Tweet

Here is the latest in a series of examinations into urban legends about music and whether they are true or false. Click here to view an archive of the movie urban legends featured so far.

MUSIC LEGEND: The song “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” was inspired by the film “Roman Holiday.”

In 1995, the band Deep Blue Something debuted their hit song, “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”

It was on their second album, Home.

The song is about a couple in a relationship, and the speaker of the song is trying to convince the other half of the relationship that they should stay together, while she argues that they have nothing in common (“no common ground between us”) and he ends up relying on the fairly flimsy fact that they both liked the film “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” as grounds that they should remain a couple (as, after all, they have THAT in common, at least!).

It’s a really catchy song, but its genesis is pretty interesting…

The film Breakfast at Tiffany’s came out in 1961 and starred Audrey Hepburn…

However, amusingly enough, lead singer and songwriter Todd David Pipes actually wrote the song about a DIFFERENT Audrey Hepburn film, Roman Holiday (which came out eight years before Tiffany’s and featured Gregory Peck)!!

Pipes spoke about the situation to Billboard magazine in 1995:

I worked at the library when I was in college. I had 15 minutes before I had to get to work one day and there was an Audrey Hepburn movie on TV, Roman Holiday, and I’d been thinking about the name Breakfast at Tiffany’s for quite a while. It just sounded really romantic. So when I saw the movie I sat down, playing these really simple chords, thinking Breakfast at Tiffany’s.

Just for fun, here’s some more of Pipes’ interview from that issue…

You’d be amazed at the amount of people who come to the show that just love the song. “That’s my favorite song, who’s Tiffany?” And I’m going, can’t you read in the lyrics, “I think I remember the film?” It’s about a movie. “What movie? Can you rent it?” I’m talking about hundreds of people: radio DJs, programmers, people at shows. You tell them it’s about a movie, and they’re just amazed. What amazes me was I thought the whole hook of the song was “Hey, I remember that movie” I thought that’s why people liked it so much, because they liked the movie.”

The legend is…

STATUS: Apparently True

Thanks to Billboard Magazine and Todd David Pipes for the information!

Feel free (heck, I implore you!) to write in with your suggestions for future urban legends columns! My e-mail address is bcronin@legendsrevealed.com