Questions for Stefan Droessler

Johnny Dale · Post by **Johnny Dale** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 2:14 am

How about coming up with a list of questions for the Curator of the Munich Museum.
We could ask Jeff to send them to him and ask for his reply.
Example: In L.A. this weekend, he said that he was unaware of any new initiatives on Chimes.
So, what else, would we like to ask the Maven from Munich?

blunted by community · Tue Feb 24, 2004 4:17 am

when is the show coming to florida?

Sir Bygber Brown · Post by **Sir Bygber Brown** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:15 am

Merchant of Venice update! Ask whether its possible for anything to be done, and whether anyone has considered it.

Other Side of the Wind updates, which are always welcome.

But i thought we decided Droessler wasn't in on any insider Welles news...

maxrael · Post by **maxrael** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:53 am

Is the plan ultimately once the various restoration projects are completed to release them to the public via DVD?

maxrael · Post by **maxrael** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:56 am

Are Stefan Droessler or his team aware of Wellesnet? Would he be up for doing some kind of live webchat?

maxrael · Post by **maxrael** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 5:59 am

Are there plans for the Munich Filmmuseum to have an English-language website where Welles fans can check the latest status of all the various restoration projects?

maxrael · Post by **maxrael** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 6:16 am

At the London showing of Welles rarities Stefan indicated The Deep restoration project should be completed in 2005. Can he tell us any more about this such as is it still on schedule and whether the footage will be presented as a documentary or a complete feature?

maxrael · Post by **maxrael** » Tue Feb 24, 2004 6:24 am

for Sir Bygber,

Stefan, at the London showing of Welles Rarities you indicated there was currently hope of being able to recover the missing two reels of Merchant Of Venice that you couldn't really talk about in any detail... is there any news on this?

Oscar Christie · Post by **Oscar Christie** » Wed Feb 25, 2004 1:27 am

Is there a fund for Americans who want to donate to the Welles Collection?
In the U.S. a charitable arm of a foreign museum would be called, "The Friends of the Welles Collection at the Munich Museum".
Such a fund is referred to as a 501{c}3 and allows the donor to get a tax deduction.

Sir Bygber Brown · Post by **Sir Bygber Brown** » Wed Feb 25, 2004 5:53 am

yes yes - ask for an update on Merchant just like maxrael worded it.

stefan · Post by **stefan** » Sat Mar 06, 2004 9:53 pm

Back in Germany I read your questions. Most of them are answered in the meantime, to some ideas like the fund for donations we will return when a concrete project like THE DEEP or MERCHANT OF VENICE will go on...

I liked to see the audiences in L.A. and New York responding to the programs, and I got very helpful and revealing informations by meeting Jonathan Lynn, Mike Caveney, Lawrence French, James Toback and Christopher Welles - beside the usual talks with Oja, Gary Graver and Bill Krohn. I didn't like so much to talk to some anonymous visitors in a quite personal way and to find me some hours later wrongly quoted in a wellesnet entry...

There are a lot of speculations and presumptions concerning Welles, and my interest is always to go to the roots, to people who were very close to Welles or to the remaining material itself. You can contact me at the Filmmuseum with concrete questions concerning our material and the projects in which we are involved.

The Unknown Orson Welles booklet is available via amazon.de for Euro 14.00. We charged more at the U.S. screenings because of the shipping and customs expenses (as far as I know amazon.de charges for oversea shipping at least additional Euro 13.00).

Filmmuseum Muenchen is always interested in getting film material, tapes, pictures, screenplays, articles, letters, notes, paintings and sketches by Orson Welles to complete its collection.

stefan d.

maxrael · Post by **maxrael** » Mon Mar 08, 2004 10:31 am

Hi Stefan,

Good to see you here!!

Is there any news on the possible recovery of The Merchant Of Venice soundtrack?

best wishes to you and your team,
max

blunted by community · Mon Mar 08, 2004 1:12 pm

stefan, i have an oversized welles collection with many odds and ends. would be glad to contribute anything the collection is missing. where do i send my not yet composed list when i compose it?

Post by **Wellesnet** » Fri Oct 23, 2015 8:24 am

Stefan talked with Wellesnet about The Deep, The Merchant of Venice and Journey Into Fear. Full text below.
http://www.wellesnet.com/stefan-droessl ... on-welles/

Stefan Dröessler is the leading preservationist of the unfinished films of Orson Welles.

He is not only the director of the Munich Film Museum, the repository of projects ranging from The Deep to the The Dreamers, but creator of a comprehensive edition of Mr. Arkadin (Confidential Report) and key player in the recent restoration of The Merchant of Venice.

Dröessler will present The Unknown Orson Welles on Nov. 19-22 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City as part of the 13th annual MoMA International Festival of Film Preservation. He will be joined by Oja Kodar, Welles' companion and rights holder to many of the films on Nov. 20. Among the rarities to be shown are the workprint of The Deep, test footage for The Dreamers, The Other Side of the Wind workprint materials, The Merchant of Venice and a reconstruction of the preview version of Journey into Fear.

Dröessler was gracious enough to answer a few questions about The Unknown Orson Welles.

What has the audience reaction been to The Merchant of Venice? Can you tell a little about what went into the restoration effort?

The Merchant of Venice got a very warm reception at the Venice Film Festival. It was part of a pre-opening gala with 1,400 people in the audience. The Italian newspapers spoke of standing ovations.
The film was restored and reconstructed by Filmmuseum Muenchen und Cinemazero. We could assemble fragments from different sources, following a script by Orson Welles and notes by composer Francesco Lavagnino. But severe technical problems had to be solved. Due to bad storage conditions the film material was in terribly bad shape and the colors had faded almost completely. And the loss of the sound mix for the third reel made it impossible to follow the story line. We had to go new ways, using digital technology for creating a form that allows us to understand Orson Welles’ original concept. Fortunately some members of the original production could support us with valuable information and suggestions: the editor Fred Muller, the assistant editor Mauro Bonanni, the actor of Tubal Jonathan Lynn and Orson Welles’ closest collaborator Oja Kodar.

With the discovery of Too Much Johnson and The Merchant of Venice, are there many other lost treasures we should soon expect?

There are bits and pieces in different collections, and it is always possible that something unknown may surface. The problem is to identify the pieces, to collect all available information about the original project, to develop an idea how to restore it in a faithful way, to clear the rights and to finance the technical work. I don’t like to speculate and don’t announce projects before they are really settled.

The restoration of the preview version of Journey into Fear has not gotten as much attention as other Welles' restorations. What is your feeling about this work?

In the last 16 years, I worked on many fragments and Orson Welles projects. For me each of these restorations is important and has its merits. Journey into Fear is a film undeservedly neglected by most experts and scholars because Orson is not credited as the director. But nobody takes in consideration the strange fact that Orson after his return to Hollywood didn’t care for The Magnificent Ambersons but tried to save the also butchered Journey into Fear and did even a reshooting. Obviously this film was not just a minor project to him. I like the film very much, especially the preview version, which takes more time to develop the characters and is funnier. We didn’t have the funds and the financial support of the rights owners to do a high resolution reconstruction which may be the cause why some programmers preferred not to show it.

There have been high hopes for years that The Deep can be restored and presented close to Welles vision. Is that likely?

Unfortunately only a few rushes of the original camera negative survive, so that today we have only various incomplete, faded and worn workprints of The Deep. Since it is impossible to “finish” an unfinished Welles film, you can only put together an interpretation of the work that’s as faithful as possible to Welles’ original vision. This requires a very intensive study of all existing film material, documents, screenplays, dialogue lists and talks with the people involved in the production. I think in the case of The Deep we have done it and are ready to take the next step. It will be a very expensive enterprise due to the bad shape of the material and we have to develop a very specific reconstruction concept. But first of all several legal problems need solving. So far you can only have a look at our assemblage of the workprints. The Deep was meant to be a little thriller as Welles did from time to time in his career. The workprint is much too long, repetitive, not color graded, lacking music and big portions of the dialogue. You need some imagination and good will to recognize the real qualities of the film.

It is frustrating for so many Welles fans that these films can only be seen at festivals. Is there a possibility of a DVD or Blu-ray collection of these films?

Frankly, I don’t think it is the worst option to be forced to go to a cinema for seeing Orson Welles films on a big screen. And they are not presented just in festivals, but also in Orson Welles retrospectives and archival cinemas all over the world. Of course it would be nice to have some of these items additionally in good quality DVDs for intense study. Many things are floating around the internet, illegally uploaded by anonymous fans. For official releases, you have to clear the rights. These are often difficult to solve due to the unusual production situations of the late Welles films. And unfortunately due to his worldwide fame everybody tries to make money with the name of Orson Welles. Even settling the contracts for The Merchant of Venice and getting access to all the film elements from the different sources needed much more time than you would believe.

RayKelly · Post by **RayKelly** » Wed Nov 18, 2015 1:18 pm

Oja Kodar will not attend the MoMA screening of footage from The Other Side of the Wind and The Dreamers on November 20.
According to a MoMA spokeswoman, "Ms. Kodar had originally been confirmed to co-present this program, but unfortunately she is unable to make the trip to New York and will not be present to introduce the Welles program on the 20th, so Stefan Dröessler will do the intro solo."
Dröessler confirmed Kodar's cancellation for health reasons and that he will introduce programming on all four nights.
Tickets for The Unknown Orson Welles, which begins Thursday, Nov. 19, are available online at https://www.moma.org

WELLESNET MESSAGE BOARD

Questions for Stefan Droessler

Interview with Stefan Dröessler of the Munich Film Museum

Re: Interview with Stefan Dröessler of the Munich Film Museum