Beatles fans on a tour of Liverpool got the experience of a lifetime when Sir Paul McCartney pulled up beside their bus at traffic lights.
The chance encounter was made all the more surreal when it emerged that McCartney was on a video call with his former bandmate, Ringo Starr.
The “Hey Jude” star waved to fans while passengers took photos until the lights changed.
“It was surreal,” Neil Morton, who has driven the Magical Mystery Tour bus around Beatles hotspots in Liverpool for the last two years, told the BBC.
“I had pulled up at the traffic lights on Hope Street when who should I see – Sir Paul with Ringo on FaceTime.”
He added: “The passengers could not believe it.”
The tour guide said that while no one got a chance to speak with McCartney, it wasn’t his first encounter with the star; he met the “Wings” singer when he used to work at the Cavern Club.
“We were told not to take photos but I managed to sneak one,” he told the BBC.
Beatlemania is at a renewed frenzy as fans wait for Sam Mendes’s anticipated four-film series about the Fab Four, with actors Paul Mescal, Harrison Dickinson, Barry Keoghan and Joseph Quinn starring as McCartney, John Lennon, Starr and George Harrison, respectively.
The four Beatles films, each focusing on a different band member, are due for release in April 2028.
Other cast members include Aimee Lou Wood as Pattie Boyd, Saoirse Ronan as Linda McCartney, Mia McKenna-Bruce as Maureen Starkey, and Anna Sawai as Yoko Ono.
The past few years have also seen the release of a number of Beatles-related projects, including McCartney’s latest solo album The Boys of Dungeon Lane, Peter Jackson’s 2021 documentary Get Back, and the announcement of a new dedicated Beatles experience at the former Apple Corps headquarters at 3 Savile Row, London.
Scheduled to launch in 2027, the project, titled “The Beatles at 3 Savile Row”, has the backing of McCartney and Starr, along with London mayor Sadiq Khan.
In 2023, The Beatles topped the charts with what was billed as their final single, “Now and Then”, which was nominated for the Grammy Awards for Record of the Year and Best Rock Performance.
McCartney, who knew his bandmates from school before they went on to achieve global fame, was in town to present actor and producer Stephen Graham with an award at his performing arts school.
Graham is being presented with a companionship of the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts (LIPA) by McCartney, a co-founder of the school.
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