OW random issues of interest

[Jay Bushman]

Does anybody have recommendations on where I could find transcripts and/or recordings of some of the political speeches that OW made during the last FRD campaign? I'm particularly interested in the lecture he gave called "The Nature of the Enemy," and his eulogy (eulogies?) of FDR. As much as I'd enjoy it, I'd like to avoid the expense of a trip to the Lilly. Really, any scholarship on Welles' poltical activities in the 40s and 50s would be great. Thanks a lot.

[Jeff Wilson]

The only place I know of with several recordings of his political speeches besides the Lilly is the Library of Congress' sound archives, which have several. You can search their online catalog, SONIC, and get a rundown of them. Your only hope for transcripts is the Lilly, though, I would think. The only easy to obtain political writings of Welles are in periodicals he wrote for, such as FREE WORLD in the mid 40s, which decent university libraries should carry.

[Peter Tonguette]

Has anyone ever determined the veracity of Welles' claim that Gideon Welles - Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy - was his great-grandfather (or a relation of any kind)? I'm curious if there is any kind of family tree for Welles that goes further back than his parents.

Peter

[Christopher]

Charles Higham came up with a family tree which is printed at the start of his book "Orson Welles: The Rise and Fall of an American Genius" published in 1985. Higham claimed he sent the family tree to Welles who could hardly believe it, and perhaps we shouldn't either. In any event, Gideon Wells shows up on the tree as a great-great-great uncle. The line of descent traced by Higham is that Gideon Wells was a brother of William Hill Wells, the father of Henry Hill Wells, the father of Richard Jones Welles (who changed the spelling of the surname) who was the father of Richard Head Welles, the father of Orson. Higham's biography has been so discredited by Welles scholars that I am personally dubious about the presence of Gideon Wells in his family tree.

[tonyw]

I don't know if any other members heard the NPR "All Things Considered" segment on the Brazilian play, "The Well Remembered" which deals with the exclusion of the black population of Brazil from recognition under a spurious ideal of ethnic harmony. The same issues that Welles encountered in his Brazilian journey which went into "It's All True" are still occurring today, especially in regard to the marginalization of the black population that RKO exectives objected to when they saw segments of the Carnival sequence.

Perhaps Catherine Benamou may deal with this in her forthcoming book on IT'S ALL TRUE? Whether she does or not, it will probably receive a blasting from Richard Schickel who condemns anything which contradicts his Cold War establishment ideas.

[tony]

tonyw:
I heard that segment too, and was thinking of Welles. Robert Stam wrote a great article in the special Welles issue on Welles back in 88, an article called "Orson Welles, Brazil, and the The Power of Blackness" which was the first article to blow open the whole racist aspect of the culture and of RKO's racist response to their spy's reports on Welles's activities in the favelas, filming the voodoo, etc. Catherine Benamou also wrote a great piece in the same issue called "It's All True as Document/Event". These articles, and others, were given at a conference held at New york University and the Public Theatre at that time.

But of course, it wasn't the "marginalization of the black population that RKO exectives objected to when they saw segments of the Carnival sequence." It was the number of black faces they saw, i.e. too many "jigaboos" jumping up and down". The "N" word was used liberally in the reports also. It seems they didn't know there was a history of slavery in Brazil, and hence a large percent of blacks in the population. Not only were they racist, but they were extremely worried about box office in the American South.

I'm sure Ms. Benamou will deal with this crucial aspect in her book, which is sure to prove to be THE definitive work on the subject: she has done massive research for many years, has gone there several times, and is an expert on Latin America. Works like hers will put to shame silly nonsense such as Thompson's, and we'll be the very fortunate recipients of her hard work and talents.

[Glenn Anders]

Over the last couple of years, Macresarf1, over at Epinions, has been touting Adam Curtis's superbly argued three-part BBC documentary, THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES; THE RISE OF THE POLITICS OF FEAR (2004), on why we are in "the long war on terror."

Curtis's thesis is that, in the 1960's, liberal politics failed to deliver a sufficiently better life to the middle class of Western Democracies or the poor of emerging Third World nations. Groups in their appropritate areas, the Neocons and the Radical Islamists, for instance, noted that fact, eventually took violent action, and polititicians have manipulated the results in years since -- brought us where we are today: the Middle East and Central Asia in flames; the American Lower Middle Class being destroyed (and the Nation, not to mention the Constitution, torn apart). Curtis presents three one-hour segments of logic and documentation, full of wisdom, wit, humor, illusion, and old fashioned muckraking, which is a further flowering of the Wellsian techniques of F FOR FAKE.

Much as I would have liked otherwise to connect this eye-opening project with Orson Welles, I could not. For one thing, the series had only been played on British and Canadian TV, or briefly in modified form at Cannes, and at several U.S. film festivals (including the San Francisco Film Festival, where I saw it). Plans for Showtime to air the series fell through (as we know can happen). That in itself might have been a connection to Welles' experience, but not one which would have passed muster here.

But, strangely, it seemed to me, Producer/Director Curtis maintained on THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES' Website that his most potent political documentary, his masterpiece, could never be released on legitimate commercial DVD because of "expensive music clearances" which would have to be obtained.

Now, I've heard this explanation before in connection with other releases, usually dealing with greedy contemporary rock or pop band groups, but I could not make it fit mainly public domain music cues in the Curtis BBC mini-series. My memory was that various visual movie allusions were made to THE THIEF OF BAGDAD, NOSFERATU, THE DESERT SONG, but the only music theme I referenced (vaguely) was to that of another BBC Production, RILEY, ACE OF SPIES. And so, Macresarf1 sadly lamented in his 2005 Epinions review the reason Adam Curtis had given:

http://www.epinions.com/content_193667698308

NOW, thanks to Viktor Kleinhaagen (and his factum-factotum, waynio), we can all watch THE POWER OF NIGHTMARES online:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 7517&q=bbc

It takes a bit of patience (especially, if you download it, as I have), but, we can now realize at our leisure, there are numerous quotes from classical, popular, and movie music -- i.e, Tchaikovsky, "Baby, It's Cold Outside," "The Dambusters Theme," "The Riley, Ace of Spies Theme," and . . . in the first segment and the third, to Bernard Herrmann's dark theme for CITIZEN KANE.

Now, Wellesnetters, it may become clear to us why, two years after Europe and Canada saw this brilliant polemic on the folly of Western Foreign Policy (and its clash with Middle Eastern "traditional values") -- this veritable CITIZEN KANE/F FOR FAKE homage -- most Americans have not been able to see the documentary and judge it for themselves. Given the numbers elsewhere who have absorbed the logic of THE POWER OF NIGHMARES, the work provides one more reason how we are regarded as such blundering fools.

I can see why the Project for a New American Century gang would not want us to see it. [Wolfowitz, Perle, Pipes, Kristol, et. al. -- not to single out their main recruitees, Donald Rumsfeld and George W. Bush -- condemn themselves from their own lips.] Curtis and the BBC might have stood up to them, as they evidently have done to the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair in Britain, but they may not have counted on the vast, insidious power of . . . Beatrice Welles and her hold on the tertiary uses to which her father's creations may be put.

Check it out, gang, tell me what you think.

Happy Hogmanay!

Glenn

[NoFake]

Here’s an interesting item on YouTube: Welles Off to Panama

Unfortunately, I see no sign of Welles...

[Roger Ryan]

That's Sumner Welles who's speaking in the clip, Roosevelt's Under Secretary of State and no relation to Orson. There is a slight connection, however - Sumner Welles' career was ended by a homosexual scandal and it is thought that this event might have inspired Orson's screenplay for "The Big Brass Ring".

[Terry]

It was bad enough when these hucksters merely claimed that Welles did the narration (when he doesn't even appear anywhere on the recording.) When I called the publisher to complain, I was informed that they had an "expert" who "should know" verify that Welles did appear, though they couldn't say where. I hung up the phone when the operator tried to distract me with a high-pressure spiel to buy their audio edition of The Bible. Actually, what sounds to be Paul Frees is on this recording, and I've found numerous Frees recordings erroneously credited to Welles over the years. I was hoping a good fraud suit would have killed this deplorable outfit by now, but now it seems that the "expert" has further mysteriously deduced that Welles was the producer and director of an adaption he had nothing to do with! Someone please bring The Government down on these folks with enough pressure to pulverize them into dust.



I suppose in Bill Clintonese, wherein words don't mean what they say, the 'produced and directed' part could merely mean that the adaption was produced and directed, without specifying by whom, and they're still standing by the "expert" for the "performance" claim.

Still....

(To be politically balanced for those who care about such things, I will add that in George W. Bushese, the credit would read "Produce, Directs and Performances by Orsons Well.")

[Kevin Loy]

Where is Beatrice at when some hellhounds need to be loosed?

Of course, I doubt she'd get much money out of these people...at least, I'm sure they don't pay as well as Universal and Showtime.

[François Thomas]

Some years ago, I listened to Jesus of Nazareth in the audiotape version released by Americana Publishing, Inc. in 2000.

The set cover then only gave the "information" that it was "performed by Orson Welles" and "with original orchestrations." On the back : "Orson Welles narrates the story, along with an international cast of actors from the Actor's Workshop in Lisbon, Portugal. In addition to the international cast, European composers wrote the orchestration for the story, including background music. The Radio Orchestra of Rome and the National Symphony Orchestra of Spain performed the compositions."

The only character whose voice resembles Welles's is the apostle Peter.

A reviewer from AudioFile identified actors June Foray and, yes, Paul Frees. He wrote, "The production sounds as if made in Hollywood thirty to forty-five years ago for LP release, and that more money than skill went into it. Dripping with bathos, melodrama, and unctuous Biblese, this curiosity best suits unsophisticated listeners and old-time radio enthusiasts."

[Glenn Anders]

I trust that all Wellsians have become fans of Keith Olbermann, the most savvy, courageous and literate (not to mention, entertaining) of the present Cable News commentators (and a former sportscaster, at that). The last couple of days, he has outdone himself. He has qualified himself as a Wellesnet Grand Poobah, in excellent standing!

Yesterday, Monday, November 26, 2007, he was discussing the "Declaration of Principles" that President George Walker Bush signed that morning with Iraqi Prime Minister Malachi. The purpose of the document was (once again) to end-run Congress and Our Constitution, and if fully executed, to commit American troops to stay in Iraq forever.

What was "a declaration of principles"? asked Olbermann. "Like something out of CITIZEN KANE"?

Not only that, but this evening on CNN (Tuesday, November 27th, 8 p.m., EST, 5 p.m., PST; rebroadcast: Midnight, EST, 9 p.m., PST), perhaps entirely coincidentally, Olbermann has scheduled old Mercury Theater veteran, Norman Lloyd, for an interview.

Gather around the electronic fire, Wellsians!

Glenn

[Oliver Oddball]

Recently I have been reading about the IQ of many celebrities, and I was wondering what was Orson's IQ? I couldn't find it anywhere online so I was wondering if anyone here knows.

[Glenn Anders]

Welcome, Oliver Oddball:

There is an online quiz which purports to answer your question:

http://www.geocities.com/rmm413/OrsonWellesQuiz.html

The IQ score given for Orson Welles is 146, in the top one or two percent tested by present reckoning, which seems reasonable, if we note the praise, attention and stimulation he was exposed to in "home-schooling" as a small child. But no source is listed for that score, and we are not told what test was used. The Stanford-Binet Test in its combined, standardized form dates only from 1916, and would have been judged "new-fangled" in the early 1920's.

We do know that, the year after his mother's death, 1925, Welles was sent by his guardian, Dr. Maurice "Dadda" Bernstein, to Madison, Wisconsin, where he was examined and run through a battery of tests by a well-known psychologist, Dr. Frederick Mueller, preparatory to selecting a school for the ten year-old. Interestingly, the recommendation of Dr. Mueller was that he be sent to a good, normal public school, Washington Grade School, in Madison. That choice did not work out, and Welles' father, Dick Welles, subsequently picked Todd School, where the family's older "backward" son, Richard Welles, had attended for awhile, unsuccessfully, before being institutionalized.

Orson Welles flowered at Todd School, and became perhaps its most famous success.

And so, as almost always with Welles, there is a little ambiguity in the record.

Hope that helps.

Glenn