MANK - Netflix biopic on Herman Mankiewicz

[tonyw]

Another perceptive review - https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/1 ... e-d10.html

[Steve Paradis]

I'll take the credit-stealing Welles of Marcy Kahan's Victorville over this mess. Hard pass.

Ah Victorville, haven't heard that in awhile. Good program; I'll have to give it another listen in light of the new film. Apparently it' s not at the BBC site right now, maybe it will come back. I would hope BBC might be thinking the same thing. IIRC, David Ogden Stiers played Houseman in that one.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000bff1

Try this:
https://archive.org/details/Victorville

[Le Chiffre]

Thanks Steve, good catch. That was Stiers, and he does the best Houseman I've ever heard.

[jbrooks]

Houseman and David Ogden Stiers also play the middle-aged and old versions of the same character in Woody Allen's "Another Woman."

[MartynH]

This is a comment not just about the guys who have played Welles over the years, it's a general comment about the better an impersonation is of the character the more dangerous it can be.

The example I'll give is Michael Sheen who played the famous football manager Brian Clough in the controversial film, well in the UK anyway, The Damned United. Sheen was brilliant as the enigmatic and abrasive Clough. As a result it was a totally convincing portrayal. However, this is the danger, in my opinion. The better the characterization the more chance it has of convincing the audience that all the major events in the film happened - especially for those who have a superficial knowledge of the story. I know from my own knowledge of the team he managed, Leeds United, it was a hatchet job on them - hence the title. There were things in the film that just didn't happen or were put out of context.

In fact, one of the Leeds players sued and won.

Both Clough and his assistant Peter Taylor had passed away by the time the book and film came out.

[RayKelly]

Decider has an interview with Peter Bogdanovich about the authorship of KANE in light of the release of MANK.
https://decider.com/2020/12/10/peter-bogdanovich-who-really-deserves-credit-for-citizen-kane/

[JMcBride]

Good interview about how the lying Kael-Houseman stories invalidate MANK, though contrary to this interview, Peter did tell me back at the time of the Kael piece that Welles had told him Houseman was in love with him during the Mercury Theatre days and that Welles's rejection of him sexually was the source of their schism.

[Le Chiffre]

Welles told that to Barbra Leaming as well, and she put it in her Welles book. Houseman undoubtedly heard about it.

Here's the schism from Houseman's point of view, when he appeared on The South Bank Show, two years after Welles's death:
https://vimeo.com/114983081

Has anyone ever seen the Merv Griffin show from May 1979, when Welles and Houseman supposedly had a cordial reunion? Hopefully it hasn't been deleted from the Griffin archive. It would have been a good one to preserve.

[Steve Paradis]

Welles told that to Barbra Leaming as well, and she put it in her Welles book. Houseman undoubtedly heard about it.

Here's the schism from Houseman's point of view, when he appeared on The South Bank Show, two years after Welles's death:
https://vimeo.com/114983081

Has anyone ever seen the Merv Griffin show from May 1979, when Welles and Houseman supposedly had a cordial reunion? Hopefully it hasn't been deleted from the Griffin archive. It would have been a good one to preserve.

As usual, look for one thing and find something else . . .
https://studsterkel.wfmt.com/programs/i ... n-houseman

"Welles and I had not met in several years, and now that we were both in Europe I would inevitably run into him sooner or later. And I went to a nightclub where a lot of theatrical people went, and I had a kind of hunch that sooner or later I would run into him. And I stayed until midnight and I had a hard day ahead of me but an overwhelming compulsion kept me glued to my chair at The Caprice," the name of the club was called The Caprice. "Making small talk with my wife while I waited for this meeting that I so feared and desired, and a few minutes before 1:00 o'clock, a faint but insistent blip on my private radar screen warned me that the Wonderboy was approaching. With that same sense of levitation I'd experienced in [Sinclair?] Stadium, . . . I now found myself rising from my seat . . . propelled by a potent mixture of nostalgia, curiosity and terror, I began to move toward the doorway in which I never for one instant doubted that Orson was about to appear. He did.
He came suddenly into view, a huge figure in a dark suit emerging from a small crowd of familiars and waiters. As I continued to move toward him I had not the faintest idea what would happen. Almost always in our long and intimate, tumultuous relationship, the emotional initiatives had been his. Either he would hurl himself upon me with a roar of rage, swinging and flailing as he so often had during our five years' partnership, or he would fling his arms around me in a choking, gigantic, passionate embrace. Either way it would be dangerous and dramatic. So I advanced towards the doorway and then came the moment when I knew that Orson had become aware of me. With no change of expression on that big round face, he separated himself from his party and started in my direction, so that we were now moving slowly and silently toward each other across the deserted floor like a pair of classic Western gunfighters approaching each other for the final shootout.
I could feel the muscles of my arms tensing, ready to fly up to parry the haymakers that would be aimed at my head, or to return the bear hug in which I would be enveloped. When we were less than three feet apart when the silence was shattered by a bellow of "Jacko!" followed by loud moans, then a second and third "Jacko!" as patrons of the Caprice were treated to the surprising spectacle of two very large men locked in a frantic clumsy embrace, slowly whirling like a giant top around the dance floor." And that was our reconcil--well, to make a long story short, within exactly 15 minutes, we had had a reconciliation, quarreled, and were howling at each other again in a rage."

I like a good story, even if it might not be true.

[Le Chiffre]

Well, that's the thing right there. Who knows what the truth is? As the old saying goes, never let the facts get in the way of a good story. If I remember correctly, the rest of that story concerns Welles suddenly screaming at Houseman because Houseman couldn't get tickets to MOBY DICK REHEARSED on the right night. Or something like that.

I like that Studs/Houseman interview; thanks for posting. That's what I love about the Internet: you never know what's gonna pop up. Sometimes things pop up briefly and you have to catch them quickly before they get taken down.

From the Bogdanovich interview:

As Orson said, Houseman had it in for him. I think—and Orson did not say this—that Houseman was in love with Orson. John may have been gay, and Orson wasn’t. There might have been some kind of thing that happened. I don’t know, but I have a feeling that’s what happened. That turned Houseman into a one-man, ruin-Orson’s-reputation department.

Then why would Welles appear with Houseman on Merv Griffin? Doesn't make much sense if Houseman had ruined his reputation. Everyone has a right to their opinion, although "feelings" are no substitute for facts.

[Wellesnet]

Oscar Futures: Is It Time to Start Worrying About Mank?
https://www.vulture.com/2020/12/oscar-p ... -mank.html

What the Mank? Pundits have pegged David Fincher’s Old Hollywood drama as one of the top-tier contenders in the Best Picture race, but those predictions are looking awfully wobbly right now. The film barely made a dent on Netflix’s top-ten list, and at the risk of going Full Douthat, its Rotten Tomatoes audience score has dropped noticeably lower than its critical one. To top it off, Mank all but blanked at this week’s critics’ awards, earning zero wins from the New York Film Critics Circle and Boston Society of Film Critics, and only managing one major nomination from the Chicago Film Critics Association. “If normals aren’t gonna go for this, and critics aren’t going to bat for it,” asks Awards Circuit’s Sam Coffey, “why are we still predicting it?”

[Steve Paradis]

Oscar Futures: Is It Time to Start Worrying About Mank?

It's Oscar campaign season and prestige pictures are jockeying for position. Directors are granting predictably fawning interviews . . .
https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertai ... story.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/17/maga ... nnell.html
Yes, sir, puffing is of various sorts. The principal are, the puff direct, the puff preliminary, the puff collateral, and the puff collusive, and the puff oblique, or puff by implication. These all assume, as circumstances require, the various forms of Letter to the Editor, Occasional Anecdote, Impartial Critique, Observation from Correspondent, or Advertisement from the Party.
. . . about films you will never want to see more than once--if that. Not a laugh in the bunch--especially the comedies:
https://variety.com/feature/2021-oscars ... 234768047/

[Le Chiffre]

Like running for office.

In the age of streaming, it's getting harder to tell which ones are the new movies and which ones are not. It's also getting harder to care. The only streaming service I have is Netflix, so I've probably missed a lot of contenders, and the only other new movie I watched on Netflix was THE TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO 7, which I liked a lot better than MANK.

We could use a good comedy right now.

[Maury]

The new Borat is very funny.

[Le Chiffre]

So I've heard. Thanks for the reminder, I'll check it out.