The Beatles' 1966 US tour tour, the band returned to Shea Stadium in New York, where they performed to an audience of 45,000, compared with the 56,000 world record attendance they had achieved the previous year. After the 1966 tour, they would become a studio band and focused exclusively on record production. In March 1966, Maureen Cleave interviewed John Lennon and the rest of the Beatles as part of a "London Evening Standard" series on the theme "How Does a Beatle Live?" During the Lennon interview at Kenwood, Cleave noted Lennon's interest in Christianity and religions, to which he replied: Although the article went largely
A Quiet Word With ... had interviewed anyone on television, and the first time he interviewed anyone by himself in twenty years. Some time later Martin viewed an "infuriating" interview with American comedian and actor Will Ferrell on the Nine Network's "A Current Affair" that involved the reporter attempting to get Ferrell to repeat catchphrases from the film "" rather than containing anything of substance; Martin regarded this interview as an embarrassment to the nation. These two factors gave him the idea for a more substantive interview program, and inspired him to create "A Quiet Word With ...". The first episode, featuring Martin conversing with