Robert Beltran, who played Chakotay in Star Trek Voyager, has been cast as Orson Welles in the upcoming biopic Eartha Kitt C’est Si Bon.
Kitt made her acting debut as Helen of Troy in Time Runs, a Welles adaptation of Faust, in 1950. He once called her “the most exciting woman on earth.”
She said of Welles, “After rehearsing all night, Orson would walk me up the Champs-Elysée to my hotel with the sun coming up. We would look at the sights, window-shop, and he would recite Shakespeare to me.” Kitt, who had had an affair with the millionaire playboy Porfirio Rubirosa, recalled the “fabulous lunches” Welles would buy her. “Orson really introduced me to a marvelous gourmet type of living. Him and Rubirosa – I tell you, I was absolutely spoiled by the best kind of men.”
Her daughter Kitt McDonald Shapiro wrote, “She was close to Orson Welles, and she was like a sponge around him because she was so drawn to his intensity and his incredible knowledge of many different subjects. People often thought they were lovers, but she said they never were. It was more of a mentorship.”
The Kitt biopic is set for release in May 2023.
“Robert Beltran is a very fine actor. He has the rare personal strength and powerful aura that was Orson Welles,” director Shadow Dragu-Mihai said in a statement. “I have worked with him in the past and it is an honor that he has agreed to join our cast on Eartha Kitt C’est Si Bon.”
Eartha Kitt C’est Si Bon will announce more cast in the weeks to come. Dani Lane is already set to star as Kitt in her younger years.
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