Forget the 27 Club: Eddie Cochran blasted onto the nascent rock n’ roll scene at the age of 18, performed a handful of swaggering early genre classics (several of which he co-wrote), starred in a salacious exploitation movie and then died at the age of 21—but not before influencing a generation of guitar-wielding, stylishly coiffed rock n’ rollers.
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Now, six decades after the rock n’ roll pioneer’s tragic death, Don’t Forget Me—the first official documentary about Eddie Cochran—is coming to tell his story. And a slew of A-list rock talent has signed on to help. Billboard can reveal that Keith Richards, Yungblud, Ronnie Wood, Roger Daltrey, Alice Cooper, Rod Stewart, Kiefer Sutherland, Sting, John Waters, Billy Idol, Linda Perry, Peter Frampton, Brian Setzer, Suzi Quatro, Stephen Sanchez and members of the Cochran family are part of exclusive on-camera interviews filmed for Don’t Forget Me.
If you’re wondering why Kiefer Sutherland is part of this esteemed company of cross-generational rock talent, well, the Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning actor is more than just a fan: he almost was Eddie Cochran. Following his breakout success in the 1987 vampire flick The Lost Boys, Sutherland was in talks to star as Cochran in a film about the rocker’s brief life. (This would have been a decade after Gary Busey played Buddy Holly and a year or so before Dennis Quaid portrayed Jerry Lee Lewis.)
“I’m 18, 19 years old and I was given a screenplay that was gonna tell the life of Eddie Cohran—tragically the short life of Eddie Cochran,” Sutherland says in an advance clip from the film, which you can watch below. “I read it and it gave me some stories about him I really appreciated. I thought he was so cool, because he was so young and yet he was breaking this incredible ground creatively and musically. I was so impressed with his character.”
Though his career was brief, the Minnesota-born Cochran was an essential force in early rock music from 1956—which marked his on-screen debut in the Jayne Mansfield-starring The Girl Can’t Help It, where he oozed attitude while singing his rockabilly original “Twenty Flight Rock”—until his death on April 17, 1960, while on tour in England with fellow rock legend Gene Vincent (both were involved in the same car accident, which Vincent survived).
Cochran’s enduring classics include the aforementioned “Twenty Flight Rock” (which Paul McCartney sang to John Lennon prior to forming The Beatles) as well as Billboard Hot 100 hits “C’Mon Everybody,” “Teenage Heaven,” “Somethin’ Else” (later covered by Led Zeppelin and Sex Pistols) and the Hot 100 top 10 “Summertime Blues.” A stone-cold classic, “Summertime Blues” has been covered by everyone from Buck Owens to Blue Cheer to The Who to Alan Jackson to Rush. (Cochran also notched a top 20 hit on a pre-Hot 100 Billboard chart with “Sittin’ in the Balcony.”) In addition to The Girl Can’t Help It, Cochran also co-starred in the 1957 teensploitation flick Untamed Youth alongside Mamie Van Doren (one poster’s tagline: “Youth turned rock-and-roll wild and punishment farm that makes them wilder!”).
Directed by Kirsty Bell, Don’t Forget Me comes from Goldfinch Entertainment; it was crafted in partnership with the Cochran Family Estate, with the participation of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and Universal Music Enterprises. The film’s release details will be announced in the coming months.