Archive of American Television Interviews

[Store Hadji]

Betty Garrett on Danton's Death:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=X32zgsxN0AA

Ruth Warrick on meeting Welles:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=7Cch2036PCA

Bob Doyle on hiring Welles to write the scripts for and narrate a series of National Geographic documentaries:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=2St2BIOhx50

[kipling71]

Bob Doyle on hiring Welles to write the scripts for and narrate a series of National Geographic documentaries....

This interview cuts off in the middle of a Welles anecdote while the camera guy changes tapes. I tried several other clips of the same guy but couldn't find where it continued, if it does. Anybody know?

[Glenn Anders]

I think, kipling71, that you will find, because the interviewer is pretty ignorant and inept, that Bob Doyle is taken away from Orson Welles, in another direction on the next segment concerning the matter of the National Geographic Specials. The interviewer sounds as if he is just interested in getting through his checklist, more concentrated on the business side of TV than the human flavor of it. Doyle keeps telling anecdotes, or promising more of them, but the guy behind the camera just moves him along.

The introductory segment has a little more about Welles because Doyle as a teenager heard the 1937 Mercury-Theater-on-the-Air "War of the Worlds," and was very impressed by it. He says that many years later when it fell upon him to produce the National Geographic Specials, he immediately thought of Welles and his marvelous voice. He says that he traveled all over Europe with Welles, and that he kidded him about setting up "The War of the Worlds" as a hoax, but Welles would only smile and deny it.

Too bad that we miss the detail which Doyle is obviously eager to provide in the later segment.

The interviewer, at times, seems to have more rapport with Sarah, the Doyles' dog, than with his subject.

He does a bit better with Ruth Warrick because she has some strong emotional memories, and she vivifies them.

Glenn