded the Dunhill and Ode record labels, managed Jan & Dean, produced the likes of Johnny Rivers, the Mamas & the Papas, and Carole King (he produced her Grammy-winning album classic Tapestry), helped plan the 1967 Monterey International Pop Festival and produced The Rocky Horror Show (both on stage and film).

“Lou Adler and I met at the [legendary rock ’n’ roll concert] T.A.M.I. Show in Santa Monica in 1964,” says Oldham. “He was managing the hosts--Jan & Dean--and I was managing one of the guests, the Rolling Stones. We became fast friends and witnessed and worked in the music that changed so much and 'edutained' the world over the following decades. We have both been privileged by our associations. Stoned and 2Stoned were my summings-up of those times and the combination of HBO, Wesley, Lou and myself working on developing my books for HBO is another privilege."

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