In mid-May 1968, John Lennon and Paul McCartney flew to New York to announce the Beatles' latest venture, Apple. After holding interviews in their hotel suite with Time, Newsweek, Business Week, and Forbes magazines and conducting a press conference, the two Beatles appeared on NBC-TV's Tonight Show on May 14. While viewers may have naïvely hoped the pair would perform, John and Paul were there to talk business.

John explained that their accountant had told them that they could give their money to the government or do something with it. “So we decided to play businessmen for a bit, because we've got to run our own affairs now. So we've got this thing called Apple, which is going to be records, films, and electronics, which all tie up. And to make a sort of an umbrella so people who want to make films about … grass … don't have to get on their knees in an office, you know, begging for a break. We'll try and do it like that. That's the idea. I mean we'll find out what happens, but that's what we're trying to do.”