The iconic dance hit “Twist and Shout” has been through a few iterations. R&B vocal group The Top Notes originally recorded the song, written by Phil Medley and Bert Berns, in February 1961. After their version failed to chart, the Isley Brothers gave us the rendition we know and love, complete with the instantly recognizable bridge, in 1962. By 1964, the Beatles had gotten ahold of the song, recorded it in one single take, and sent it to #2 on Billboard’s singles chart. On this day in 1986, “Twist and Shout” resurfaced on the charts thanks to a John Hughes classic.
How The Beatles’ “Twist and Shout” Re-Entered the Charts 25 Years Later
Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in awhile, you could miss it. However, if you’ve seen the seminal 1986 comedy Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, you probably didn’t miss the epic parade scene.
The film centers around the eponymous high school senior, played by Matthew Broderick, who goes to creative and extreme lengths to play hooky from school. Apropos of nothing, he ends up commandeering a float in Chicago’s Von Steuben Day parade, where he lip syncs to “Danke Schoen” and “Twist and Shout.”
Recently, actress Mia Sara, who played Ferris’ girlfriend, Sloane Peterson, reminisced about filming that scene in a June 2025 interview with People. “That was so crazy. Because we would do the dance and then we’d get in a van and they’d drive us blocks away, and the camera would go, and then we’d do the dance again and wait for Matthew to pass,” she recalled. “And so it was just this crazy let’s catch it as many times as we can.”
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John Lennon Hated His Voice in “Twist and Shout”
The instantly iconic scene propelled “Twist and Shout” up the Billboard Hot 100, reaching #23 and giving the Beatles their second charted single of the ’80s. But John Lennon, who died six years earlier at age 40, was never a fan of that song “”because I could sing better than that, but now it doesn’t bother me. You can hear that I’m just a frantic guy doing his best.”
The Beatles would attempt a second take, but by that point, Lennon had nothing left. Thus, “Twist and Shout” went down as “the most famous single take in rock history.”
Featured image by Fiona Adams/Redferns