Val Lewton

[Terry]

Watched I WALKED WITH A ZOMBIE and THE BODY SNATCHER today. They were produced by Val Lewton at RKO around the time Welles was being shown the door. I recognized such names as Mark Robson, Robert Wise and Roy Webb in the credits. SNATCHER features the Ambersons staircase in one set and costars Henry Daniell, who was in JANE EYRE. ZOMBIE stars Frances Dee, who I believe appeared on Campbell Playhouse, costars Edith Barrett, who was in JANE EYRE, and had a screenplay co-written by Curt Siodmak, who authored Donovan's Brain. Even without these peripheral Welles connections, Lewton's RKO films are fascinating - delightful to see what another excellent and creative producer did with that same electric train set.

[The Night Man]

I'm fairly certain you can also see part of the Ambersons set in CAT PEOPLE; other of the Lewtons may utilize it as well.

Lewton was an intelligent, literate guy and I suspect his deal at RKO (which allowed him a lot of leeway) was, in a way, a rebuke to Welles.

[Terry]

This from Wikipedia:

"In 1942, Lewton was named head of the horror unit at RKO studios. He was paid $250 a week. As head of the B-horror unit he would have to follow three rules: each film had to come in under a $150,000 budget; each film was to run under 75 minutes; and Lewton's supervisors would supply the title for each film."

He also appears to have been good at and taken a delight in cannibalizing the standing sets left over from the A-films, which gave his productions a far richer feel than could be achieved with his small budget.

Robert Wise said that the shooting schedules were about 20 days, six day weeks including Saturdays.

Maybe Lewton was a more manageable employee than Welles, and one who "wanted to direct the kind of film that producers wanted to produce."

I don't know about a rebuke - Lewton's films seem far more intelligent than showy.

[tadao]

There's an excellent documentary on the Lewton DVD boxset which covers Lewton's career at RKO and contains considerable reference to Welles and the fallout from Kane / Ambersons. The documentary places Lewton as a natural successor to Welles, but one who *could* 'play the game' and please moneymen, audience and critics at the same time.

Crucially, Lewton was producing 'B' pictures, not would-be 'prestige' films like Welles, and his budgets would have been a fraction of Kane / Ambersons. 'Cat People' made RKO a lot of money; this is what gave Lewton his leeway, rather than a vindictive rebuttal against Welles on the part of RKO. In spite of everything, had 'Kane' and 'Ambersons' been big moneyspinners, Welles would have been 'forgiven' by RKO (whether he'd have forgiven them or not is another matter...); alas of course, prevailing circumstances and deliberate inteference, among other things, prevented financial success and closed Welles's first Hollywood chapter with some ignominy.

Lewton was a fine craftsman, if not a 'genius'. Welles was also a fine craftsman, but his reputation for 'genius' likely hurt him as much or more than it ever helped him. Welles's attempt to recast himself as a popular entertainer (Jack Benny stand-in, 'Around the World', etc) in the later 40s and early 50s wasn't fooling anyone. Flicks like 'The Stranger', 'Lady from Shanghai' and even 'Touch of Evil' play like highbrow Lewton, though. If Welles had been able to successfully convert his attempted populism to ticket sales, things might have worked out very differently for him. To be able to see Lewton-budget films of the literary classics that Mercury Theatre on the Air turned out... this is perhaps what the Welles's mooted Desilu series in the 50s could have been?

Lewton's unit continued to make populist films (with their lurid titles imposed by the front office) with strong art credentials and psychological depth. He declined the chance to move into 'A' pictures, as he wouldn't have been able to keep his unit together, and made nine excellent little films. Sadly he suffered severe depression and ill-health, and died relatively young.

I'd strongly recommend the Lewton boxset, not just for the (wonderful) films, but for several good commentaries, and the aforementioned documentary, to anyone interested in Welles's early Hollywood career.

Nice article / review here: http://www.nysun.com/article/21282

[mido505]

There is an excellent 2-part post on Lewton at http://greenbriarpictureshows.blogspot.com/ , a terrific site. Lewton did not necessarily have an easy time of it at RKO, either.

[The Night Man]

I don't know about a rebuke - Lewton's films seem far more intelligent than showy.

Even if Lewton's deal was only a rebuke after the fact, I do believe that RKO's allowing a smart, literate guy who was more "manageable" quite a bit of leeway (within parameters) almost had to be a bit of a slap at Welles.

[Terry]

Lewton's first $150,000 film made RKO $4,000,000.

Letting him keep some autonomy after that just sounds like a practical business decision to me.

Had Welles made money for the studio, he probably would have kept his as well.

It's more a slap in Lewton's face that he wasn't offered the money, ability to choose his own titles, or running times over 75 minutes that Welles was given.

[tonyw]

Exactly, Store! Despite Lewton's associations with a low-budget genre, RKO executives were also suspicious of him. We must also remember what Edward Dmytryk says in his FILM NOIR READER 3 interview (which Robert Porfirio conducted in the 1970s) that Welles's two RKO films were very influential on the visual style later defined as "film noir" which Welles also contributed to post-RKO in many ways.

[Terry]

Skelton Knaggs was a curious personage. Carved quite the indelible image. Peculiarly androgynous as well. Seemed to be a favourite of Mark Robson at the time.

Billy House is in BEDLAM. Ernst Deutsch is in ISLE OF THE DEAD.

Great little films. I'll have to hunt for the two non-horror Lewton RKO titles as they seem to have been left out of the recent DVD series.

[Tony]

Cat People is one of the silliest damn movies I ever saw! But the "sequel"- 'Curse of the Cat People' is a beautiful masterpiece about a lonely child. Actually it had nothing to do with cats or horror, so Lewton cleverly disguised it as a sequel.

[mido505]

For all Wellesnet members who are interested, TCM will be showing VAL LEWTON, MAN IN THE SHADOWS on Monday at 8PM EST, followed by most if not all of Lewton's movies. As several Wellesnet members have pointed out on this thread, Lewton gave a number of Mercury technicians, including Robert Wise and Mark Robson, their big breaks following the collapse of the Mercury unit, and the AMBERSON'S staircase can be seen in many of the flicks. As I have mentioned previously, I highly recommmend that all Wellesnetters read this series on Lewton at the excellent Greenbriar Picture Shows site: http://greenbriarpictureshows.blogspot. ... ckers.html The story of Lewton's travails at RKO make for extraordinary reading - if this is how Charles Koerner and his minions treated a guy who kept his budgets miniscule and raked in millions for the studio, think what Welles, who refused to even give lip service to studio demands, had to deal with! In the end, Hollywood killed Lewton; Welles was made of sterner stuff; perhaps he was right to get out. Is it even possible, given his uncompromising artistic temperament, that Welles could have survived out there? I think not. In his more sentimental moments, Welles liked to imagine that, under the old Hollywood system, "there was always room for an Orson Welles picture." But then reality and sense would reassert itself, and Welles would catalogue the list of giants that Hollywood had effectively ground into the dirt since day one: Von Stroheim, Keaton, the mighty Chaplin, even Gish and Garbo, to switch to actors, if Louise Brooks is to be believed. Read Brook's essay on W. C. Fields, published in LULU IN HOLLYWOOD, to understand what that sardonic genius had to go through to get his caustic comedic vision on screen , and mourn what we did not and never will see because Field's effectively had one hand tied behind his back for most of his movie career. EVEN THE SUCCESSFUL ONES COULD HAVE GIVEN US SO MUCH MORE! Hitch, Ford, Hawks, imagine the movies that would have resulted had they been given what Welles was given with CITIZEN KANE, or given what the Young Turks were given in the early 70's. What a crying shame...