Why Yoko Ono Remarked She Went from ‘Bitch’ to ‘Witch’ After Meeting Husband John Lennon

Yoko Ono knows her social status changed after she and her late husband John Lennon met. 

In archival footage from the trailer for One to One: John & Yoko, the Japanese multimedia artist and musician, now 92, reflects on how the public’s perception of her changed after she married the Beatles singer.

“I was considered a bitch in this society,” a young Ono says about 40 seconds into the nearly two-minute teaser. 

She adds, “Since I met John, I was upgraded into a witch.”

His words could also be heard over clips of their time together.

“I fell in love with an independent, creative genius,” the British rock star confessed. “I started waking up.”

The former couple met in London in 1966, when he happened to stop Lennon by Ono’s solo exhibit. Soon after, an affair began, which prompted Lennon to leave his first wife, Cynthia Lennon, whom he shared a 5-year-old son, Julian, with.

They married in 1969 and Lennon and Ono became one of the most polarizing and high-profile couples, even beyond his death in 1980.

Ono’s presence in his life seemingly motivated Lennon to explore new ways of creating music and bring new experiences to his fans.

“Why would you do a concert for free?” a journalist asks him in the trailer. 

Lennon responds, “To change the apathy that all of you have. Speak to them. Sing to them. And do anything to get them alive again.”

From there, Lennon and Ono are on stage together — she plays a piano as he sings “Imagine.”

The 1971 hit song was based on concepts found in Ono’s 1964 book Grapefruit, a series of instructional poems. She later received a co-writing credit for the track in 2017.

When asked by another reporter how they would like to be remembered, Lennon says, “Just as two lovers.”

The famed couple welcomed a son, Sean, in 1975.

In a November 2024 interview with PEOPLE, Sean, now 49, opened up about his mother’s reputation as a “witch.”

“She is deeply into cosmic things, to a level that I’ve never seen in anyone else. You could argue that she’s a good witch,” he told PEOPLE while laughing. 

“I was raised with so much cosmic woo-woo stuff that I rebelled against it. I was more interested in science and rational thinking. Growing up, it just felt like everything always had to be about numbers and calculating dates for astrology. [I’d say] ’Mom, can we just do something without worrying about what the tarot cards say?!” 

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Additionally, Lennon and Ono’s documentary — which is directed by Sam Rice-Edwards and Kevin Macdonald — will revisit Lennon’s 1972 benefit concert in New York City.

The Madison Square Garden concert raised $1.5 million to help the children with special needs at Willowbrook State School.

One to One: John & Yoko will be released in the U.K. in IMAX on 9 April and April 11 in America, with a wider release to follow.