Kevin Bacon recently sat down with Jimmy Kimmel and recalled how he got his daughter, Sosie, to sing ‘Life On Mars,’ in a low-budgeted film, meeting David Bowie at a party, how the rocker told Bacon he was influenced by him while practicing his American accent and why, upon hearing that, Kevin decided to ask for a small favor.
The actor has been a longtime fan of Bowie’s music, so when the opportunity came to have his daughter sing a Bowie song for the low-budget movie, ‘Lover Boy,’ in the early ’00s, Bacon was thrilled. However, he knew there would be copyright issues, and using ‘Life On Mars’ would over cost the budget.
So, when Bacon met David at a party and got over the initial shock, the pair started to chat. To Kevin’s joy, the singer liked his movies, even disclosing that he would watch Bacon while practicing his American accent. Upon hearing this, the actor couldn’t help but ask David for a favor, wishing for a bit of a discount in copyright for the film’s use of ‘Life On Mars.’
The actor, on meeting David and asking him for his help:
“I’m at a party, and David Bowie is there, and actor shmactor. I can meet any actor; it’s not that big of a deal when I meet my rock gods; I pee my pants. It can be very overwhelming in a weird way. But he was very nice, and he struck up a conversation with me, and he said, ‘You know what? I’ve watched a lot of your movies to learn how to do an American accent.’ and my jaw just dropped because, you can imagine, I was like, [mimics stuttering] Bo-Bowie.
So I said, ’Listen since I have you here, someday there may be a request coming up your desk. We’re planning on making this tiny little movie, and there’s a scene where a little girl is going to sing ‘Life on Mars’ a capella. So if that does happen to fall into your lap, can you show pity on us and give us a break on the cost.’ [And] we got our first song.”
It was definitely a delight for Bacon to learn that Bowie liked his films and used to learn from his accent while practicing his American accent. He also was surely proud to hear that from his rock hero, and things got even better when David helped the film to use his ever-iconic song.
