Orson Welles' The Other Side of the Wind Finally Sees the Light of Day

What would Orson Welles have thought of his meticulously crafted final flick The Other Side of the Wind making its debut on Netflix? That’s been on my mind ever since the streaming service announced that the long anticipated film would finally be making its debut on the platform, over forty years after filming wrapped. Would he embrace the wide reach of this technology that arrived long after his death? Or would he scorn a limited theatrical release and focus on home viewing?

As a classic film fan, I’m just grateful to be able to see it. For many years, I wondered if it was even possible. While I kept my expectations low, partly because the director himself was not able to oversee the final edit, I knew that a work by Welles would have something intriguing to offer, whatever the flaws.

The director had reportedly asked filmmaker and friend Peter Bogdanovich (he also appears in the film as essentially himself) to oversee final edits if he was ever not able to do so himself, and as that has happened and Welles’ partner and co-writer Oja Kodar has also had input in the completion of the film, I believe the final product is as close to his vision as could be achieved.

Welles’ story follows Jake Hannaford (John Huston), a director with a Hemingway-style macho vibe on the last day of his life. He has just completed a film, despite the fact that his leading man walked off the set in the middle of a key scene, and he is celebrating his birthday at an isolated ranch with a chaotic band of co-workers, friends, journalists, and hangers-on. That celebration is juxtaposed with scenes from the film, which appears to be a spoof of the intensely symbolic works of European filmmakers (apparently the movie was made very close to the house Michelangelo Antonioni used as a location for Zabriskie Point [1970]).

The assembly of personalities from old and new Hollywood alone is enough to make The Other Side of the Wind a remarkable film. It’s stunning to hear the distinctive voices of the likes of John Huston, Mercedes McCambridge, Lilli Palmer, and Edmond O’Brien saying new things so long after they have left us. Among the party guests is the new wave of filmmaking: Dennis Hopper, Henry Jaglom, Paul Mazursky, and Claude Chabrol among them. They all have plenty to say about film, each other, and Hannaford.

In contrast to the chatter at the party, the stars of the film-within-the-film Bob Random and Kodar remain silent, both on and off the screen. While they don't reveal themselves with speech, both are naked for most of their scenes, a combination of emotional self-protection and physical vulnerability that was new for Welles.

The aggressive sexuality of their scenes together is also a dramatic departure for Welles, who always claimed to be a prude and scornful of film nudity. Kodar was responsible for this change in the director. In addition to being a perfect intellectual match for him, she awakened eroticism in him which he seemed to be learning to process here.

It is in a way fortunate that The Other Side of the Wind is on Netflix, because the film requires multiple viewings to be fully appreciated. On first glance, there’s so much going on. Conversations flying from everywhere, quick edits, different film stocks representing the view of multiple cameras. It can take the whole running time to simply establish who everyone is, and the wide array of their motives and desires. On second viewing, I also got a better feel for the varied rhythm of the film, from the jittery jump cuts of the party scenes to the long, luxurious shots of Hannaford’s last work.

The complex production was filled with enough drama to warrant an entire book: Josh Karp’s The Making of the Other Side of the Wind, my review of which was one of the most read posts ever on A Classic Movie Blog. Film fans have clearly been hungry for this film. 

There is also a documentary about the film on Netflix called They’ll Love Me When I’m Dead (2018), and while it is full of fascinating archival footage and frank interviews with key players in the cast and crew, it doesn’t capture the scope and spirit of the project the way Karp has. The film is worth a watch, but the book is essential.

Quote: Orson Welles on Being a Filmmaker

My definition of a filmmaker is a man who presides over accidents.

-Orson Welles

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Book Review--Young Orson: The Years of Luck and Genius on the Path to Citizen Kane

Young Orson: The Years of Luck and Genius on the Path to Citizen Kane
Patrick McGilligan
Harper, 2015

The universally acclaimed Citizen Kane (1941) alone would have assured Orson Welles a solid place in entertainment history. That the 25 years leading up to that unique cinematic achievement were filled with enough success for a lifetime makes the novice filmmaker's accomplishment all the more remarkable. I've taken my time reading the 747 pages of Young Orson: The Years of Luck and Genius on the Path to Citizen Kane in which Patrick McGilligan tells that story and I am glad I allowed myself to linger. This is a fascinating book about one of the greatest artists to have existed.

McGilligan offers a thorough background to Welles' story, devoting nearly three chapters to his family and hometown Kenosha, Wisconsin before the baby genius is born. Even before his birth, you see the seeds of his work in his mother Beatrice and father Richard. The stage is set for a childhood of affluence, but much turbulence.

Beatrice Welles is most responsible for bringing out young Orson's artistic side. A devoted patron of the arts and piano recitalist herself, she schooled him in music, art and literature. As a child he spent a lot of time in the company of the famous singers, writers and actors who were a part of her social circle. When she died in 1924, at age 42, Dick Welles was not as able to take up the reigns of parenting as his by then estranged spouse had been, but the inventor and alcoholic gave his son another education as he accompanied him on travels around the world.

Papa Welles would die six years later, but not before he had ensured his son was firmly in the care of Dr. Maurice Bernstein, a close family friend. Known as "Dada", he would have a major, if complicated, influence on Orson. The young Welles was sent to the Todd School, where he would meet another caretaker of sorts and lifelong friend Roger Hill, who was headmaster and teacher and the first to give the teenage Orson the chance to direct a stage production. The two men would be as important as his parents, if not more so throughout his life. These varied early influencers are shown to form the foundation for Welles' remarkable early career.

As a teen, Orson traveled alone to Ireland, where he first found success on the stage. That early minor fame led him to New York City, where he would write a book of Shakespearean play adaptations, star on Broadway, become a director for the government theater WPA, start his own Mercury Theater company with the Brit John Houseman, become a famed radio player and somehow find the time to marry all before he was barely out of his teens.

Among the great successes of those early years: an all-black production of Macbeth with a voodoo theme set in Haiti, the controversy-plagued political musical The Cradle Will Rock, which would eventually be the subject of its own movie, and the legendary scandal that was Welles' all-too-realistic radio production of The War of the Worlds. These high notes, and the myriad successes and failures in between are dissected in great detail, with accounts from many of the players involved.

You get a great sense for how absorbed Welles was in his work, with little care for material gain, sleep or any sort of personal stability. He would drive himself to exhaustion, gorge himself on elaborate meals and forge forward with the next idea, or as was often the case, many ideas at once. It is exhilarating and draining to absorb all that Welles did in these years.

While the essential concept of the book is to take Welles' story up to the filming of Kane, McGilligan does describe aspects of the filming his first Hollywood movie while telling the story of its pre-production. These chapters are among the most interesting, because they show how deeply the roots of the filmmaker's childhood, education, early work and relationships are embedded in his first movie. In many ways, it would be his most personal work.

Young Orson would have been more effective had it ended with the director's first call to action on the set of Kane. The final chapter is a weak spot, full of interesting tidbits about the later years of his life and those who were close to him, but gathered in a jumble of incidents and anecdotes which lacks the flow of the rest of the book. It is possible that everything shared here could have been expanded into yet another biography about the last years of Welles' life.

Overall this is a stunning work. Drawing heavily on previous Welles biographies, including Simon Callow's acclaimed work and Barbara Leaming's version which was supported by the director, McGilligan prods at some of the assertions in these works, often correcting or at least thoughtfully question the record. Along with Harlan Lebo's Citizen Kane: A Filmmaker's Journey and Josh Karp's The Making of The Other Side of the Wind: Orson Welles' Last Movie, I find it to be a deeply satisfying portrait of one of the many artist phases of this unique craftsman.

Many thanks to Harper for providing a copy of the book for review.

Seattle International Film Festival 2016: Orson Welles in Falstaff/ Chimes at Midnight (1965)

It's almost comforting to watch Orson Welles play the title character in Falstaff/ Chimes at Midnight (1965), because he seems so happily at home. The director called it his favorite film, a sentiment that wasn't shared by critics upon its release, but which has changed in the years since. In a new restoration, it is possible to fully appreciate the beauty and madness of Welles' passion project.

The concept for the film began as the 1939 stage play Five Kings, which was written by Welles. He drew parts from Shakespeare's Richard III and Henry IV, V, and VI into one show. That first try was a disaster, as was a 1960 revival, but Orson was determined to produce this ultimate expression of his love for Shakespeare, and his favorite character Sir John Falstaff. Long scorned by Hollywood, he managed to cobble together a Spanish/Swiss production. Given the battle it took to fund and film it's astonishing how beautifully-executed and powerfully acted it is.

Welles had a great sense for how the language of Shakespeare should be presented, alternating between busy tableaux with lots of movement and chatter and the stillness of quiet monologue. He sets his more populated scenes in impeccably designed surroundings, all worn beams and hanging bunches of herbs. He stages extras high and low, and deep in the frame, always keeping the visuals lively. The monologues are stark by comparison, shot in intimate close-ups, with moody lighting reminiscent of an alley scene in a film noir.

As Henry IV, John Gielgud gets the best of that one-on-one attention. I don't think I fully appreciated this actor before I saw him here. Finally I understand how mesmerizing he could be. Though he speaks with passion, there's never the feeling that he is out of control. Even a shot of the back of his neck can bring chills, as you realize his every movement is shot through with power, but carefully calibrated. When he's onscreen, it's impossible to look away.

Playing son of Henry IV Prince Hal, Welsh actor Keith Baxter looks a bit like Anthony Perkins, even possessing some of his youthful tension, which works well for the conflicted character. He shifts believably from playboy cad to imposing royal. You can see the threads of his past within him though; he is never quite to be trusted.

This is essentially a man's world on display, so Jeanne Moreau has little to do as Doll Tearsheet. She doesn't need much to command attention though. In a role like this, you wonder how much further she could have gone as an actress in English language productions.

While I was blindsided by Gielgud, this film is still essentially Welles' playground. He somewhat tamps down the humorous aspects of Falstaff, but there's always a bit of a twinkle to him. It is clear that the character is home to him, the role for which he has the most affection. When looking at his enormous size, it's hard to believe the actor actually had to lose weight to play the part.

Juxtaposed with the alternating merry and elegant tone of the rest of the film, an extended battle scene comes as a bit of a shock. It is shot to show the chaos of war as it directly affects the bodies of soldiers. The charging motion of arms and legs are set off against bodies submerged in mud, and larger vistas are abruptly switched to close-ups of gushing wounds and falling men. It's a bloody spectacle in the midst of another, more civilized demonstration, but you sense the same game is being played.

Chimes at Midnight will return to SIFF Cinemas for a regular engagement once the festival is over. It's well worth a watch for fans of Shakespeare on film and the featured actors. For Welles lovers it's a must see.

Quote of the Week: Orson Welles

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I passionately hate the idea of being "with it," I think an artist has always got to be out of step with his time.

-Orson Welles

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Book Review--Citizen Kane: A Filmmaker's Journey

Citizen Kane: A Filmmaker's Journey
Harlan Lebo
Thomas Dunne Books
Release Date April 26

I had luck as no one had; afterwards, I had the worst luck in the history of cinema. But that is in the order of things. I had to pay for having had the best luck in the history of cinema. Never has a man been given so much power in the Hollywood system. And absolute power. And artistic control.

-Orson Wells, about his initial Hollywood contract

How did Orson Welles, a 24-year-old radio and Broadway man with no experience making films become the director, producer, co-writer and star of a major RKO production for his Hollywood debut? How could he win near complete creative control and corral a group of brilliant technicians and artists to teach him how to make movies?

In his new book about the production, release and legacy of Citizen Kane (1941), Harlan Lebo helps you to understand just how astounding the circumstances surrounding this legendary film were, from its filming to the controversy that surrounded its release. Welles' RKO contract gave him freedom that few filmmakers before or since have had and he also faced greater pressures when his masterful debut offended one of the most powerful men in the nation.

For all its grandeur, Kane was a surprisingly economical production, with detailed, carefully designed sets, but also with clever use of camerawork to make crowds appear larger, buildings more imposing and rooms more spacious. While Welles was notorious for his excesses, here he barely went over his budget, mostly due to the guidance of cinematographer Gregg Toland, who was his primary collaborator on the set. It was fascinating to read how the creative team used lighting, angles and special effects to create these illusions.

Kane cinematographer Gregg Toland

Lebo also notes the invaluable, and essentially forgotten role RKO president George J. Schaefer played in getting the film made while under great pressure himself to save the studio. By giving Welles the freedom to create, and steadfastly supporting the project whenever there was controversy, he was a key figure in its production. Without him, it may never have made it to the screen at all.

Lebo is a strong storyteller and he is able to go deep into technical details without losing narrative flow. This is also greatly helped by the way the book is organized. There are two major sections, followed by a well-organized series of appendices, all of which allow easy browsing and the option to skip through information or get as geeky as you please.

One of Toland's stunning deep focus shots

Part one covers the film's production, and is the most comprehensive section of the book. It profiles all the major talent working on Kane, with a strong emphasis on craftspeople, particularly the innovative cinematographer Gregg Toland, whose process for achieving his famous deep focus shots is examined, but also screenwriter Herman Mankiewicz, composer Bernard Herrmann and uncredited make-up man Maurice Seiderman, who can be credited with molding Kane's nose, in addition to crafting realistic old-age make-up.

Kane co-writer Herman Mankiewicz

This section is more slight when it comes to profiling the actors. While there is much written about the roles they played, their circumstances and the long hours they worked, the actual impact of their performances is not analyzed in great detail. Welles gets the bulk of that attention, and rightfully so, though there are certainly other intriguing performances by the Mercury Theatre players from Welles' New York enterprise who made their Hollywood debut in Kane at his insistence.

A misleadingly cheerful poster for the film

Part two is much more sensational. You are ripped from the cozy cocoon of creativity and thrown into a fascinating, if nerve-wracking, mess of bad publicity, threats and gossip that threatened to destroy Welles' carefully constructed debut. The most famous story associated with Kane is that wealthy and powerful publisher William Randolph Hearst attempted to block the film because he was told that it appeared to be essentially the story of his life and that of his mistress, beloved movie actress Marion Davies. That wasn't quite true. There were certainly similarities between his life story and that of Kane, but there were a lot of significant differences as well.

Welles flanked by Mercury players Joseph Cotten and Everett Sloane. Both actors would find further success in film

Nevertheless, ads for Citizen Kane, and for a time RKO productions were banned from Hearst publications. Hearst film gossip columnist Louella Parsons went on the warpath for her boss, followed by unaffiliated columnist Hedda Hopper who wished to show up her older rival. While Welles always believed it was Hearst's people, looking to make a few points with the boss, who had gone after his film, the book reveals that W.H. was more instrumental in essentially attempting to blackmail RKO, and the rest of the film industry into destroying the film.

While Kane was blocked from several theaters, and thus not able to become profitable in its initial release, by the fifties it was rediscovered by French film critics and it began its ascension to the adoration it enjoys today. Lebo traces the film's path to acclaim, which began with critical raves when it first hit theaters and grew as new audiences discovered it on television and in theater revivals beginning in the mid-fifties. He offers an interesting analysis of the way the meaning of Kane has changed over the years and how Welles' achievements have inspired filmmakers, even though it didn't significantly inspire studios to give directors more artistic freedom. That was a practically unique privilege, for which Orson was grateful, despite the near constant troubles he had financing his films in the following decades.

Welles as failed politician Kane

The appendices are a diverse viewer's guide to Kane, with sections about details like the cinematography, music, budget and soundstages. There's a full list of cast and production credits, a meticulously constructed scene-by-scene guide and an extensive list of further resources. This part of the book was a lot of fun to browse, and I found it useful to absorb the information there first, before reading the other two sections.

If there is any film that begs for an in-depth examination, it is Citizen Kane, and Lebo has been thorough in his research. It should please any fan of the film, Welles or the art of filmmaking, and fans of outrageous stories about the studio age. If you do read this book, have a copy of the film ready to view, because you'll be dying to see it before you get through part one.

Many thanks to Thomas Dunne Books for providing a copy of the book for review.

Quote of the Week: Orson Welles

I think the basic and essential human is the woman.

-Orson Welles

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Quote of the Week: Orson Welles on the Movies

The trouble with movies today...is that all of us are too much in love with them and there's no damn cure for it.

-Orson Welles, 1981

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Book Review--The Making of The Other Side of the Wind: Orson Welles's Last Movie

Orson Welles began filming The Other Side of the Wind in 1970. He died fifteen years later, the film incomplete. It was to be his masterpiece, as important to him as Citizen Kane (1941), if not more so. The Making of The Other Side of the Wind, reveals the whole fascinating, frustrating story of its production, up to the present day, where the effort to release Welles' final work continues.

Over the fifteen years of its production, Welles constantly sought funding, cast members died, marriages were destroyed and everyone involved did everything possible to complete the film. While money was always an issue, the biggest roadblock was its director, who could never commit to an end date, always striving to bring his work even closer to perfection.

The Press Scrambles to Cover Hannaford's Birthday Party in TOSOTW

The Other Side of the Wind was to be a satire of Hollywood in the 1970s, where young, bold filmmakers brushed away the last of the old studio system. It centers on the birthday, and last day, of 70-year-old director Jake Hannaford. Played by fellow legendary filmmaker John Huston, Welles always insisted that the role was not autobiographical, but there are parallels that must have been obvious to even the director himself. It co-starred Susan Strasberg as a Pauline Kael-like critic, Peter Bogdanovich as pretty much himself and the director's mistress and collaborator, the Croatian artist and actress Oja Kodar.

From the beginning, the film's production was intense. The crew would work sixteen hour days and six day weeks, all of them ready to drop from exhaustion but devoted to Welles. The director was demanding and often temperamental, on multiple occasions firing his entire crew, but they were all so eager to work with a genius that they'd simply give the director a few days to cool down and then return to work as if nothing had happened.

Strasberg and Bogdanovich in TOSOTW

Welles was completely devoted to his craft, typically spending the night typing new script pages and coming to the set in his robe. He drank can after can of Fanta, stuffed himself with rich food, and fortified his body with a table full of drugs that kept him alive as he struggled through each new breath. His passion for filmmaking was the thing that gave him life above all else.

The elements that made the process of making movies addictive for Welles astonished those who worked with him. Even the way that it was filmed would be unusual, as footage would come from thirty-five-, sixteen- and eight-millimeter cameras. He was endlessly inventive, playing with perspective to achieve remarkable results, and always with the most budget friendly effects he could manage.

Huston in TOSOTW

Welles was also a gifted film editor, working with tiny pieces of film to mold the precise effect he desired. He would use footage collected over years of filming, and sometimes the final product would be highly unusual. In a scene where Kodar changes clothes in a bathroom, it is edited to include footage of her acting in the same segment at age twenty-nine, thirty-two and thirty-three.

This movie without end became a familiar legend in the industry. When Strasberg told her agent she'd been asked to do a film with Orson Welles, he told her another client had done a project with the director years ago and had a great experience. The name of that film? The Other Side of the Wind.

Welles in the 70s

By the 1970s, the industry was eager to pay tribute to Welles: he was the third to be honored with a lifetime achievement award by AFI and the Academy of Arts and Sciences gave him an honorary Oscar. While Welles would use these honors to promote his work in progress, his admirers were not as eager to fund his projects.
There's plenty of attention given to the administrative aspects of the production, from the involvement of patient, but anxious Iranian investors, to the constant lack of a budget or financial documentation.

Welles needed a patron, but got businesspeople who wanted a good investment. He was an artist with no regard for time who struggled to finish his projects because he wanted to keep working to perfect them. While he was due that respect to a point, his refusal to ever finish the project was troublesome. He'd go to great lengths to avoid discussing an end date, hiding, refusing to sign contracts--and yet still asking for more cash and equipment.

Karp discusses Welles' better known collaborators, like his mistress of twenty years the Croatian actress and artist Oja Kodar and director Peter Bogdanovich and lesser known players, the most intriguing being the director and cinematographer Gary Graver, one of Welles' most devoted supporters throughout the process of making and funding the film, so much so that he destroyed his own life to work with him.

It can be painful to wade through all the details of the production of The Other Side of the Wind. The book often becomes tedious, but through no fault of Karp. It's a long, drawn out story and the only way to understand why the film has still not been released is to soak up every last frustrating detail.

Nevertheless, it is overall an entertaining read, full of interesting anecdotes and above all a great tribute to Welles as an artist. It also brings up the question of whether an artist can thrive, or even survive in a world that is increasingly focused on the pursuit of money. This is a world which Welles would never acknowledge. Were it not for that scramble for wealth, it is very likely the film would have been released by now.

For a quick glimpse of The Other Side of the Wind, take a look at this clip featuring Huston, Strasberg and Bogdanovich:

Quote of the Week

Chaplin's a great artist—there can't be any argument about that. It's just that he seldom makes the corners of my mouth move up. I find him easy to admire and hard to laugh at.

-Orson Welles, to Peter Bogdanovich

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Quote of the Week

I like the old masters, by which I mean John Ford, John Ford and John Ford.

-Orson Welles

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Book Review--My Lunches with Orson: Conversations Between Henry Jaglom and Orson Welles

My Lunches With Orson: Conversations Between Henry Jaglom and Orson Welles
Edited and with an Introduction by Peter Biskind
Henry Holt and Company/Metropolitan Books, 2013

What would it be like to eat lunch at a French restaurant with Orson Welles? According to My Lunches with Orson, you'd get a lot of gossip, industry talk, discussions about culture and Shakespearean quotes galore. You would also be lucky to finish a sentence.

In the early 80s, Welles supposedly asked director Henry Jaglom to record several of their lunchtime conversations at the Ma Maison restaurant in Hollywood. He knew his friend had done the same with his father, capturing years of memories. His only requirement was that the recorder remain in Jaglom's bag, because he didn't want to look at the machine. Reading that may make your eyebrow pop up involuntarily, but I get the impression Jaglom was a true friend, he appears to have worked hard to help Welles late in his life. It also appears as though editor Peter Biskind had to convince him to publish the contents of the tapes.

Compiled from several encounters recorded from 1983 to 1985, Lunches is essentially one big conversation. According to Biskind, it was slightly rearranged and edited, but is true-to-life where it counts. I don't mean true either, because I don't think Welles was particularly interested in the truth. He liked to tell stories, and that is why a simple translation of his words is quite enough to make an engrossing read.

Lunches captures Welles near the end of his life, when he was still working like mad, writing scripts and scrambling to find funding to finish his many projects. He was frustrated by this uphill battle, but still loving life enough to enjoy a rousing conversation.

Hearing Welles speak for himself is exciting, because you can sense the richness of his intelligence. Here is a busy, fertile mind letting it flow. Biskind edited lightly enough to preserve Welles' voice. You can hear him booming out every word.

And it seems Welles had something to boom about nearly everyone. I stopped trying to keep track of how many names he mentioned after the first couple of chapters. He couldn't handle Bette Davis' face and he thought Brando had a neck like a huge sausage, but he was devoted to Joseph Cotton and impressed by John Wayne's good manners. His comments about his peers are more bitter than sweet, which I partly took to be a reflection of his feelings at the time, but I wouldn't be surprised if he always thought Laurence Olivier was stupid.

You may not like what he has to say about all these talented people, but he might make you think again about the so-called talents of an actor. Not only does Welles not hold back, but his opinions are unpredictable, and somehow fresh for changing your perspective, if not your mind. For instance, I've always admired Irving Thalberg, but Welles didn't, and he has good reasons for being critical of the "Boy Wonder."

Welles knew so much about his craft. He was an observer and a student, always curious and critical. This background, and the intelligence that helped him to learn so easily, was both a blessing and a curse. It's not easy being the smartest guy in the room. Sometimes it can be downright frustrating. If you've got an oversized ego as well, it can be excruciating.

Listening to Welles without a filter can be alarming, but also fascinating. His tall tales could get out of hand, and Jaglom picked up on this often, and called the director on his shaky grasp of the facts. While he'd admit to, as Homer Simpson once said, "writing fiction with his mouth," he never seemed apologetic about it. So no, this isn't a reference book, it's Welles blowing off steam and being very entertaining in the process. Maybe he didn't have the funds to make movies, but nothing could stop him from putting on a show.

Deepest thanks to Henry Holt and Company/Metropolitan Books for providing a review copy of the book.

Quote of the Week

About Citizen Kane (1941):

It’s not like any movie made at that time. It’s very much ahead of its time. In fact, you could say it was, you know, 40 years ahead of its time.

-Peter Bogdanovich

Orson was doing a biographical film and didn’t realize it.

-Robert Wise

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Quote of the Week

I have wasted the greater part of my life looking for money and trying to get along. Trying to make my work from this terribly expensive paint box, which is a movie. . .it’s about 2% moviemaking and 98% hustling. That’s no way to spend a life.

-Orson Welles


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Quote of the Week

I think I made essentially a mistake staying in movies. But it’s a mistake I can’t regret because it’s like saying I shouldn’t have stayed married to that woman, but I did because I love her.

 -Orson Welles


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Quote of the Week

A film is a ribbon of dreams. The camera is much more than a recording apparatus; it is a medium via which messages reach us from another world that is not ours and that brings us to the heart of a great secret. Here magic begins.

 -Orson Welles

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Quote of the Week

There, but for the grace of God, goes God
-Herman Mankiewicz, about Orson Welles

My personality is that of an egotisical adventurer
-Orson Welles

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Quote of the Week

They let the studio janitor cut The Magnificent Ambersons in my absence.

-Orson Welles

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Quote of the Week

Hollywood’s all right. It’s the pictures that are bad.

-Orson Welles

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Book Review--In My Father's Shadow: A Daughter Remembers Orson Welles

In My Father's Shadow: A Daughter Remembers Orson Welles
by Chris Welles Feder
Algonquin Books, 2009

They may turn their backs on me now, but you wait and see, darling girl. They’re gonna love me when I’m dead.

-Orson Welles

Christopher Welles Feder, the eldest daughter (yep, daughter) of Orson Welles, is the first family member to write a biography of the legendary director and entertainer. Though Feder has lived most of her life in privacy, in the years after Welles’ death in 1985, she has stepped into the spotlight to defend both her father and his legacy from attacks and misinformation disseminated by those who did not know him. In this frank, but loving book, she continues her quest with intelligent grace.

Feder exposes several lesser known facets of Welles’ personality: the artist obsessed with work and constantly driven to create; the compassionate reformer who fought prejudice when it was not fashionable to do so--even when it cost him his radio show; and the errant father whose brief encounters with his daughter both illuminated her life and left her eternally hungry. The story alternates between the frustrations of father and daughter: Feder’s own desperate quest to win her father’s attention and approval and Welles’ lifelong difficulty in finding funding for his projects.

The only child from Welles’ first marriage to actress Virginia Nicolson, Feder was one of three daughters he had with each of his wives. All three children were essentially abandoned by Welles, both financially and emotionally, but Feder describes many happy moments with her father. Their periodic outings together, including long meals at restaurants and extensive travels through Europe, provided Feder with a valuable cultural education and the best opportunities she would ever have to bond with her father. Feder describes these moments in great detail, and with a wistful fondness.

However, for every leisurely stroll though a museum, there were years of separation, misunderstandings and missed connections. Occasionally, Feder would travel to be with her father, only to be left with a secretary while Welles was occupied by his work. She also endured the unrelenting scorn her mother (not without reason) felt towards Welles, and the dismissive, mentally abusive attitude of her rigid stepfather. Still, Feder emphatically does not feel sorry for herself. Despite the heartbreak she has suffered, she is appreciative of the opportunities presented to her early in life, including travel, culture and moments with the richly talented people in her father’s life.

Though Feder never got the love she desired from her father, she found significant support outside of her family. Despite being uprooted constantly throughout her childhood, she had a flair for building close friendships. She also writes lovingly of Welles’ second wife Rita Hayworth, who was by her account an exuberant, loving playmate—though she understandably cut off contact once Welles abandoned her and their daughter. Welles’ childhood guardians Roger and Hortense Hill provided Feder with a longer-lasting familial bond—filling in where blood relatives failed over two generations.

In some of the most touching moments in the book, Feder bonds with Oja Kodar, Welles’ mistress for the last twenty years of his life. Twenty-six years his junior, and two years younger than Feder, Kodar gave Welles the intellectual simulation lacking in his previous romantic partnerships. Feder describes a fiercely, and perhaps a bit blindly devoted woman still grieving the death of her great love. It is gratifying to see Kodar finally acknowledged for her influence on Welles’ life.

Feder herself seems haunted by the memory of her father. Though she has built a comfortable life for herself, including a happy marriage and a successful career as a writer and educator, you can sense the void left by her unrequited love for Welles. Still, she is devoted to her father and is his most vocal supporter, always willing to fight for the memory of a man who strived to fulfill his creative visions to the end of his life.