My two conversations with Sean Ono Lennon

Tom Brook was the first on the scene when the BBC reported on John Lennon's death, later interviewing his widow, Yoko Ono, and their young son. Today, he reconnects with Sean Ono Lennon on his parents' legacy – and giving peace a chance.

On 8 December 1980, I was getting ready for bed in my tiny Greenwich Village apartment when a colleague phoned with the alarming news of reports of gunshots outside The Dakota Apartment building and that possibly John Lennon was the target. I wasted no time. I gathered my tape recorder, microphone, notepad and a portable radio and ran to 8th Avenue to hail a cab uptown. En route, I willed the taxi driver to go faster as we listened to radio reports confirming that Lennon had indeed been shot. He'd been taken to Roosevelt Hospital. It didn't sound good. At 23:15 that night, Lennon was pronounced dead.

Forty-five years have elapsed since the former Beatle – then 40 years old – was murdered by a fan as he returned home with his wife, Yoko Ono. It was a night I will never forget, both professionally and personally. I was in my mid-20s, newly arrived in New York and a huge Lennon fan. I really felt the loss, but it was by pure chance that I ended up being the voice on BBC News that brought word of Lennon's slaying to an early morning UK audience, with the first live radio reports from outside The Dakota.

I was still pretty fresh to journalism and inexperienced. Normally, the job of reporting a death so momentous would have fallen to Paul Reynolds, the staff's New York correspondent at the time, but he was out of town on another story.

When I first arrived at the scene, Ono was still in the emergency room at Roosevelt Hospital, but Lennon's five-year-old son Sean was in their fifth-floor apartment, hundreds of wailing fans congregating in the street below. In the aftermath, I often wondered how difficult that must have been for both mother and son. Two years later, back at The Dakota, I met them both to record a BBC TV interview in their living room. Ono told me that, as far as she was concerned, John Lennon was very much with us: "He's still alive, he's still with us, his spirit will go on. You can't kill a person that easily."

As she spoke, seven-year-old Sean contributed to the interview, excited by the prospect of Christmas Day, which was fast approaching, then as it is now. To him, there was a joy to the day: "I get up in the morning. I say 'Yay, no school!' and then I play with my friend." He came across as a sweet and animated young boy.

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Recently, I interviewed Sean once again. He resembles both his parents and their philosophy. Physically, with his long hair, Sean looks like his father. I have met Ono on several occasions as a reporter. I found her fascinating, if a little mysterious. Sean, by contrast, seems more of an open book. Although he strikes me as someone who has thought a lot about himself and his place in the world as the son of a world-famous music icon, he doesn't come across as narcissistic or self-referential.

During our interview, it dawned on me that what John Lennon has left behind isn't just his music and idealism, but his legacy is carried forward by Sean, as it is by Julian Lennon, the older son with whom John had a more difficult relationship in the margins of his astronomical career. When Sean came along, Lennon took time off to nurture him attentively.

In the song Beautiful Boy (Darling Boy), written for Sean, he expresses his love for his young son and his wish to be a better father. It's a lovely song and, like a lullaby, its lyrics are full of optimism: "Every day, in every way, it's getting better and better." An admirable hope, of course cut tragically short that night in 1980, two months after the record had been released. I had this in mind when I interviewed Sean, now hardly a boy, but a middle-aged man and accomplished musician in his own right.

As a musician, sometimes his voice resembles that of his father. And like him, Sean has been experimental in his work, swimming across genres. Politically, he has spoken out on environmental, economic and social justice issues, often sounding a bit like John Lennon. When we speak, he stresses that whatever blows he's encountered in life, he makes a point of remaining an optimist, and it seems to be serving him well.

On optimism, Sean clarifies it's a matter of necessity in order to see a better future. This is part of his explanation as to why he so fully endorses his parents' peace activism, and believes it to be as relevant today as it was 50 years ago. This can be witnessed in the 2024 documentary One to One: John & Yoko, now streaming on HBO Max, which focuses on the pair's first years in New York City in the early 1970s.

"I think the biggest thing that's missing are thought leaders, like my dad, who believed in peace and love. You know, I looked at the social media accounts of the most famous rock stars of today, and none of them are calling for peace and unity. I never see that. I never see anyone saying, you know, we should love our brothers and sisters. I think that there's a message to be learned about how peace and love and tolerance for our fellow humans is a missing element of today's political discourse." 

John Lennon's anti-war philosophy is often defined by his songs like Give Peace a Chance and by slogans such as the massive billboard campaign he and Ono created, declaring "War is Over! (If You Want it)". Their efforts had a multitude of champions, but also critics who viewed them as simplistic. Sean concedes the complaints weren't without some merit. "It was a little bit naive, but that was the power of it. These ideas of, you know, 'war's over if you want it'. I think they're still very potent, because of the simplicity. So, I guess I wouldn't call it naivete. I would call it simplicity. And I think there's a beauty in simplicity." Ever in his parents' corner, he adds, "but I don't think they were naive people". Instead, he says, there was a "virality" to their work. "They were using memes before that was a concept."

The pair performed just one concert together, at New York's Madison Square Garden on 30 August 1972 – it is this event that forms the backbone of the One to One documentary, the music of which has been newly remixed by Sean himself for the film.

For me, meeting Sean as an adult was a very emotional experience. On the night his father died, while hundreds gathered sobbing outside The Dakota, I didn't shed a tear. As journalists we are taught to suppress our emotions, but when I listen back to my live report of that night, I can hear a hint of emotion in my delivery.

Talking to Sean made me aware that I carry around some degree of guilt that my career as a BBC journalist took off as a result of covering his father's demise. I was a struggling freelancer in New York at the time and Lennon's death put me on the map with BBC News editors in London – and brought me plenty of work.

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"I think that life is often like that," Sean told me, generous in his response. "I think it's a kind of great paradox of the Universe that very often, the very worst things are the very best things on the flip side. The darkest things always come with kind of great rewards, as well, if you can survive it."

That simplicity with a dash of depth, warmth and empathy for his audience felt like a glimpse at John Lennon. Ono is in there, too, the mark she has left on Sean shining through.

I never met John Lennon. By some accounts, he could be difficult, but he was incredibly gifted, and, I believe, full of good intentions – and authentic, to borrow a buzzword of today he probably would have worn proudly. I felt that was true with Sean, too. After our half-hour conversation, 43 years after the first, I was left thinking that John Lennon would feel pretty good about the way his beautiful boy has turned out.

One to One: John & Yoko is now streaming on HBO Max in the US and on Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video in the UK.

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