Britain’s The Oldie magazine recently dug out an interesting piece written a few years back by the late filmmaker Andrew Sinclair (Under Milk Wood) recalling an unfinished 1970s project starring Orson Welles and Oliver Reed.
Sinclair was set to direct Reed, Welles and Oja Kodar in a movie called Rider. He had previously worked with Reed on the horror movie Blue Blood in 1973. And Welles and Reed had previously co-starred in Michael Winner’s British comedy I’ll Never Forget What’s ‘Isname in 1967.
However, after a week’s worth of shooting in Athens, the stock market collapsed, the producer fled, and Sinclair writes he found himself “stranded between two of the largest men on Earth.”
We sat for fourteen hours in the Gerofinikas restaurant in Syntagma Square. Orson sat on three chairs, Oliver sat on two, and I was squeezed on one chair like fishpaste between the two monsters. We consumed 22 bottles of red wine and two dishes of every course in the place. They mainly discussed whether to smash up their hotels or to kill me. But there was a reason not to do that. Somebody had to pay for the meal.
Reed removed an American Express card from Sinclair’s top pocket, telling him “Stars don’t carry credit cards.”
Welles vowed to murder Sinclair “if you don’t pay my hotel bills and escort me and Oja from this abyss.”
Sinclair agreed, adding that Welles repaid him with the “best advice ever.”
“You can solve all problems, Andrew, by six letters.”
“What are they, awesome Orson?”
“MP, YP, HP. My Problem, Your Problem, His or Her Problem.”
This was My Problem. I solved it for Orson and Oliver, and I saw to their exit. But I was broke – and Rider never made it to the screen.
The British Film Institute lists Rider as a 1974 effort, directed by Sinclair and co-written by Sinclair and Welles. The cast included, Reed, Welles, Kodar and Meg Wynn Owen. It was produced by Brian Jackson.
Relatively little else is known about Rider. The brief filming could have taken place before Welles began shooting the party sequences for The Other Side of the Wind with John Huston and Rich Little in February 1974 or during a break in production in the spring of that year.
Welles recalled the project with Reed during an appearance years later on the Merv Griffin Show, noting he had not been paid for his 10 days work and had to sneak out of Athens.
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