The Making of Prince Purple Rain Explained

In 1984 the soundtrack “Purple Rain” successfully hit the top of the chart and remained on the top for a very long time. After a month later, the film was released and quickly become a cult classic.

The Complete History Of Prince Purple Rain

Everyone wants to know the complete history of prince purple rain and how it was made. Everything starts on August 3, 1983. Purple rain is the sixth album of the prince. The song is composed by American musician Prince and his backing band “The Revolution”.

It was a creative time; there was a lot of influence of band members what he was doing. Everyone wants to contribute their creativity to the process of writing. However, Prince was the main lyricist for all the songs and he has never taken any content from others.

The most trusted advisors of Prince were Wendy and Lisa who was west costars and held music royalty percentage. Prince preferred female company in the music studio. Along with Wendy and Lisa, engineers Susan Rogers and Peggy McCreary also handled the recording responsibilities of purple rain.

As the women are very nurturing nature, he hired the women in the music studio as he wanted to create an atmosphere, where people are creative as well as flexible too.

Another important woman in the purple rain was Wendy Melvoin’s twin sister Susannah. Later, she became a star on her own with the guidance of Prince. Besides, the leading lady of the purple rain Patty ‘Apollonia’ Kotero was also an important part of this entire journey.

Prince has started carrying a big purple notebook for writing ideas for movie script instead of focusing on new albums. In 1999, he made it clear that the new songs will be used for a soundtrack for the movie, in which he would be the star. This was Prince’s final ultimatum to his label Warner Brothers.

Even after ninety weeks, the Prince was still on the charts. Hollywood never took Prince seriously for the leading man in the movies. However, in the end, the Warner Brothers finally agreed to pony up the money for his untitled film project.

The first draft of the screenplay was written by William Blinn. He was known for his Emmy-winning TV movie Brian’s Song, and episodes of Starsky & Hutch. He was frustrated with the least communication from the artist. However, he managed to hash out a semi-autobiographical script.

Later, the screenplay fell to Albert Magnoli, a 30-year-old director, who only had a one acclaimed student short film. He described the love triangle between the lead, the kid, the comic one, and beautiful ingénue.

Magnoli outlined the tension between the kid and brand and how he has struggled to become a team player. After the script, the first three months were invested at the start of the film process.

Prince has hired acting coach and dancing instructor to get all the elements and he worked nonstop. He was always natural in front of the camera and get ready with his lines. The shoot was wrapped within six months before just after Christmas.

The soundtrack purple rain had sold 2.5 million copies a month before the movie opened. In the end, the purple rain was the greatest gift for the prince as he found his way to belong to the music world at large.