Here is a letter Darryl Zanuck, the President of 20th Century Fox and a great friend of Welles wrote to him after first seeing ”Chimes At Midnight”. For whatever reasons, Zanuck and Fox were not able to secure the rights to “Chimes” which was rather unfortunate, since had Fox acquired the film it might have done far better in the […]
I’ve just returned from a fabulous�two week vacation in Spain, which�by sheer accident has turned out to be a�wonderful�source of Welles information – �inparticular on Chimes At Midnight, which was�Welles own favorite movie, as well as mine. Chimes�of course, was shot in Spain, which was�Welles� favorite country in Europe, as can be seen in this […]
I saw this on another site, and can’t vouch for its quality or lack thereof yet, but here is a link to a film noir podcast series, this particular episode focusing on Carol Reed’s The Third Man. It’s a free download, so give it a shot if you like.
If you’re in the UK, you may wish to venture to East Sussex to see Voodoo Macbeth, an exhibition at this year’s Brighton Photo Biennial, a festival dedicated to photography. As the web site summary describes it: “Orson Welles’ African-American theatre production of Macbeth forms the basis of a major exhibition, Voodoo Macbeth, at the […]
My hometown of St. Louis sees another Welles play being mounted; this one is called The Probe: an Inquiry Into the Meteoric Rise and Spectacular Fall of Orson Welles in Hollywood. “Conceived and created by Chuck Harper,” as the home page states, it uses pre-existing material to look at Welles’ career. This article features a brief […]
(Editor’s note: Leslie Weisman has graciously sent along this report on the Paris production of Richard France’s  play,  which has captivated theatergoers across Europe, but apparently, as with most Welles projects, it has yet to find backers for a U. S. production). By LESLIE WEISMAN Earlier this month I had the great pleasure of […]
Here’s a rare�treat.� A long scene from Orson Welles script of… � ��� THE DREAMERS (1982)� Directed by Orson Welles. Screenplay by Orson Welles and Oja Kodar, based on The Dreamers and Echoes by Isak Dinesen.� Cinematography (in color) by Gary Graver.� Music by Erik Satie.� � Starring Orson Welles as Marcus Kleek� Oja Kodar […]
Richard France�s play OBEDIENTLY YOURS, ORSON WELLES is now playing in Paris at the Th��tre Marigny until Oct. 29. Our European correspondent Allegra saw the play while she was in Paris and tells me it’s quite wonderful, noting that the actor M. Drouot at times seemed almost to be channeling Welles. If you live or […]
Joseph McBride’s new book on Orson Welles features two chapters on the saga of the making, and unmaking of THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND. It’s the most comprehensive coverage of this unfinished Welles masterpiece that has yet been seen. In the book Mr. McBride also goes into some detail about the early problems Welles […]
Here’s a very nice piece on OSOTW featuring comments from John Huston, Susan Strasberg and Gary Graver, written for the March, 1976 issue of AFTER DARK, a New York based magazine that billed itself as “The National Magazine of Entertainment.” *** ORSON WELLES AND FIVE YEARS OF   “THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND” By VIOLA […]
One of the saddest things to realize about Orson Welles late career was the lack of support he received not only from studios, but from the “bankable major stars.” One only has to recall the story of Welles trying to cast any of the above actors for the leading role in The Big Brass Ring, […]
The New York Times Sunday Book Review weighs in on Simon Callow’s “Hello Americans” with an interesting piece by Gary Giddins.� Mr. Giddins makes some excellent points, and we can also be�quite thankful The Times didn’t ask Charles Higgham or David Thomson to review the book.� In fact, The Times review serves as quite a […]
After The Other Side of the Wind had been shooting for only a few months, Charles Higgham, whose error-ridden book on Welles had recently been published, wrote this short piece about the filming of OSOTW. It appeared in The New York Times on January 31, 1971, and since Mr. Higgham’s piece gets almost 100 % of his facts […]
Shortly after Welles had begun filming The Other Side of the Wind, he published this piece in Look magazine (Nov. 3, 1970), about the rise in prominence of young directors who were now seen as the driving force behind Hollywood’s biggest box-office hits. Films like Dennis Hopper’s Easy Rider and Paul Mazursky’s Bob & Carol […]
To complete the series of poems about Orson Welles I’ve included two selections from one of Welles favorite poets, Mr. Robert Graves. Both of these poems would seem to fit neatly into the Welles canon, as 1915 is the year of his birth and JONAH obviously needs no explaination, since Melville’s MOBY DICK was quite an obssession with Welles. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ […]
Shortly after receiving the AFI’s Life Acheivement award in 1975, Orson Welles was asked to contribute a foreword to Marion Davies oral history, The Times We Had. In his foreword, Welles reflects on what people assumed where some of the Hearst like elements in Citizen Kane, and purports that only one scene in Kane “was […]
Interview with JACK ARNOLD � on DIRECTING ORSON WELLES in MAN IN THE SHADOW (1957)�� � By Lawrence French � � *******************�� � The following are excerpts from an interview I conducted with director Jack Arnold, which took place in 1981 when Arnold had been invited by Mark Fishkin, the director of The Mill Valley […]
Joseph McBride’s third book on Orson Welles, entitled “What Ever Happen To Orson Welles?: A Portrait of an Independent Career” won’t be in bookstores until this October, but in a highly questionable move, it was reviewed today — nearly two months early — in tandem with Simon Callow’s “Hello Americans” in the Los Angeles Times. […]
Simon Callow’s second volume on Orson Welles life and career has just come out in it’s�U.S. edition.� Details on the book from Viking Press are below, followed by a review from Entertainment Weekly. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ ORSON WELLES Vol. Two HELLO AMERICANS By Simon Callow Hardcover | 5.98 x 9.01in | 656 pages | ISBN 9780670872565 | […]
Here are some excerpts from an interview with the master animator Ray Harryhausen, where he talks about trying to interest Orson Welles in making War of the Worlds, and how he came close to working with Welles in Spain. LAWRENCE FRENCH: After years of keeping your effects secrets under wraps, what led you to be so forthcoming […]
