The Directors Guild of American honored Sir Ridley Scott with its Lifetime Achievement Award on February 4, and the filmmaker noted the influence of Orson Welles on his career.
While many speakers at the 69th annual DGA Awards referenced President Donald Trump and the recent executive order on immigration, Scott refrained talking politics.
“I’m not going to talk about politics because there have been a lot of references to politics tonight and I’m best off not talking about it.” Scott said. Instead, he talked about his work and influences.
“I was always impressed with what Orson Welles had done with his very first film. He was 19 at the time of making Citizen Kane. He’s the reason I was so attracted to our world, with all its challenges,” Scott told the crowd at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, Calif..
(Welles was, in fact, 25 years old during the making of Citizen Kane.)
Scott was one of the producers of the 1999 drama RKO 281, which depicted the making of Citizen Kane.
The 79-year-old, English filmmaker has spoken in the past of his admiration of the works of Welles, David Lean, John Ford, Carol Reed and Akira Kurosawa.
Scott did not direct his first feature film, The Duelists, until age 40. His other works include Alien, Gladiator, Blade Runner, Thelma & Louise, Prometheus and The Martian.
The DGA honored Welles with its Lifetime Achievement Award in 1984, a year before his death at age 70.
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