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A source close to Mick Jagger has cast doubt on a claim by Melania producer Marc Beckman that his team was closely involved with the singer over the use of a Rolling Stones song in the film.
The film, which follows the first lady in the 20 days leading up to Donald Trump’s second inauguration in January 2025, opens with a sequence in Mar-a-Lago soundtracked to the Rolling Stones’ Gimme Shelter. Despite being owned by music company ABKCO, Beckman told Variety that Jagger “was actually involved” and “gave us his blessing”.
“We worked very close with them on that,” Beckman continued. “And that wasn’t a political thing. With the Stones, they were just like, ‘Oh, you’re making a nice movie.’ They were like able to get over the hurdle. It’s not politics – it’s just some story about some woman that is going from being a civilian back into the White House, and this movie looks cool and Brett [Ratner] is doing a cool job and Melania Trump is focused, and let’s do it. We showed it to them and they were impressed.”
Speaking off the record, the source close to Jagger said he felt scepticism was necessary as the producer was attempting to promote the movie. A spokesperson for the Rolling Stones also told the Guardian the deal to use Gimme Shelter in the film was made exclusively between rights holders ABKCO and Melania’s producers, and that the band had nothing to do with it.
The Rolling Stones are among those artists who have previously objected to the use of their songs in rallies for Donald Trump. Others include Guns N’ Roses. Grace Jones, the estate of Prince, Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, Adele, Queen, REM, Elton John, Abba, Jack White, Céline Dion, the Foo Fighters and the estates of Isaac Hayes and Tom Petty.
Beckman also told Variety that the first three of these had also been approached with a view to using their music on Melania, but refused on political grounds.
He clarified that the members of Guns N’ Roses were split on the decision, which needed to be unanimous, while Jones “apparently couldn’t get over the political hurdle, notwithstanding the fact that the film is not a political film”. While the rights holders to the Prince song requested were reportedly in favour of it being used, the lawyer managing his estate vetoed the request, saying: “Prince would never want his song associated with Donald Trump.”
Beckman said that he protested that the film was “not a Donald Trump film! He comes into the movie once in a while, but this is all about Melania. It’s not political. And that guy blocked it. It’s so ridiculous.”
The Village People anthem YMCA is a staple of Trump rallies and features on the Melania soundtrack, as does Billie Jean by Michael Jackson, which Melania says is her favourite song by her favourite artist.
As well as Jackson’s version, the audience hears an impromptu cover by the first lady and Ratner as they duet on the tune in the back of a limo.
In the Variety interview, Beckman – who has been an adviser to Melania Trump for 25 years – also discussed the impasse over use of a song from Jonny Greenwood’s soundtrack to Phantom Thread. Greenwood and director Paul Thomas Anderson requested the removal of the track, citing a lack of notice given to Greenwood by rights owner Universal. The music currently remains in Ratner’s film and Beckman said he believed it would stay so “for ever, regardless of the infrastructure which delivers the content”.
Beckman attributed Greenwood’s distaste to “just part of the unfortunate time we’re living in. We went out and created a nice film that doesn’t get into any kind of political policy or anything like that.” He also said the row had not dinted his fandom for Radiohead, saying he would continued to “listen to their music every single day”.
Amazon paid $40m (£29.6m) for the rights to Melania and spent $35m (£25.9m) on marketing. The film opened earlier this month and has so far made around $16.4m (£12.1m) worldwide, 98% of which comes from its US take.
The film scored a better-than-expected $7m (£5.2m) in the US on its first weekend of release before falling 67% in its second week. In the UK it opened at No 29 before falling 88% week-on-week to No 62. No showtimes are currently available for the film in the UK.
Beckman addressed the record-breaking disparity between the film’s critics rating on aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes and the scores given to the films by audience members (who could verify a ticket purchase via Fandango).
“What really is a critic’s job today?” he said. “It’s worse than bias. It’s like they’re voting, with political ideology first. There were some critiques I read that didn’t even talk about the film; they only spoke about President Trump. That’s just unfortunately where we are today in society.”
