Ozzy Osbourne’s final months were filmed for a BBC documentary, his son Jack has revealed.
Osbourne made his remarks in today’s Weekend magazine in an interview conducted before Ozzy’s death at the age of 76 this week.
Ozzy’s youngest son, 39, told the Mail at the time of the interview that cameras were there filming Ozzy and his wife Sharon in their Buckinghamshire mansion.
The series Home To Roost originally promised to follow the couple as they returned to their home in Buckinghamshire after 20 years of living in the US, but is now likely to be more of a tribute to the late rock star.
He also confirmed that his father had finished an autobiography titled Last Rites, which is due out in the autumn.
Jack also spoke excitedly about his work as co-producer on the much-anticipated biopic on his father. He promised there would be lots of drugs, groupies and mayhem in the dramatic retelling, but also Ozzy and Sharon’s love story.
He said: ‘Right now it’ll take place over the Sabbath era and early 1980s. We’re definitely going for a more adult rating for the film.
‘This is by no means going to be a fluff piece.’
Oppenheimer’s Oscar and Bafta-nominated Florence Pugh has been touted as a prospective Sharon with Hollywood funnyman Bill Hader as a possible Ozzy.
Lee Hall, who wrote the Elton John biopic Rocketman, has submitted a draft script. ‘Right now we’re going through a rewrite with Craig Borten, who wrote [Matthew McConaughey-starring] Dallas Buyers Club,’ Jack said.
Five days before the interview with Jack, Ozzy had played a farewell concert in front of 40,000 at Birmingham’s Villa Park and around 5 million watching on the live stream to belt out their classics such as Iron Man and Paranoid as he reunited with his band Black Sabbath for the first time in eight years.
The plaudits following the gig were incredible, as his son told him afterwards, urging him: ‘Dad, you’ve got to see these reviews – they’re all amazing. Everyone loved the show and your performance.’
Jack said watching his dad on stage was ‘very emotional. Just to see him up there doing his job was great. We were all tearing up.’
His dad, however, remained nonplussed and replied with his typical blunt wit: ‘Lot of f***ing good that does me. I’m retired now!’
In the interview, Jack gave no clue that Ozzy’s demise would be so soon. He said: ‘Listen, everyone gets old, everyone slows down as you age – it’s part of the journey.
‘I just try and support him as much as I can. We all do.’
In a statement issued by the Osbournes after his death, they remarked that during his final moments, ‘he was with his family and surrounded by love’.
Kelly Osbourne said she had lost her ‘best friend’ following the death of her father. In a heartfelt message posted to her Instagram stories on Thursday, Kelly shared lyrics from the Black Sabbath song Changes, a track she famously re-recorded with her father.
‘I feel unhappy I am so sad. I lost the best friend I ever had,’ she wrote next to an emoji of a broken heart.
Released in 2003, their re-imagined duet hit number one on the UK singles chart.
The duo became only the second father-daughter act to top the charts, following Nancy and Frank Sinatra’s Somethin’ Stupid in 1967.
