Moon Zappa: Alex Winter not my choice for Frank film

A photograph of Moon, Gail and Frank Zappa taken in 1968 — Moon, Gail and Frank Zappa in 1968 (Image credit: Getty)

Frank Zappa’s daughter Moon says Alex Winter wouldn’t have been her choice to direct the upcoming Zappa documentary.

Bill And Ted’s Excellent Adventure actor Winter is behind the Who The F*@% Is Frank Zappa? film, which was the subject of a successful Kickstarter campaign after it raised $1.1million against a $1m target.

But in the midst of a furious family row over rights to the Zappa name and estate, Moon tells Rolling Stone: “He wouldn’t have been my first choice. He might not have been my 100th choice.”

Moon’s brother Dweezil recently had to change his performing name from Zappa Plays Zappa and also rebrand his upcoming tour in the face of cease and desist orders from brother Ahmet, as the family’s relationship battles continue to be played out in public.

Moon Zappa also tells Rolling Stone that she has looked back on her relationship with her mother Gail since she passed away in 2015.

She recalls Gail asking for her forgiveness from her deathbed, but not realising what she was being asked to forgive. She later learned Gail put Ahmet and their sister Diva in charge of the family business.

Moon says: “I was completely blindsided. For a whole year I was taking care of my mother – bringing her green juice and driving her to her doctor appointments. How do you look someone in the eye and say, ‘Thank you for the foot rub,’ and be plotting against that human? It’s unconscionable.”

She also remembers being asked by Gail to sell her house to pay for Frank’s cancer treatment. “She said it had cost them $250,000 to raise me, so I had to sell my house,” Moon says.

“Only recently was I thinking, ‘Wait a second – it cost $250,000 to raise me?’ What a weird sentence to say to your own child.”

In celebration of the 50th anniversary of the release of The Mothers Of Invention’s 1966 debut album Freak Out!, Dweezil will launch his 50 Years of Frank: Dweezil Zappa Plays Whatever the F@%k He Wants – The Cease And Desist Tour in September.

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Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.