Welles script for "Crazy Weather" uncovered

[Wellesnet]

What Welles Really Thought About Ernest Hemingway:
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/ja ... -hemingway

[Le Chiffre]

Hemingway was awarded the Nobel prize for literature for work including The Sun Also Rises and Death in the Afternoon, both of which were lovingly devoted to the culture of Spanish bullfighting. Welles lived in Spain in the 1960s, returning there throughout the last 20 years of his life, but became exasperated by what he saw as the touristic legacy of Hemingway’s work.

“Spain was one of his passions,” Gear said. “By late 1973 he was thoroughly disgusted by the superficial appropriation of Spanish culture by American tourists who were inspired by Hemingway. There were a lot of tourists coming to Spain, seeing the bullfights, inspired by Hemingway’s life and his books. Welles saw this as very superficial and he really detested the machismo. He clearly had that in mind when he co-wrote Crazy Weather.”

Hopefully Welles fans will get a chance to read this script in the near future. With it's theme of travel vs. tourism, CRAZY WEATHER sounds a bit like the Paul Bowles classic, THE SHELTERING SKY. Welles frequently railed against the superficial aspects of tourism, but as Roger Hill wrote in his memoir, "Travel was Orson's addiction; also his education.

From Welles's script for Crazy Weather:

Americans living abroad can be divided in general terms into two separate categories. The majority spend their days and nights hermetically sealed in their own small American colony. Any contacts with the natives are limited to waiters, cab drivers, domestic servants, and of course, to such business communications as may be unavoidable.

But a romantic strain lives on in the American character. This finds expression in that minority among ex-patriots who do indeed make quite determined, if futile efforts to participate in the social and cultural life of the country.

Jim Foster is one of these last. He works and lives in Spain and has fallen head over heels in love with everything Spanish. Spain has a very strong appeal for this sort of American. Their special vision of the so-called “Spanish way of life” seems to combine the prestigious dignity of an antique civilization with something of the tense simplicity of a good cowboy movie. Jim Foster never read Merimee, but he’s well-grounded in Hemingway. The key to his character is that he cherishes Spain as a man’s country.

An executive in one of those huge American-international conglomerates, he works in an office. But at heart he’s an outdoor man. A keen hunter and ardent fisherman, he’s become a passionate and dedicated aficionado of bullfighting. Not surprisingly, the Corrida has never had so many fans among non-Spaniards. Hundreds of foreigners follow the bulls with studious enthusiasm from the beginning to the end of one temporada after another. Jim of course is one of these.

Her name is Ampare and she comes from a middle-class family of one of the smaller Spanish cities. Attractive and charming with a quick humorous mind, she is however, by no means typically Spanish, as Jim fondly imagines. Nobody could be. I fact, she is untypical enough to have had two years experience in the tourist bureau in New York.

[Wellesnet]

Author Matthew Asprey Gear ("At the End of the Street in the Shadow: Orson Welles and the City") talked with Wellesnet about his research into the influence Ernest Hemingway had on three Welles' projects: Crazy Weather, Sacred Beasts and The Other Side of the Wind.
https://www.wellesnet.com/exploring-hemingway-welles-connection/