TOO MUCH JOHNSON Found!

[Wellesnet]

CBS News weighs in on "Too Much Johnson":

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505270_162- ... n-decades/

[Wellesnet]

Very nice writeup in the New Yorker on the Nov. 25th NYC premiere:

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/m ... hnson.html

[Wellesnet]

"Too Much Johnson" will have it's West Coast premiere at Berkely:
http://www.wellesnet.com/?p=9190

[Wellesnet]

Thanks to Greg Boozell on Facebook. Joseph McBride writing for Bright Lights on TMJ. A great in-depth article, McBride does an amazing job of showing how seminal this little film was for the great Welles projects to come:

http://brightlightsfilm.com/too-much-jo ... 0W3iqgo63t

[RayKelly]

A few fleeting seconds are contained in a video clip on composing a soundtrack. It can be found on our main news page at http://www.wellesnet.com/?p=9925 or on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pm_PEIY8ysg

[Roger Ryan]

The full TOO MUCH JOHNSON workprint has now been uploaded to the National Film Preservation Foundation site:

http://www.filmpreservation.org/preserv ... work-print

...as well as a delightful 30 minute attempt at editing the extant footage into a watchable short:

http://www.filmpreservation.org/preserv ... reimagined

[Le Chiffre]

Fabulous, thanks Roger! Amazing to see how the young Welles, with almost no filmmaking experience, had such a feel for the rhythms, timing, and special qualities of silent comedy. Just watching the rushes I found myself cracking up several times. And Joseph Cotton does some pretty breathtaking stuntwork! After seeing this, I realize what a shame it was that this unique experiment in film/theatre fusion never got to be seen and experienced as it was intended to be. I was impressed by how well the new piano score (not Paul Bowles's) complimented the film too.

Roger do you remember the guy that wrote about have seen the TMJ footage several years ago? He said he had seen it in the 1960's and wrote a detailed description. We suspected at the time that he was hoaxing, but I'd like to take a look at what he wrote just to make sure.

[Le Chiffre]

Never mind, I found it, by F Gwynplaine MacIntyre:

In the mid-1960s, I met Orson Welles while I was working for Lew Grade's ITC television organisation. Welles wanted Grade's backing for a film or TV project, and he was very eager to ingratiate himself. I had heard a rumour that 'Citizen Kane' was not actually Welles's film debut, and that he had directed some short films before 'Kane'. When I asked him about this, he graciously arranged for me to screen two brief films which he had directed pre-'Kane'. One of these was 'Too Much Johnson'.

Before I describe this movie, let me explain its source. 'Too Much Johnson' was originally an 1890s stage farce written by and starring William Gillette, an actor-playwright now remembered only for having written the first play about Sherlock Holmes. The main character in 'Too Much Johnson' is Augustus Billings, an American businessman who travels to Cuba with his wife and his termagant mother-in-law Mrs Batterson. Also aboard the steamship are a hot-tempered Frenchman and his wife, and some dim-witted Canadians. En route, Billings's wife discovers an embarrassing letter in his possession. To avoid divulging the truth, Billings claims that the letter was written by a Mr Johnson (who doesn't actually exist). In Cuba, the Billings party encounter an American named Joseph Johnson. Mrs Billings and her mother assume that this man is the author of the letter. Comic complications ensue ... but they're not very funny and certainly not believable.

Now, the film: the footage that Welles made (and which he allowed me to screen) was NOT a film version of Gillette's play. (His film ran only two reels, whilst Gillette's farce is a full-length play.) Nor is it an incomplete or abbreviated version of the stage play. Welles told me that he and the Mercury Theatre players had intended to stage a production of Gillette's play, directed by Welles. (I'm not certain if this production ever actually took place.) As an innovation, Welles and his cast filmed some bridging material, which would have been projected onstage during the scene changes. Welles cheerfully admitted that he had shot these sequences as an entree to Hollywood, in order to persuade the movie-studio executives that he could handle the disciplines of film direction.

Bearing in mind that this footage was never meant to be a complete film, it consists of several brief unlinked scenes. We see Joseph Cotten, Ruth Ford and the very funny Mary Wickes boarding a gangway at a wharf. (There's supposed to be a large ocean liner berthed just out of frame, but there obviously isn't; the quay is clearly too small -- and in water too shallow -- to harbour an ocean liner.) We also see the Frenchman and his wife (Edgar Barrier, Arlene Francis) in an unconvincing 'shipboard' sequence. We see some shaky hand-held footage of Joseph Cotten rushing about in the 'Cuban jungle', but the local flora don't look remotely tropical ... and Cotten's clothing, as well as his lack of perspiration, indicate that this footage was shot well north of the Tropic of Cancer. Welles told me that these scenes were filmed in Connecticut, but he didn't recall precisely where and I'm not even certain that he was being truthful. (During the same conversation, Welles told me that he had been a personal friend of Bram Stoker ... who in fact died three years before Welles was born.) None of the distinctive traits of 'Citizen Kane', such as Gregg Toland's depth-of-focus shots, or Welles's ceiling compositions, are in evidence here.

Welles also permitted me to see a brief clip of silent-film footage, shot mostly out of focus, consisting of some blurry close-ups of Joseph Cotten grinning outdoors in three-quarter view, a hand tugging a door-pull, and a brass bell spinning on a pavement. These clips seemed to be the result of Welles larking about with a camera, rather than increments of any sort of coherent film narrative. Judging from Cotten's appearance, and the general ineptitude of Welles's direction, these shots were filmed many months before 'Too Much Johnson' ... and they probably constitute Welles's debut as a film director.

The footage which I saw on this occasion has very little entertainment value except as a curiosity, and no significance except as a footnote to Welles's career ... and perhaps as a reminder that even geniuses have to start out completely ignorant of their disciplines. 'Citizen Kane' is definitely a masterpiece, but none of that genius is on offer in these film clips.

[Roger Ryan]

If it wasn't obvious before, it's clear now that "F Gwynplaine MacIntyre" fabricated the whole account. His sketchy scene descriptions all managed to be inaccurate; there isn't even a "shipboard sequence" between Barrier and Francis, "unconvincing" or otherwise. He spends more time describing THE HEARTS OF AGE while pretending not to know what it is.

Alas, MacIntyre killed himself before he could truly watch the TOO MUCH JOHNSON footage. I applaud Professor Scott Simmon's editing job and Michael D. Mortilla's attentive piano score which brings the footage to life in a way that is hard to appreciate simply looking at the rushes.

[Le Chiffre]

It's great that we now have the real footage to make MacIntire's fake account obsolete. There are plenty of instances where Welles seems to be experimenting with deep focus, and the Cuba shots don't look shaky or hand-held. MacInitire actually does have a Wiki page, which states:

MacIntyre reviewed dozens of older and silent motion pictures, including a large number of lost films which he claimed to have seen under circumstances the details of which he could not reveal. Some silent film critics and fans believe the reviews to be elaborate jokes; others have accused MacIntyre of muddying the historical record by publishing fake reviews.

John Houseman was one of the duelers on the cliff, and in RUN THROUGH he criticizes Welles for constantly being careless with his actors' safety, always asking Houseman and the other dueler to get closer to the edge of the cliff, for example. One can see why now: he was going for the kind of visual stroke that Ingmar Bergman would later make famous in THE SEVENTH SEAL, and would become a Welles signature as well, in films like CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT and DON QUIXOTE.

Also a quick nod to the unintentional "Decasia" effect seen in the scene where the jealous husband knocks off everyone's hat in the street. From what I've read, the lab worked miracles with the badly damaged reel and it was well worth it.

[Wellesnet]

From Wellesnet Facebook, Michael Koenig writes:
If anyone wants to read the original play that the film was intended to accompany, it's available online as well. (It's helpful when watching this to look at a brief plot summary at least, since this was intended to be shown in three between-act segments).

http://books.google.com/books?id=2lo2AQ ... te&f=false

[Roger Ryan]

Thanks to Greg Boozell on Facebook. Joseph McBride writing for Bright Lights on TMJ. A great in-depth article, McBride does an amazing job of showing how seminal this little film was for the great Welles projects to come:

http://brightlightsfilm.com/too-much-jo ... 0W3iqgo63t

Joseph McBride has updated his "Bright Lights Film Journal" article (same link) with new information including a little more research into that house fire outside Madrid. Essential reading on the TOO MUCH JOHNSON saga.

[Wellesnet]

Thanks Roger. That's a valuable piece by McBride.

[jbrooks]

Regarding F Gwynplaine MacIntyre, it seems to me that he did describe the scene at the dock at least somewhat accurately. It is true that the characters are supposed to be boarding the gangway to large cruise ship but there (pretty obviously) is no actual cruise ship there and the gangway we see is probably too low to lead to a large ship. (Later we see an actual cruise ship -- but it's only in the reverse shot -- and never in the same short as the pier). Given that, I'd guess he did see a portion of the film -- or at least stills.

[Colmena]

A good blog essay on TMJ:
Too Much Johnson Is Never Enough Orson: The ‘Lost Film’ of Orson Welles

http://lokkeheiss.wordpress.com/2014/02 ... on-welles/