Orson Welles

November 18, 1996

Orson Welles, one of the greatest actors and directors of all time, was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin on May 6, 1915. From the time he was young, many considered him a genius, destined for greatness. Before Hollywood, he had already gained a critical reputation in radio and theater. At age 18, he joined the experimental gate theater in Ireland; at 19, he made his debut on Broadway as Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet; and with partner, actor-producer John Houseman, he joined up with the New York Federal Theatre Project. The first major success of the company was an all-black version of MacBeth, where Welles introduced a new style of theatric performance.

In 1937, Welles and Houseman formed the Mercury Theatre, one of the most well-known independent Theatres in history. Welles directed many of the productions. His first major success at Mercury was a updated version of Julius Caesar, which he rewrote and set in Fascist Italy. In 1938, Mercury Theatre went on the radio and Welles caused a stir that same year on Halloween. That night, broadcast across the country, the Mercury players put on a production of H.G. Wells War of the Worlds. Unsuspecting listeners believed that a real Alien landing was taking place in New Jersey, mainly due to the fact that the actors "reporting" sounded amazingly authentic. Because of the media attention surrounding the broadcast, RKO brought him to Hollywood and gave him the freedom to produce, write, act and direct films for $225,000. It was one of the highest offers ever given to an first-time filmaker.

Welles first few projects ended up in the scrapheap (including an attempt to produce a film version of Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness), but the young Welles was not distraught. His first completed film became the greatest directorial debut in cinema history. That film is, of course, Citizen Kane (1941). With this film, Welles stretched the art of filmaking (script, dialogue, art direction, cinematography, etc.) to new heights and gave generations of filmgoers and filmakers something to be inspired by. The only problem was that certain folks at the time thought it was an attack on famed millionare-newspaper publicist, William Randolph Hearst. Hearst and his entertainment connections barraged the film with negative campaigns, forcing it to do poorly at the box-office. Because of this, Welles never gained complete control of any of his pictures ever again. His second film, The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), was severly cut by RKO, while Welles w as down in South America attempting to shoot a documentary (which was completed by others and became It's All True in 1993). His supervising of the mystery Journey Into Fear (1942) did little for his trashed reputation at RKO. They dismissed him and the rest of the Mercury players in 1943.

Welles kept acting and performing, making film noirs like The Stranger (1946) and The Lady From Shanghai (1948). With these films, Welles proved he had a great eye for the technical aspects of films, but were still devoid of that special Welles magic. In 1948, the Mercury players and Welles put on a film production of MacBeth. Though it is regarded as one of Welles finest works, it did poorly on it's initial release and was dismissed at the Venice Film Festival. His second Shakespeare production, Othello (1952), was in production limbo for many years before being completed. This time, it got good reviews and won the Grand Prix at Cannes.

With the failure of Macbeth, Welles took on a self-imposed, decade long exile from the Hollywood system. He acted and directed mostly outside the US, attempting to make many films that have mostly remained unfinished to this day (including Don Quixote, which has gained a mythical reputation). He returned to Hollywood with the fantastic film noir, Touch of Evil (1958). This remains up there with Kane as one of Welles greatest achievements. His last years were hugely unsuccesful ones. His adaptation of Kafka's The Trial (1963) and the Shakespearean drama Chimes at Midnight (1966) faired miserably with critics at the time.

His last work, F For Fake (1973), was rarely seen and remained shelved for many years. Welles has been claimed by Martin Scorsese to be the man who inspired more people to be filmakers than anybody else in history. The reason why he didn't make it with the film world of his time, including the critics and public, was most likely because he was ahead of his time. He changed the medium of everything he ever did. Theater, Radio and Movies were forever changed by Welles brilliant artistic triumphs. He died on October 9, 1985. He was working on his unfinished autobiographical film, The Other Side of the Wind. My rating on a scale of 1 to 10:10

Back to Home Page

The Dream Machine --- Network Services

...the best independent ISP in the Twin Cities