Wellesnet

By RAY KELLY

As the 40th anniversary of Orson Welles’ death approaches, Wellesnet is showcasing a two-hour video of the DGA memorial held three weeks after Welles’ passing on October 10, 1985.

Journalist Frank Beacham, who met Welles during his final months, was asked to record the November 2 tribute at the Director’s Guild of America Theater in Los Angeles. It was organized by two Welles associates: author Joseph McBride, who had worked with Welles on several projects, most notably The Other Side of the Wind; and director Richard Wilson, whose collaborations with Welles dated back to the Mercury Theatre.  Chuck Warn, public relations director of the DGA, assisted the two. Peter Bogdanovich was the host of the memorial event.

For decades, copies of  Beachan’s video, Remembering Orson, were limited to close friends and attendees at the memorial.  However, Beacham decided in 2019 to provide the video to Wellesnet while he was promoting his stage play Maverick saying,   “It feels like an appropriate time to release the video. I would like to offer it exclusively to Wellesnet.”

The star-studded public memorial at the DGA was in sharp contrast to the stark private wake held at a Hollywood mortuary two days after his death. It was organized by lawyer Eli Blumenfeld and attended by Welles’ widow, Paola Mori, his three daughters and a handful of mourners.

Participating in the DGA memorial were longtime companion and collaborator Oja Kodar, loyal cameraman Gary Graver and lifelong friend and educator Roger “Skipper” Hill. In addition to Wilson and Bogdanovich, tributes were offered by such notables as Charlton Heston, Janet Leigh, Geraldine Fitzgerald, Norman Lloyd, Dan O’Herlihy, Greg Garrison and Robert Wise. Biographer Barbara Leaming, and Patrick Terrail, proprietor of Ma Maison, Welles’ favorite restaurant, also shared heartfelt memories.

Years later, Beacham would revisit Welles’ legacy in a revealing article entitled Orson Welles and his Brief, Passionate Love Affair with the Betacam.  (Beacham was among the first users of Sony’s revolutionary Betacam camera on Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.)

Beacham with Wilson produced the six-hour audio retrospective, Theatre of the Imagination: Radio Stories by Orson Welles & the Mercury Theatre.  He also wrote, directed and produced the documentary, The Mercury Company Remembers with Leonard Maltin.

A graduate of the University of South Carolina, Beacham embarked on his journalistic career at WHPB-AM radio in Belton, S.C. He went on to work with U.S. Senator Richard Byrd of West Virginia and contributed to WIS-TV, the Miami Herald, and the Washington Post. He covered pivotal events for NBC News and Sports, including the 1968 Democratic convention riots, the 1980 Winter Olympics, and several Super Bowls. In 2001 Beacham helped document the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks and broadcasters’ efforts to restore over-the-air broadcasting in New York. He died in December 2023.

As for the DGA – which had already honored Welles with a lifetime achievement award in 1983 – it chose to host another tribute to Welles at its theater to mark the 100th anniversary of his birth in 2015.  Again, Bogdanovich was a participant but was joined by follow directors Henry Jaglom, John Landis and Chuck Workman. The event included a screening of Workman’s documentary Magician: The Astonishing Life and Work of Orson Welles .

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