U2's high-profile court case against their former stylist is about much more than who owns a hat and trousers, writes Frank McNally
Her name was Lola. She had a showreel. And when her agent showed it to U2 in early 1987, the band decided she was the person to replace their pregnant stylist on the Joshua Tree world tour. They were poised on the brink of greatness at the time, and the tour would push them over it. Lola Cashman's job was to give them a look to match their defining moment.
The relationship started badly and, after a few highs, ended badly too.
"She was a very good stylist with a very good eye," Bono told a packed courtroom this week. "But it was clear very early on that she was incredibly difficult to work with."
The band seem to have considered the pain worthwhile. At the end, it seems to have been only an excessive asking price that ensured her contract was not renewed. U2 went on to mega-stardom. Lola returned to photo-shoots in England and occasional forays into music with George Michael and the Pet Shop Boys.
She left with a trunkful of memories, and no fewer than 12 cases of actual luggage too. The collection included a pair of Bono's stage trousers, a stetson hat, cheap metal earrings, and a green sweatshirt: all given to her by the singer, she said. U2 say otherwise. And, almost 18 years after the tour ended, the Dublin Circuit Civil Court has been asked to rule on the ownership of the four items.
It was "essentially a one-issue case", the band's council Paul Sreenan said. But the two-day hearing was mired in extraneous issues, and it was clear the two parties had brought a lot of excess baggage to court. The background included a case begun by Cashman in London - now stayed pending the decision here - in which she claims she was defamed in a letter from U2 to the auctioneering house Christie's, questioning her ownership of memorabilia offered for sale in 2002.
The Christie's list included not only the four items now at issue but also a pair of boots autographed by Larry Mullen, which U2 said the drummer could not remember ever wearing, never mind signing. He has since conceded that the boots were his and that he did indeed give them to Cashman, complete with autograph. But Bono, who was the only band member to give evidence, rejected defence counsel Hugh Hartnett's suggestion that the Dublin case was "a stunt" conceived when the band realised they had "a problem" with their Christie's letter.
THEN THERE WAS the book. For rock stars who have reached the top and stayed there for two decades while successfully guarding their private lives, Cashman's U2 memoir, Inside the Zoo (published 2003) was a bitter pill. Bono, whose penis size is among the issues discussed in it, was probably putting it mildly when he said that, "sad" as U2 were over the auction, "we were even sadder when we heard about the book". But he also rejected suggestions that this was the real reason for the band's challenge on the memorabilia.
The giddy excitement on the first day of the case, when young barristers joined the queue of admirers looking for autographs, died down when the U2 entourage left. But the dramatic climax of the hearing was on day two. The band's lawyers had invited Cashman to repeat her claim to the creation of Bono's "iconic" stetson-hat look, made famous in the film of the tour, Rattle and Hum. Whereupon they produced documentary footage of the singer buying a stetson before the stylist joined the band. And yet, even this had only an indirect bearing on the disputed hat's ownership (it was a different hat in any case).
As they couldn't but do in the wake of the boots incident, U2 to some extent conceded the unreliability of memory after 18 years. It was admitted that the green sweatshirt - an official tour souvenir ("swag" in the industry term) that Bono happened to have worn - might be in a different category to the other items. The singer couldn't claim to be "100 per cent" sure he hadn't gifted it to the stylist, and allowed there was a "tiny" possibility he had given her the earrings too.
IT WAS AROUND the hat and trousers that the band's wagons were circled. The main thrust of the argument was that a clear line existed between personal clothes (such as Larry's boots), that could be given away, and "working" costumes, which were owned collectively and, when no longer worn, archived or donated to museums. Several of U2's 10 witnesses stressed that crew members never asked for items of stage gear - as Cashman says she did - because it was unthinkable they would get them.
The stylist painted a different picture, one of backstage "chaos" with no clear lines, where old clothes were often simply discarded, and stage wardrobe was not particularly respected by the band. After concerts she would "have to run around like a mummy to get clothes off the guys", she said, adding: "They've obviously become very sophisticated now."
Bono rebuffed counsel's suggestion that the band's interest in archiving came only after the epochal 1987 tour. "Oh no," he quipped, to laughter. "We had delusions of grandeur from a very early age."
Cashman was the only witness for the defence, and Hartnett played up her image as one woman against the U2 corporation. Reminding Bono he was a very wealthy man - "I don't say that as a criticism" - he contrasted his client's very limited means and said she was even poorer since U2 secured a £34,000 (€50,271) (preliminary costs) order against her in London.
The singer said he was aware of this. It was "in great sadness" the band members took the action against a woman to whom their acknowledged gifts included a pair of "Connemara rosary beads".
Judge Matthew Deery will deliver judgment in the case on Tuesday.