Anthony Franciosa is dead - played Welles' son in Long, Hot Summer

[Harvey Chartrand]

Actor Anthony Franciosa has died of a stroke at age 78, just days after the death of his ex-wife Shelley Winters. Franciosa, the embodiment of the intense fifties-era Method actor, played Orson Welles' son in THE LONG, HOT SUMMER (1958). Reportedly, the two did not get along. But then Franciosa often butted heads with his colleagues, and this confrontational attitude may have hampered his career.
This is one of the strangest instances of miscasting father and son roles in cinema history: it is impossible to accept the slim, handsome and athletic Italian-American Franciosa as the son of the enormous, slovenly, grotesque and boisterous Welles, then tipping the scales at 375 pounds.
Only the casting of Peter Lorre as Jack Nicholson's father in THE RAVEN (1963) is more preposterous.

[Harvey Chartrand]

In 2003, I interviewed Ted Rusoff, an American expatriate actor based in Rome. Here are Rusoff's observations on working with Anthony Franciosa:

HC: In 1989, you appeared in "Death à la Mode" (aka "Fashion Crimes"), a giallo with Anthony Franciosa. Did Franciosa live up to his reputation of being a volatile Method actor?

TR: Yes. I had two scenes with him. Tony was very impatient with me. He said, “Come on, give me something!” I had to take it because he was the star. I said, “Tony, my character is described in the script as laid back and unemotional. What do you want me to give you that I’m not giving you?” He admitted I had a point. But I respected Tony, because he was involved. His best didn’t happen to coincide with what I was trying to do, but Tony was in there fighting. He was doing what he thought was best for the film.
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Franciosa may have been a hardhead, but he gave a damn.