How Roger Farrington got the last photos of John Lennon at work

From pre-fame Matt Damon to Danny DeVito in Jordan Marsh and Yoko Ono in Boston, this Newton native has seen it all. We asked him about his decades-long career as a Boston culture photog.

I called Jamaica Plain photographer Roger Farrington ostensibly to talk about his photos of John Lennon and Yoko Ono.

It speaks volumes about his decades-long career as a Boston-area photographer that those photos — the last ever taken of Lennon in a studio— were the tip of the iceberg.

Soon the Newton native is telling me about the time he’d photographed Matt Damon before “Good Will Hunting.” Danny DeVito riding the escalator in Jordan Marsh. Now-King Charles talking to shoppers on Newbury Street.

“It was ridiculous! It was a circus! I mean — oh, I had Elizabeth Taylor!” he says, jumping into a tale of Liz’s Hasty Pudding parade that ends with locals chasing her entourage “all the way through Harvard Square to the Lampoon Building, shouting ‘Liz, Liz, Liz!’”

Oh! And that time Andy Warhol was on Newbury Street. Farrington photographed the Queen of Thailand’s royal visit to Boston. Vanna White. Richard Pryor. Oh, and Alec Baldwin! Stories spill out, each more colorful than the last.

Farrington, 74, doesn’t speak about past gigs— he exclaims! There is a palpable wonder in his voice that he was there. That he captured these moments! He vividly remembers each assignment, and his enthusiasm oozes in each tale.

After graduating from Connecticut College in 1975, Farrington worked five years as a publicity photographer for the Charles Playhouse before going freelance in 1980.

And that summer, he got one helluva gig in New York. Ono needed a press release photo for a major announcement: Lennon and Ono were returning to the recording studio after a half-decade absence.

Source: boston.com/Lauren Daley

Read More<<<