The late Orson Welles spins tales of the great magicians while performing his own astounding feats of mind-reading and illusion in the new theatrical production Orson The Magnificent.
The play debuts July 13 at the Trinidad Theatre as part of the Capital Fringe Festival in Washington, D.C.
The brainchild of actor-playwright Lars Klores, the 75-minute production is part magic show and part dramatic biography, told by a legendary raconteur with a few tricks still left up his sleeve.
In the show, Welles makes reference to his death, and the location of the show is a sort of undefined black-walled room with a howling wind outside. The play begins with the clock tolling 11 and ends appropriately with the chimes at midnight.
Klores provided a glimpse into the making of Orson The Magnificent for Wellesnet.
How did you come to write this show? Have you always been a fan of Welles’ work?
It’s funny, as a boy growing up in the ‘70s, I knew Orson only as a magician. I used to see him on the various talk shows of the day, and he would always open with a card trick or an ominous piece of mentalism. It was only later, in my young teens, when I became interested in classic movies that I realized what a cinematic genius he was. The first time I saw Citizen Kane I actually saw the ending first. It was so clearly a moment of exquisite emotion, I became obsessed with seeing the whole film. Back in the ‘70s, that meant waiting about a year for the local TV station to re-air it. Suffice to say that once I saw the full film it started a deep interest in Orson as a performer and as an artist.
I actually own a piece of furniture that once belonged to Orson. It was auctioned by his estate when he died. It’s a giant old-world globe that transforms into a bar. It’s rather magical in and of itself.
So, you were a fan of magic since before you were a fan of Welles?
Yes, I think most magicians get bitten by the magic bug when we’re quite young. In my case when I was about 9 or so, my stepbrothers took me to Al’s Magic Shop in D.C. to check out the jokey items, the Halloween masks, the joke buzzers, plastic doggie-do, stink bombs, etc. I didn’t know it at the time, but Al’s was one of the best and most famous magic shops in the world. As my stepbrothers pored over the joke counter, I found myself attracted to the back of the shop where all the old magicians gathered around packs of cards, old books, and pieces of exotic magical apparatus. Pretty soon, I was spending all my allowance there.
Magic shops don’t really exist anymore, do they?
There are a few that remain. I’m lucky to live in driving distance of one of the best: The Denny & Lee Magic Studio just outside Baltimore. But you’re right, the internet has pretty much killed off most of the brick-and-mortar shops. It’s a real shame, because a lot of what makes magic special is that it’s passed down from magician to magician. Not just the secrets, but the little bits of business, the heart of the trick, what makes it amazing, etc. The magician Jim Steinmeyer has a great quote about magic secrets. He says the greatest secret in magic is that magicians guard an empty safe. The secret to a trick is often the least important part of it. What a true magician brings to it is the ability to captivate an audience and bring to it a sense of wonder no matter what the secret of the trick is. Orson demonstrated this many times, taking a trick which in a lesser performer’s hands would have been mundane and making it a compelling piece of theater. There were many magicians who were better than Orson at sleight of hand, but there was no magician who could match Orson’s presence and theatricality. That’s what made him a singular magician.
How did you get the idea to create this show?
About two years ago, I was preparing to audition to play Orson in a production of Orson’s Shadow, a great play by Austin Pendleton about the time when Orson directed Sir Laurence Olivier in a production of Ionesco’s Rhinoceros. As I was preparing, it occurred to me that if I were cast in the role, it would be a great use of the stage on dark nights to perform a little one-man show recreating Orson’s magic. And if I didn’t get cast, I thought, I would still have the play to work on and maybe turn into something bigger, and that’s what happened.
You appear to be much thinner than Welles. Did you consider making a physical transformation?
I decided early on not to wear a fat suit for this play. Some of my reasons were artistic; some were practical. To my eye, fat suits always look silly unless perhaps they’re created by Hollywood special effects teams. So, the audience always notices the fat suit, and it takes them right out of the play. This is especially troubling when the actor is trying to convey a sense of gravitas, and it’s clear to everyone in the room that he’s swimming in a suit of foam rubber. I know that when I come out onstage, some in the audience might think, “He’s not as fat as Orson was,” but then I hope they put it out of their mind and enjoy the show rather than noticing my fat suit all night. Orson’s weight was a small part of who he was, and in fact he had lost a good deal of it by the time he died. I am trying to dress like him, I’ve grown his beard, I try to mimic his voice, I’m doing his magic. I’d hope after all that, the audience doesn’t need me to look fat in order to enjoy the show. It’s a theatrical performance, not an impersonation.
Are the tricks you perform in the show Welles’ tricks?
Some are and some aren’t, but all are in the spirit of tricks he performed. For instance, for a TV special, he once performed an actual game of Russian Roulette with a real gun and a real bullet (and a real Angie Dickinson). Recreating that exactly wasn’t practical for insurance reasons alone, so I instead perform a game of Russian Roulette using paper bags and a real metal spike. The danger is still there, just with no firearms. In other cases, I recreate tricks faithfully to how he performed them. In same cases, I improve them with methods of my own, some of which became available after his death. My goal in all of it was to do the magic show that Orson would have wanted to do today. Sort of a 2017 staged version of the Magic Show film he worked on up until his death.
How much research did you do into writing this?
I read the standard biographies by Simon Callow and Barbara Leaming, as well as the interviews he conducted with Peter Bogdonavich and Henry Jaglom. When it really got interesting, however, was when I started combing through old magic magazines for mentions of his name. The internet has made research of this type so much easier than it must have been decades ago. Through the Conjuring Arts Research Center, I was able to access full runs of obscure magic magazines and search them for mentions of Orson’s name. Not only did I get actual tricks and essays he published, but I also got fascinating glimpses into private moments, such as when a reviewer for a magic show wrote, “In the audience was Orson Welles, whom I overheard praising the work of Abb Dickson.” Stuff like that, little hidden moments, were just golden. It would have taken a team of researchers years to do the research I was able to do in just a few days. I was also very fortunate to be able to speak with Rich Bloch, a magician who was very close with Orson right up until his death. Rich gave me some great advice on the script and some real insight into what Orson was like and how he approached magic.
Do you have plans to take this play beyond the current run?
That depends on the response, I suppose. For now, after working on it for two years, I’m just happy to have it be performed.
Orson The Magnificent opens July 13 at the Trinidad Theatre in Washington, D.C. Tickets are available at http://www.
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