The Pet Shop Boys first asked photographer and film maker Bruce Weber if he would make a video with them a couple of years ago when "Domino Dancing" was Corning out. They met him in New York whilst recording demos with Liza Minnelli. At the time he was keen, but too busy; he was working on his second documentary film, Let's Get Lost, (a Film about the late jazz trumpeter Chet Baker. His first film was about boxing, Broken Noses).

At the end of last year they bumped into his producer at Liza Minnelli's anniversary party and the producer reaffirmed that Bruce was interested. As we wrote Being Boring! we thought of Bruce Weber to make the video", remembers Neil "because we thought it would fit his style His work has this innocent quality and you also never know whether it's in the past or the present It has this timelessness." It was to be Bruce Weber's first video- They discussed some ideas over the phone.

Chris just said " I wanted it to he sexy - he laughed at that!' and Neil told him about the Zelda Fitzgerald quote that had inspired him It was filmed in one day at he beginning of October in a house in Long Island, just out side New York: Bruce Weber chose long Island because of its associations with Zelda and Scott F Fitzgerald. Bruce Weber had explained his idea of a wonderful party: he said be didn't want it to be street because he looked at MTV and everything was street and he thought it was corny He wanted it to be like this beautiful fantasy". When the Pet Shop Boys turned up they felt quite intimidated, all these beautiful people running around in towels.

(The cast were people Bruce Weber was friends with. Or knew the girlfriends or boyfriends of, or bad photographed before. They included Neneb Cherry's half-brother. Ex-TV presenter Eagle Eye, and Robert de Niro's daughter).
Originally the video begun with everyone on the stairs with their eyes closed and Neil saying to the camera the Zelda Fitzgerald quote she covered her face with powder and paint because she didn't "need it and she refused to be bored chiefly because she wasn't boring. She was conscious that the things she did were the things she had always wanted go do".

It turned out to be too complicated so the video eventually began with a handwritten message (written by one or Bruce Weber's friends) based on things Neil has said, reading I come from Newcastle in the North of England. We used to have lots of parties where everyone got dressed up. And on one party invitation was the quote "she was never bored because she Was never boring". The song is about growing up -the ideals that you have when you're young and how they turn out. The Pet Shop Boys" The video, of which Neil and Chris &e very proud, is, Neil observes, "in a way the video of the first verse or the song".

Literally talked to Bruce Weber about it.

What did you know about Pet shop Boys?

I'd listened to the music for a long time and I'd always loved it, because it always took me to another place. I think my images of them was that they were not just singers and songwriters hut had a kind of artful attitude about what they did. And I liked their charm and enthusiasm. I remember hearing "west End Girls" and I just loved that song so much. You know?

What had you deduced from their videos and photographs?
They were kind of my stenos. They always reflected to me a lot or the attitudes that were happening on the streets in England. I always feel that being on the street in London was a real inspirational place and they represented a lot of those feelings.
You thought they need very English? Yes
What about them seen Like that ?

Oh... you know... (laughs)... they like black.
What did you-a when you fin' met them?
I thought they had to be great because they had that sensibility, and they were. You meet a lot or musicians and they're so chatty about themselves, and they weren't. They were really interested in what I thought Usually when you meet musicians to talk about a video they just care about what they think.
What they're going to look like
Exactly.

Why had you not done a video before?
Time and circumstance, and I also fell that I really wanted to fall in love with a song. Because t knew I was going to have to listen to it about a million times (laughs). I got the tape and I loved it; I had an immediate reaction to it. I thought it had a lot of musicales and a lot to say, I loved the lyrics and really felt that it was something I wanted to be part of.

Before you discussed it with them, what did you pick up that the song was about?
The feeling that times are different today, and that feeling of abandoned we can't have today because of the way the world is the whole sexual thing with AIDS, the feeling of different groups around the world trying to ban a lot of visual things. The world's really different from the times I think Neil and Chris are writing and singing about in the song. We talked about the lyrics and talked about (laughs) having a party, you know. r really wanted to show what the kind of panics were like that I used to go to- We found a house where the owner wasn't there much, and I think the man not being there gave a spirit of when I'd go to friends houses and we'd stay for two days. I wanted to give something like that back to a lot of kids who couldn't really do what I did when I was that age.
You'd got to parties like the one in the video?

Yeah! I used to have a lot of, you know, eccentric friends. And I was really inspired by the attitude of the way parties were in European films when I was growing up, he kind of things where people would stay for days. In American films they were always like a huge fraternity party but in French and Italian films... That sort of beautiful overindulgence?
Right. And I really felt the song was about that loss of abandoned, and that fear of indulgence that is so prevalent now. We have to behave differently now. But we can't be afraid to look at things and to dream and he transported.

Why were there annual's there?
In certain films especially French films of Renoir - there was always a country animal brought as a pet. Like in he Bertolucci film where Dominique Sandra comes into the house on a horse. t always loved animals in houses, especially animals that don't really belong in houses. I kind of love the fantasy of it.

In the video are we Supposed to see Neil and Chris as fitting into the party, or are they observing It from the inside?
I always felt when I met then that they were like London kids on the street and I fell that no matter how old they are, or will be, they'll always have that wonderful child attitude about the way they see things. So it was really a little bit about the way I fell they see things. It was a little bit from their mind: "is the party really happening?" "who's upstairs in the bubble bath?" "who's in the bedroom?" "are the dancers really here?" "or are we sleeping on the staircases?
You tried to get Chris to dance, didn't you?

Yeah, And I saw him dance and he got real shy. It's kind or refreshing, because most musicians are desperate to be in every scene of their video. Also, a lot of rock Stan and pop stars do videos and never talk to the kids in them: they show up and are escorted in by a bodyguard and do a scene then go back to the trailer. Neil and Chris were banging out.
Is it frustrating 'making something a video -that is by its very nature a slave to the music?.
I think if I got a chance to do another I would talk to the people I was making it with and see if I could use the format of the music in a slightly different way. Maybe in the future people will say "come into the studio whilst we're recording this song", or even that a song might be written for a specify video. At the moment you are a slave to the music, but if you like the song that's airtight. And I really love the song.