Jagger on the first night at The Beacon Theatre:

"What Keith was saying, it's good to play there more than one night. I agree with him, because the first night we played was more like a rehearsal for us in a way. By the time the second night came around, we got more adjusted to playing in this smaller theatre, because though we played lots of small theatres in the past, we hadn’t done it on this tour. So this is quite different, suddenly, to go into a small theatre. So by the second night, we knew... do it! This is going to be the night with all these people there and everything. So I felt really good about that particular night. So you just have to sometimes come and do it."

Scorsese on how it feels to be back in Boston after making The Departed:

"For me, it's great to be back in Boston. It's a little cold right now, especially at night, but aside from that it's really good, and we're working a little bit outside of Boston, in Medfield and places like that."

Jagger, Richards, and Scorsese on why Martin was chosen and what he brought the project as a director:

MICK JAGGER JAGGER: He's the best one around... [and] well, I can’t answer that. I mean, I’m going to embarrass him now. He’s not part of the furniture, you know. He’s actually sittin’ here. [laughs] And so he’s a fantastic director and he assembled a wonderful crew. I think that he would agree with that. He got fantastic DPs, camera, lighting, everyone workin’ on it. And then [he was] very painstaking on the editing to produce the movie that you see. It’s not all in the shooting. It’s obviously in the editing, too.

KEITH RICHARDS: Also we didn't choose Marty, Marty chose us.

MARTIN SCORSESE: It was mutual.

Martin Scorsese on comparing The Stones to one of the mafia crews from his films:

"That’s an interesting question. You know, I don’t know if I can make direct associations to it. But the music is something that deals with [it]. I’m gonna tell you, it reminds me of when I went to see Threepenny Opera back in 1959 - 1960 at the Theatre Delique and how the music affected me and what that was saying; what that play said. And the lyrics, the lyrics are so important to me in that particular play. I found I grew up in an area that was kind of, in a sense, like the Threepenny Opera. And I think at times their music - The Rolling Stones music - had the similar affect on me. It dealt with aspects of a life that I was growing up [with] around me that I was associated with or saw, or was experiencing and trying to make sense of. So it was tougher, it had an edge. Beautiful and honest and brutal, brutal at times, and powerful. It’s always stayed with me and it’s become a well of inspiration. To this day, as Mick said in Berlin, he said, 'I want you to know that this is the only film - Shine a Light is the only film that 'Gimme Shelter' is not played in that I’ve made.' [laughs] And when I use 'Gimme Shelter' in a film, which I think is just as apropos of the world we’re living in today, Gimme Shelter. When I use it in a film, I don’t remember that I used it before. I said, 'Well, let’s use that.' And they said, 'Marty, you did it before.' I said, 'Well, that’s alright. Let’s put it in.' [laughs] I keep forgetting, you know, but it’s something that the music has been very important to me over these years."

Martin Scorsese on using "Gimme Shelter" in The Departed and also selecting obscure songs like "Let It Loose":

"Well, for me, I think it's from "Exile" isn't it? "Exile on Main Street" is an album I like a lot and that, again, is sort of in my DNA so to speak. It just came the way Jack Nicholson sat down next to Leonardo DiCaprio and said, 'Do you know who I am?" The tone of that and the mood I found' I heard that sound from that song, and I played it against it. I tried a couple of other things afterwards, because invariably, you say, 'That's the first one... it works but it can't be [that easy to do]. Working on the first try can't be that way.' So we tried some other songs, but we went back to "Let It Loose" and placed it just at the right moment in between the dialogue for the highlights of the song, but it had the tone and the mood and again, the edge that the scene had and the characters were like really."

Scorsese on the specific narrative arc in the film:

"We had hoped for that arc. That’s where the tension is. That’s where we need them to perform the way they are. I can’t put cameras in their way, yet I wanted to get that arc. And I knew that if you call the arc, I knew that getting certain camera men and Ellen Kuras, also Bob Richardson, all of these people working together, they also could find the angles and find the looks and know when to pan to Ronnie on guitar, know when to pan to Keith, know when to stay on Mick and Charlie... that sort of thing. And so I was hoping that the cameras in those positions would get those moments. Then that was constructed in the editing."

Jagger and Richards on the guest appearances in the film and their relationship with Buddy Guy:

JAGGER: Well, Buddy Guy, we’ve done. In fact, we’ve done quite a few shows with Buddy Guy in the past. I think we’ve known him on and off for quite a long time. He’s like one of those continually wonderful blues performers that you admire.

RICHARDS: I met him through Muddy Waters And then it goes back a long way.

JAGGER: And I think that the thing that Marty captured, the duet thing that we did with him, was really one of the high points of the movie for me.

RICHARDS: I didn’t give him that guitar for nothing, man. [laughs]

JAGGER: You mean that wasn’t just for show?

RICHARDS: Hat’s off, a high point to me on that.

JAGGER: Yeah, and I think the other guests are really - in their own slightly different ways - [they] all add to the movie. And I like all of the duets very much, I think they really will work, because they don’t always work. But they...

RICHARDS: Christina’s [Aguilera] very soulful.

JAGGER: I think that everyone sort of likes all the duets and they really come off.

Shining a Light with The Stones and Scorsese Page 3