Thanks to Cat Burglar for pointing out the new features on the Treasures from The Library of Congress website. It is indeed a treasure trove of Wellesania. The site currently has many rare items from several of Welles’ Federal Theater Project productions of 1936 and 1937 on display. You can access it here: Federal Theater […]
Just a note that I’ve posted (in the Film section) a summary of some fascinating facts, as well as some rare stills from an article by Willy Kurant, a terrific DP who worked with Welles on The Immortal Story (1966), The Heroine (1969), and The Deep (1969), and was also asked to work on The […]
To all you Welles aficionados down in Australia, Gary Graver will be showing his highly recommended program of rare Welles material at the “Celebration of Cinematography Festival” in Canberra this weekend. More details are in this article in the Sydney Morning Herald: No chance of this Welles running dry And here’s an excerpt from an […]
Here’s a link to the latest Callow rave, from the Guardian, where the writerďż˝observes that Callow’s tone has changed from a “certain acid” and “cattiness” to one of love: indeedďż˝that Callow may have “fallen a little”ďż˝for Welles:: Guardian Callow review
Since Mr. Arkadin didn’t open in America until 1962, it’s not surprising that most of the U. S. press didn’t review it until then (if at all), but strangely Variety also missed the boat, failing to review the film on it’s European release. However, they made up for their mistake with this rather perceptive review, […]
Hi! I’m also going to be helping Jeff out during his sabbatical, and hope to help keep the site lively. I’m hoping to soon have a translation of Sigi Sciortino’s interview with Mauro Bonannini, along with an on-line petition re: Don Quixote. I’ve also scanned several book covers, and they’ll be up soon as well, […]
Greetings to all you happy Wellesnet people: As I long ago hooked up with Jeff and have contributed several articles to Wellesnet before it was even launched, I asked Jeff if he would like me to take over some of his posting burdens since he felt the need to go on sabbatical for a […]
ORSON WELLES on MR. ARKADIN It is quite remarkable that other than Peter Bogdanovich’s indispensable interview book, This Is Orson Welles, there were so few important English language interviews done with Welles during his lifetime. Admittedly, Welles was often not on American soil when a film like Mr. Arkadin came out, but it […]
By JEFF WILSON I posted something similar on the message board, but long story short, I’ve decided to take a break from the site. I had thought digging into re-furbishing the site at long last would ignite my interest again, but it hasn’t. It’s simply a chore, and one I don’t want to do. The […]
As noted on the message board, Simon Callow’s adaptation of Micheal MacLiammoir’s memoir Put Money In Thy Purse is being given a re-broadcast this Saturday on BBC5 radio. The play will be available for listening for the week following, so you have plenty of time to catch it. On a site note: does anyone know […]
Ignore the dust, we’ll have it all cleaned up shortly. For the old blog with the links to the rest of the site, click here.
As the title says, the second volume of Simon Callow’s biography of Welles has been released in the UK; the American release looks to be pushed back to August, according to Amazon.com; reviews are starting to be published: the Times the Telegraph The Observer I am not sure how long those links will remain active, […]
Ages ago (okay, early last year) I picked up a bunch of film magazines that were being thrown out. I had intended to somehow use them on the site, but put them in a box and consequently forgot about them. I stumbled over them again recently, and seeing as how I hadn’t posted in a […]
I received my review copy of the Criterion Complete Mr. Arkadin set last week, and after a cursory walkthrough, I can say it’s pretty much everything we hoped it would be. While it isn’t absolutely “Complete” (something that has to be a bit of a gag on their part, given the project at hand here), […]
Sent to me today was this rather exciting bit of news regarding the Italian TV channel RAI, which is planning a Mr. Arkadin fest on April 1; the translation from their Web site, as provided to me: “Among the films completed by Orson Welles, this is certainly the work that’s presented in the largest number […]
As you’ll have seen if you peruse the message board, a post linking to Tim Lucas’ Video Watchblog column about the new Criterion Collection Mr. Arkadin DVD set resulted in some less than adulatory (but hardly vicious) words being written about Lucas, which in turn resulted in him ripping those of us who dared to […]
At the Home Theater Forum chat with Warner Home Video tonight, the usual “when is Ambersons coming out” question was posed to the Warner reps present; the answer was the same old “we’re still looking for materials” bit, which is rather frustrating, to say the least. How long, exactly, does this process take? Surely there […]
Per DVD Times, Richard Fleischer’s Compulsion, which featured Welles as a Clarence Darrow-type attorney defending a pair of Leopold & Loeb style murderers, will be making its DVD debut on May 23, in an anamorphic widescreen transfer. Extras are basically nil, but for those who want the film, this is good news.
Warner Bros has announced an “aggressive” release plan in 2006 for their catalog titles, of which The Magnificent Ambersons is one; a preliminary list of many titles was posted over at the Digital Bits site today, and Ambersons (not surprisingly, at this point) was not among those titles listed. With 200 titles on the cards […]
I’ve only recently seen over on the Criterion Forum forum that the excellent UK label Masters of Cinema will be releasing F for Fake, and that this release will include an interview with critic/Welles scholar Jonathan Rosenbaum; no date was given. Considering their usual high standard of work, this should be a very good release. […]
