Young Orson: The Years of Luck and Genius on the Path to Citizen Kane (121 page)

“The Stately Homos of Ireland” from Joseph McBride, “The Irish Education of Orson Welles,”
Irish America
, July 31, 1999. “A violent cloud of dust” and other MacLíammóir commentary, unless otherwise noted, from MacLíammóir,
All for Hecuba.
“Deep, guttural” and “When Orson calls with a smile in his voice . . .” (quoting Paul Stewart) from Milton Berle,
B.S. I Love You: Sixty Funny Years with the Famous and the Infamous
(McGraw-Hill, 1988). “Forced and defensive . . .” (Tennessee Williams) is quoted by Kenneth Tynan in his profile of OW,
Show
, November 1961. J. J. Hayes wrote about the eighteen-year-old “Orson Wells” with Goodman and Theatre Guild experience in “A Yeats Play and an American Actor in Dublin,”
New York Times
, November 8, 1931. OW’s reminiscences about his salad days in Ireland from the six-part BBC television series
Orson Welles’ Sketch Book
, 1955 (including “It was the only thing I could think of . . .”). “With the gallery and the pit . . .” from OW, letter to Hortense Hill, quoted in Callow,
Orson Welles.
The Longfords and Betty Chancellor, unless otherwise noted, are quoted from Noble,
The Fabulous Orson Welles.
“Went to jail . . .” from Biskind,
My Lunches with Orson.

Young OW discussed
The Dead Rides Fast
disparagingly with Hugh Curran in the
Chicago Tribune
, November 19, 1931. Joseph Holloway’s journals, touching on Gate Theatre productions during this period, were edited by Robert Hogan and Michael J. O’Neill and published as
Joseph Holloway’s Irish Theatre: Volume Two 1932–1937
(Proscenium, 1970). All of OW’s quotes about the supposed jealousy of MacLíammóir and comparing him with Anew McMaster come from Leaming,
Orson Welles.
“Several pounds of nose-putty . . .” from Noble,
The Fabulous Orson Welles.
“Hilton Edwards played Mogu as he played . . .” and Padraic Column’s “I don’t recognize . . .” from Georgie Hyde-Lees (Mrs. William Butler Yeats), “Yours Affly, Dobbs: George Yeats to Her Husband,” in
Essays for Richard Ellmann: Omnium Gatherum
, ed. Susan Dick (McGill-Queen’s Press, 1989). “Youngest and only American . . .” from
Irish Tattler and Sketch
, January 1932. “One of the best [Ghosts] I have ever seen . . .” from Noble,
The Fabulous Orson Welles.
“That’s a problem . . .” from OW’s filmed conversation with Bernard Braden in a Paris hotel room, known as
Orson Welles: The Paris Interview
(1960). “My debt to them . . .” from OW’s footage in the Irish television documentary
Orson Welles and the Gate Theatre
(Darren Chan/Brian Reddin, 2013).

Chapter 8:
1932–1933

All the OW quotes in the first half of this chapter, and later, describing his trip to Africa and Spain, are from contemporaneous letters to RH, except where noted. Most of the letters have been published, partially or in full, some originally in Hill,
One Man’s Time and Chance.
I fact-checked all the letters, arriving at the conclusion that, however much it goes against the grain of his mythmaking reputation, these contemporaneous accounts are largely truthful and accurate. Most of the letters, albeit with gaps in time, are on deposit at the UM or LL. They are augmented by letters in the Ashton and Florence Stevens Collections at the NL, which also contains correspondence from Welles, from Dr. Maurice and Hazel (Moore) Bernstein, and from Whitford Kane to the Stevenses. Once again, I have tried to sequence the letters, which are typically undated.

“In the throes of Orson” from Hazel Bernstein (HB), letter of May 29, 1948, to AS, and “an intensely interesting person . . .” from HB, letter of May 5, 1948, to Florence Stevens (NL). “Suitable for entertaining . . .” and the rest of RH’s account of the New York expedition from Hill,
One Man’s Time and Chance.
“I do hope you won’t . . .” from Leaming,
Orson Welles.
The accounts of the possible radio job and audition and of young OW’s visit to the Whistler retrospective with AS come from a series of undated 1932 letters from OW and AS to Florence Stevens, including AS’s letter of November 19, 1932, to his wife, and her undated reply (NL). “There is splendid stuff . . .” from AS, letter of November 27, 1932, to Florence Stevens (NL). “Some very exciting letters . . .” from an undated 1932 letter from OW to Florence Stevens (NL).

“As you love me, do . . .” from OW, letter of January 1933 to RH (UM). “His opera house and his millions . . .” from Hill,
One Man’s Time and Chance.
“Tough days those . . .” from John Clayton, “The Man Behind This,”
Los Angeles Times
, November 20, 1938. “Stick with this boy!” from Hill,
One Man’s Time and Chance.
Roger Hill did stick with “Marching Song,” presenting its world premiere, performed by the Todd Troupers, directed by Hascy Tarbox, at the Woodstock Opera House on June 7, 1950. “Debussy and others . . .” from OW, undated letter to RH, winter of 1932–1933 (UM). “The year is tearing by . . .” and “I have decided not to go to college . . .” from OW, letter of January 1933 to RH. “Shakespeare said everything . . .” from
Everybody’s Shakespeare: Three Plays Edited for Reading and Arranged for Staging—Twelfth Night, Julius Caesar, Merchant of Venice
(Todd Press, 1934).

“No one believes me . . .” from Callow,
Orson Welles.
James Van Hise, Nils Hardin, and Sam Moskowitz’s investigation into OW’s pulp fiction credentials was published as “Orson Welles: Pulp Writer?” in
Rocket’s Blast and the Comic Collector
, May 2000. OW’s deposition in the Ferdinand Lundberg lawsuit (like Herman Mankiewicz’s and John Houseman’s testimony, quoted elsewhere in this book) is among the voluminous civil case files held in Record Group 21 of the U.S. District Court in the National Archives and Records Administration, New York City. “The home of song and dancing” from Walter Starkie,
Don Gypsy
(John Murray, 1936). The actual facts of Welles’s bullfighting stint have thus far eluded the best detectives. OW wrote the introduction to Conchita Cintrón’s
Torera! Memoirs of a Bullfighter
(Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968). “Juan, you know how much I love . . .” from my correspondence with Juan Cobos, who interviewed OW extensively and worked with him in Spain and who impressed upon me the importance of Walter Starkie, Seville, Triana, Spain, and bullfighting. “[Don Quixote] is better than any . . .” from Cobos’s notes and reminiscences.

Chapter 9:
1933–1934

“He turned out literally . . .” from Hill,
One Man’s Time and Chance.
MAB quoted from his notes for a memoir. “Jump of association” and the rest of the account of young OW’s first encounter with Thornton Wilder (TW) from Noble,
The Fabulous Orson Welles
, with emendations from other sources. “Rather pudgy-faced . . .” and “The whole town [of Dublin] was staggered . . .” from TW’s letter of August 1933 to Alexander Woollcott, published in its entirety in
The Selected Letters of Thornton Wilder,
ed. Robin G. Wilder and Jackson R. Bryer (HarperCollins, 2008). “At times Wilder’s mentor . . .” from Penelope Niven,
Thornton Wilder: A Life
(HarperCollins, 2012). “With no more than a ‘wotta-mess-I’m in’ . . .” from OW’s undated letter of late August 1933 to Hortense Hill. “Never passed so serene a Pullman night . . . ,” from OW’s undated letter of late August 1933 to RH. The rest of OW’s fall 1933 correspondence with RH (including, below, “In the simple acceptance of each other . . .”) is undated. “Conversation was the most . . .” from Howard Teichmann,
Smart Aleck: The Wit, World, and Life of Alexander Woollcott
(Morrow, 1976). OW’s handwritten, nineteen-page letter of September 11, 1933, to TW is in Wilder’s papers in Special Collections, Beinecke Library, Yale University. “Physical vitality, psychic intensity . . .” from Michael A. Morrison,
John Barrymore, Shakespearean Actor
(Cambridge University Press, 1999).

“The ghosts of past magnificence . . .” and the outlook for the “grand tour of the country” from “Miss Cornell Starts Her Tour,”
New York Times
, November 26, 1933. Basil Rathbone writes about the tour in
In and Out of Character
(Doubleday, 1962). Brenda Forbes’s autobiography, also touching on the Cornell tour, is
Five Minutes, Miss Forbes
(Fairmile, 1994). A couple of tour anecdotes come from MAB’s notes for a memoir. I also drew from Guthrie McClintic,
Me and Kit
(Little, Brown, 1955), and cited McClintic from Noble,
The Fabulous Orson Welles.
Katharine Cornell is quoted from her six-part “I Wanted to Be an Actress,” as told to Ruth Woodbury Segwick,
Stage
magazine, 1939, which evolved into her autobiography
I Wanted to Be an Actress
(Random House, 1939). (Part Five,
Stage
, January/February 1939, centers on the national repertory tour.) In his papers, Stanley Custer recalled greeting OW backstage at the Madison stop of the tour. There are many versions of the cross-country train trip to Seattle, including Alexander Woollcott, “Miss Kitty Takes to the Road,”
Saturday Evening Post
, August 18, 1934. I have fact-checked and collated the versions with Seattle press accounts. “Orson at the time always . . .” from France,
The Theatre of Orson Welles.
“Terribly campy” from Callow,
Orson Welles.
“Do reviews ever wound you?” from Michael Parkinson’s interview with Welles on BBC’s
Parkinson
, 1974. I have a sheaf of clippings from newspapers in U.S. cities, which helped trace the itinerary and events of the tour. Kenneth Tynan mentioned the palmisty and fortune-telling anecdotes in his collected
Profiles
, ed. Kathleen Tynan (Nick Hern Books, 1990); the long portrait of Welles melds his early
Show
piece with later interviews with OW. “About twice a year . . .” (OW) and, below, “gauche and tiresome . . .” (Forbes) from France,
The Theatre of Orson Welles.

“That hurt for a while . . . ,” “some picturesque black chef” and “I expect you to shine brightly . . .” from Callow,
Orson Welles.
I have quoted from OW’s letters of April 12 and May 2, 1934, to Hilton Edwards in the Gate Theatre Collection. “Now he had added to . . .” from MacLíammóir,
All for Hecuba.
AS’s column about Welles and the Woodstock Summer Theater, undated, is in his NL papers. “I wanted to go to Europe . . .” from France,
The Theatre of Orson Welles.
“A bevy of stage-struck high school kids” and other RH memories of the summer theater from Hill,
One Man’s Time and Chance.
“A combination Bayreuth and a strawberry festival” from
Woodstock News
, June 28, 1934. Details of the launch dinner at the Tavern Club from an undated clipping, Margot Jr., “Thursday Evening All Roads Lead to Woodstock Opera,”
Chicago Daily News
, in the Woodstock Public Library file. “Joseph Jefferson made a curtain speech . . .” from Margot Jr., “Woodstock, Ill., Never Saw Equal of Last Night’s Doings in All Its Mellowing Century,”
Chicago Daily News
, July 13, 1934. “Rather mean” and “He revered them . . .” from Leaming,
Orson Welles.
“Vigorous non-homosexual” and the debate about “pansies” are also from Leaming. After proclaiming young OW’s genius in the
Chicago Tribune
, Charles Collins questioned it in “Planting Chicago’s ‘Fresh Fields,’ ”
New York Times
, July 15, 1934. John Clayton again quoted from his profile of OW,
Los Angeles Times.

My section on
The Hearts of Age
is greatly indebted to Professor Russell Merritt and Joseph McBride. When I was still in high school, my older sister took me to one of Professor Merritt’s film classes, where I first heard him talk about and then viewed
Citizen Kane
for the first time at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1969. Later, as a student myself, I took every class Merritt taught. Joseph McBride, who was the first to write about
The
Hearts of Age
—in “Welles Before
Kane
,”
Film Quarterly
, Spring 1970—was also an invaluable mentor dating back to those years; his investigation of Welles’s filmmaking from the first to last continues to this day. Charles O’Neal’s son Ryan and William Vance’s daughter Cynthia filled in with their memories. “It was a Sunday afternoon . . .” and “certainly nubile, probably a virgin . . .” from Brady,
Citizen Welles.
“A new star in the making” from
Woodstock Daily Sentinel
, August 21, 1934. “On the last regretful night . . .” from MacLíammóir,
All for Hecuba.
OW would “take a vacation . . .” from “Many Attended Final Showing of
Tsar Paul,”
Woodstock Sentinel
, August 21, 1934.

Chapter 10:
1934–1935

The half dozen OW-to-RH letters and telegrams from 1934–1935, all at UM, are undated, and I have sequenced them in context. “They fell under . . .” from “Moral and Domestic,”
Irish Times
, April 4, 1941. The Nicolsons are characterized from Feder,
In My Father’s Shadow.
I relied upon Mona Z. Smith,
Becoming Something: The Story of Canada Lee
(Faber and Faber, 2004), for background on the relationship between OW and Lee. “Tybalt seldom gets . . .” from MAB’s notes for a memoir. “Your father was a virgin . . .” from Feder,
In My Father’s Shadow.
Marriage rumors were squelched in Judith Cass’s society column,
Chicago Tribune
, November 19, 1934; the betrothal was announced in “Orson Welles, Actor, to Wed,”
New York Times
, November 18, 1934. “In the manner”: Katharine Cornell again quoted from the
Saturday Evening Post.
“Friendly and good-natured” is Brian Aherne quoted from
A Proper Job: An Autobiography of an Actor’s Actor
(Houghton Mifflin, 1969). Wedding details from the December 24, 1934,
Newark Star-Eagle
and
Newark Evening News.
AS wrote about
Everybody’s Shakespeare
in his column in the
Chicago American
, January 18, 1935.