Orson Welles stands behind a bust of William Shakespeare, April 1942. (© Conde Nast Archive/Corbis)
Orson Welles’ lifelong obsession with The Bard was recently explored in the uneven and often grating Folger Shakespeare Library podcast A Rescue, a Rescue.
The podcast begins promisingly with the declaration that Welles produced and starred in Shakespeare plays on Broadway (Macbeth, Julius Caesar) and directed and starred in multiple versions of Shakespeare’s work on film, including Othello, Macbeth and Chimes at Midnight. (No mention is made of the unfinished Merchant of Venice and proposed King Lear.)
A Rescue, a Rescue listeners have to endure inteviewer Barbara Bogaev’s comments that Welles’ final years were like that of Paris Hilton (“famous for being famous”), Macbeth was a “mess” and “nightmare,” Othello a “mixed bag” and the soundtrack of Chimes at Midnight “unlistenable.” No mention is made that these films have been hailed by critics and two took home top prizes at the Cannes Film Festival.
On the flip side, Bogaev does admit she likes Welles “amazing camera angles” and “wonderful things with lighting.” Sheesh.
The “rescue” in this 30-minute podcast comes in the form of the fine insight offered by Michael Anderegg, professor emeritus of English at the University of North Dakota and author of Orson Welles, Shakespeare, and Popular Culture.
While Anderegg let’s some of Bogaev’s remarks, like comparing the Macbeth sets to those from Lost in Space slide, he takes exception with more than a few remarks, including Bogaev’s complaint about the Scottish burr in the film.
“Actually, I think it’s perfectly understandable, but the studio bosses at Republic and some of the other people just thought this was terrible. They couldn’t understand what the actors were saying,”Anderegg says “And my feeling is that they couldn’t understand it because they couldn’t understand Shakespeare. You know, this was not a high-class group of producers at Republic, but in any case, the studio was so upset that they forced Welles to redo the soundtrack. This caused a lot of problems because Welles, at this point, was in Europe. So he had to do this work long-distance.”
The podcast is embedded below. It can also be heard on iTunes, Google Play, SoundCloud, or NPR One.
A complete transcript may be found at folger.edu/shakespeare-unlimited/orson-welles
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