With Two ‘60s Legends Onstage, It Seems Almost Like ‘Yesterday’

Iconic pop stars Paul McCartney and Paul Simon shared a stage Thursday at a glittering fund-raiser to fight the scourge of land mines, and while both dipped into their famous songbooks, it was a McCartney poetry reading that seemed to pack the most emotion.

Saying the words “came to me the day John [Lennon] got shot,” McCartney recited a poem called “Jerk of All Jerks” about Mark David Chapman, the gunman who killed McCartney’s former bandmate in 1980. Among the verses: “I’m the guy with the pistol that kills your best friend.”

The black-tie affair at the Regent Beverly Wilshire hotel raised about $500,000 for Adopt-a-Minefield, part of the international campaign to eliminate land mines. Whoopi Goldberg, Roger Daltrey, Larry King and Penny Marshall were among audience members who cheered and sang along as the two famous Pauls took turns performing mini-sets.

An animated Simon, wearing his trademark baseball cap and a white suit, performed “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” “Graceland,” “The Boy in the Bubble” and “Mrs. Robinson” with a seven-piece band.

After Simon’s set, emcee Jay Leno asked, “Is the lad from Liverpool here yet?” McCartney then jogged on stage, doffed his tuxedo jacket and launched into “Yesterday.”

He was joined by a four-piece band for “The Long and Winding Road” and an up-tempo new song, “Drive in the Rain.” For his poetry reading, the band provided a spare musical backdrop, which McCartney joked was “very ‘60s, very beatnik stuff,” a moment of levity prefacing the emotional verse.

He finished up with “Let It Be” before Simon reappeared to join in the rollicking “I’ve Just Seen a Face,” another Beatles selection.