On The Industry Wires - Ambersons

[apexjazz]

Did everyone see this website make the wires?

The star of the remake of Orson Welles' The Magnificent Ambersons, which supposedly employed Welles' original script and shooting notes, has expressed her dismay over the outcome of the project. Madeleine Stowe (The Last of the Mohicans, The General's Daughter), who portrays Isabel Amberson Minafer in the three-part miniseries due to air on the A&E channel in January, told today's Calgary Sun: "It is the best screenplay I have ever read. I was so thrilled to be part of this great project, but what happened was a disaster." In the interview, Stowe seemed to accuse Mexican director Alfonso Arau (Like Water for Chocolate, A Walk in the Clouds) of reworking Welles' script. "Arau didn't want to discuss his vision with the actors, nor did he want any input from any of us about our characters. All he wanted to talk about was incest. It was 12 weeks of agony. We had a chance to make cinema history and, because of Arau, we botched it." Ironically, in his own time, Welles had accused executives of RKO of botching his original version of Ambersons, based on the novel by Booth Tarkington, by drastically cutting his film. Arau had said earlier that he intended to be faithful to Welles' script, telling one interviewer, "We couldn't take the risk of spending millions on trying to better something that couldn't be bettered." But Stowe told the Sun: "It breaks my heart that we didn't do the material justice." A message posted today (Wednesday) on a website devoted to Welles' films (http://www.wellesnet.com/News.htm) claims that the new film is only "loosely based" on the original screenplay and lists numerous alterations -- and even the elimination of scenes that were included in the original RKO release.


Nice new website by the way!

[LA]

Thanks for posting that article, apexjazz.
This mini-series is sounding increasingly like a turkey. I thought from the first time I heard about it that the Welles connection was probably going to be used more as publicity than anything else, but I had hoped to be proved wrong.
Oh well. Maybe in another sixty years, someone will try again?

[mteal]

Thanks for the article. Yes, looks we've got another BIG BRASS RING on our hands.

[apexjazz]

Brass Ring? Let's hope its not THAT bad.

[O J Radok]

-- "A message posted today (Wednesday) on a website devoted to Welles' films (http://www.wellesnet.com/News.htm) claims that the new film is only "loosely based" on the original screenplay and lists numerous alterations -- and even the elimination of scenes that were included in the original RKO release."

Huh? What message is this referring to? I looked for it, but couldn't find it. But by looking for it in the News section, I came across the review from a German newspaper which came out a day after the Munich premiere of the new Ambersons, and that didn't sound bad AT ALL.

[jaime marzol]

if the post does exist, how much more definitive can we get than a website where people post? why not go to a bar and ask the first drunk you see. different methods that render the same result; joe schmoe's opinion.

[apexjazz]

or listen to a self proclaimed critic.

[jaime marzol]

Apejazz:
no, no, i'm not a self proclaimed critic. i'm a self proclaimed ipinionator, and this is an opinion board. so I'm in the right place.

What I wrote was no critique on you. I was commenting on the writer of the article you posted. Giving an opinion board as a reference resource is pretty feeble, don't you think? Or didn't you understand what i was saying?

Don't feel persecuted.

[Jeff Wilson]

Real quick, as I'm in an Internet cafe in London as I write this. The news article that the wire item mentions is in the last update section I posted. I received a brief description of the new mini-series from someone who screened a pre-release copy and they told me those details, i.e. it didn't follow Welles' original script and cut the boarding house scene and narration. I am rather amazed to have the site be mentioned in a wire story, though. Welcome to the new members, incidentally.

[apexjazz]

I was not referring to you, comrade Marzol. just making a little ironical comment, very general in its aim. no offense was taken.

Don't feel persecuted.

[jaime marzol]

sorry, comrade, i guess i was the one feeling persecuted