Read Orson Welles, Vol I Online

Authors: Simon Callow

Orson Welles, Vol I (109 page)

58.
‘… the audience was fresh …’ Quoted by O’Connor and Brown, op. cit.

59.

Faustus
played to just people, you know …’ Paula Laurence in an interview with NYU.

60.
‘We should have had a national theatre …’ Quoted by O’Connor and Brown, op. cit.

61.
‘Orson was very well aware
…’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

62.
‘I see myself in those old stills …’ From
Orson Welles
by Barbara Leaming.

63.
‘When I played
The Cradle Will Rock
…’ Quoted by O’Connor and Brown, op cit.

CHAPTER ELEVEN:
The Cradle Will Rock

1.
‘… that most resistant of all …’ Quoted in
Mark the Music
by Eric A. Gordon.

2.
‘He was nervous …’ From
This Bright day
by Lehman Engel.

3.
‘… he was the first American composer …’ Quoted by Eric A. Gordon, op. cit.

4.
‘Orson was excited by this …’ and ff. From
Run-Through
by John Houseman.

5.
‘Marc Blitzstein sat down …’ From
Arena
by Hallie Flanagan.

6.
‘Hallie Flanagan … is crazy for it …’ Quoted by Eric A. Gordon,
op. cit.

7.
‘… to Bert Brecht …’ From the published text of
The Cradle Will Rock
.

8.
‘Even during those early years …’ From Lehman Engel, op. cit.

9.
‘Orson was in a regular fever heat …’ Interview from Federal Theatre Research Project.

10.
‘… as actors, it diminished …’ ibid.

11.
‘Federal Theatre Workers were striking …’ From Hallie Flanagan, op. cit.

12.
‘Before this
date, the WPA chiefs …’ Alva Johnston and Fred Smith,
Saturday Evening Post
27 January 1940.

13.
‘The theatre was sealed …’ Interview from Federal Theatre Research Project.

14.
‘Like partners in a vaudeville team …’ From John Houseman, op. cit.

15.
‘… made a too-long speech …’ From Lehman Engel, op. cit.

16.

STEEL STRIKE OPERA
…’
New York Times
17 June 1937.

17.
‘I cannot
get out …’ Quoted in
Backstage at ‘The Cradle Will Rock
’ by Barry B. Witham.

18.
‘Important as the issue raised …’ Quoted by Eric A. Gordon, op. cit.

19.
‘… if you go ahead …’ Quoted in Witham, op. cit.

20.
‘There is good contemptuous laughter …’
Time
28 June 1937.

21.
‘The formerly audacious left-wingers …’
Saturday Evening Post
3 February 1940.

22.
‘Denby and I …’ From Aaron
Copland and Vivian Perils, op. cit.

23.
‘The fact that the orchestra sat in every-day dress …’
New York Times
22 April 1937.

24.
‘… there is here the suggestion …’
World Telegram
22 April 1937.

25.
‘Gradually the real reasons began to come out …’ From Hallie Flanagan, op. cit.

26.
‘… we had little to say …’ From John Houseman, op. cit.

CHAPTER TWELVE:
Mercury

1.

AGAIN

A PEOPLE’S THEATRE
…’
Daily Worker
18 September 1937.

2.
‘It is the duty of all …’ Grenville Vernon,
Commonweal
27 August 1937.

3.
‘… has already given …’
New York Times
1 September 1937.

4.
‘… inveigled some wonderful night watchman …’ From
Run-Through
by John Houseman.

5.
‘Emphasis has been placed …’ Quoted in ‘Welles Peers Through his Beard and sees Chaos’, Wilella Waldorf,
New York Times
1 July 1938.

6.
‘… everything in the theatre depends on a great personality …’ From Notes in the Lilly Library Welles Collection.

7.
‘… the role he’d been given …’ From
This is Orson Welles
by Peter Bogdanovich.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN:
Caesar

1.
‘As those familiar with the play …’
The Mercury
September 1937.

2.
‘Here we have true fan psychology …’ An interview with
Michael Mok,
New York Times
24 November 1937.

3.
‘In drastically cutting the last twenty minutes of the play …’ and ff.
The Mercury
September 1937.

4.
‘Welles dictated very clearly …’ From
The Magic of Light
by Jean Rosenthal.

5.
‘At the Mercury nobody else had any identity for him at all …’ and ff. ibid.

6.
‘When he felt like rehearsing …’ and ff. From an interview with Federal
Theatre Research Project.

7.
‘He seemed a prep school boy
…’ Peg Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

8.
‘Every scene had to have a production idea …’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

9.
‘Be a singer, be a singer!’ Quoted in an interview by Elliot Reid with S.C.

10.
‘I thought you could say …’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

11.
‘… that they’re thinking about what they’re
saying …’ From
This is Orson Welles
by Peter Bogdanovich.

12.
‘His own performances happened suddenly …’ From
This Bright Day
by Lehman Engel.

13.
‘The idea, the actor and a pool of light …’ From Jean Rosenthal, op. cit.

14.
‘Jeannie considered the most important lighting …’ ibid.

15.
‘Every elaborate effect had to be created by hand …’ From
The Mercury Theatre
by Andrea Nouryeh.

16.
‘One effect, spoken of as stunning and innovative …’ From Jean Rosenthal, op. cit.

17.
‘The way they came up the ramp …’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

18.
‘In those days we never took him very seriously …’ ibid.

19.
‘… in anguish, fear and righteous indignation …’ An interview with Federal Theatre Research Project.

20.
‘He was the most insecure …’ Augusta Weissberger
in an interview with S.C.

21.
‘Orson would argue with you as he ate …’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

22.
‘Its great success …’ ibid.

23.
‘When he started acting out …’ ibid.

24.
‘Of all the many new plays and productions …’ and ff.
New York Post
12 November 1937.

25.
‘… modern variations on the theme …’ and ff.
New York Times
11 November 1937.

26.
‘… a wavering
liberal …’ Eric Englander,
Daily Worker
12 November 1937.

27.
‘It is as if a great poet had risen in our midst …’
New York Journal American
12 November 1937.

28.
‘It is when the play …’
New York Sun
12 November 1937.

29.
‘With most of Antony excised …’
Theatre Arts Monthly
January 1938.

30.
‘… on the whole pretty much disappointed …’
New Republic
1 December 1937.

31.
‘The production
of
Caesar
…’ From
Sights and Spectacles
by Mary McCarthy.

32.
‘… playing
Julius Caesar
in modern dress …’
Newsweek
22 November 1937.

33.
‘… the hysterical critical endorsement …’
Scribner’s Magazine
February 1938.

34.

Julius Caesar
opened with tremendous éclat …’ From Jean Rosenthal, op. cit.

35.
‘After a succession of muffled death-rattles …’ From ‘Marvelous Boy: Shadow to Shakespeare,
Shoemaker to Shaw,’
Time Magazine
9 May 1938.

36.
‘If they are still complaining around the Lamb’s club …’
New York Times
26 November 1937.

37.
‘Mr Welles looks the way musicians used to look …’ Michael Mok,
New York Post
24 November 1937.

38.
‘Welles was so masterful …’ Quoted in
Citizen Welles
by Frank Brady.

39.
‘I believe in the factual theatre …’
New York Post
, 24 November
1937.

40.
‘Strange things are happening
…’
New Yorker
18 December 1937.

41.
‘He also admires films …’
New York Times
28 September 1937.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN:
Shoemaker’s Holiday/Heartbreak House

1.
‘George Zorn (the box office manager) grew resigned …’ From
Run-Through
by John Houseman.

2.
‘It is the best thing militant labor …’
New York Times
6 December 1937.

3.
‘A savagely
humorous social cartoon …’
New York Herald Tribune
, 6 December 1937.

4.
‘I only wish that the present production …’ Alistair Cooke on NBC Red Network.

5.
‘His acrid personality is, in fact …’ From
Sights and Spectacles
by Mary McCarthy.

6.
‘It’s lucky I’m playing tragedy tonight …’ Quoted in
Virgil Thomson
by Virgil Thomson.

7.
‘Why do you have everybody dress up like chauffeurs?’
Quoted in
This is Orson Welles
by Peter Bogdanovich.

8.
‘I say this in all seriousness …’ Reported in
New York World Telegram
5 February 1938.

9.
‘We were all very serious actors …’ Vincent Price in an interview with S.C.

10.
‘How do you like that for a title?’ and ff. From Helen Ormsbee, ‘The Welles Theater Philosophy: Everything Old Once Was New.’
New York Herald Tribune
2 February
1938.

11.
‘The play is laden with sentiments …’
New Masses
18 January 1938.

12.
‘All the groupings and firkings …’ Quoted in
The Theatre of Orson Welles
by Richard France.

13.
‘He rehearsed with military discipline …’ From
This Bright Day
by Lehman Engel.

14.
‘One day accidentally Hiram ran into the curtain …’ Arthur Anderson in an interview with S.C.

15.
‘… he moulded you
…’ From Lehman Engel, op. cit.

16.
‘Welles the choreographer …’ Quoted by Richard France, op. cit.

17.
‘We thought she would die as she watched him …’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

18.
‘He was the best director I ever had …’ Vincent Price in an interview with S.C.

19.
‘The way our script was arranged …’ Quoted by Richard France, op. cit.

20.
‘Our settings are simple
– what I call factual …’ Quoted by Helen Ormsbee, op. cit.

21.
‘he had the most revolting triangle of shoe leather …’ Quoted in
The Mercury Theatre
, unpublished thesis by Andrea Nouryeh.

22.
‘An entire score …’ and ff. From Lehman Engel, op. cit.

23.
‘Getting wind of the event through the Broadway telegraph …’ Herbert Drake,
New York Herald Tribune
2 January 1938.

24.
‘The audience
felt intimately connected with the actors …’
New York World Telegram
11 January 1938.

25.
‘To
Julius Caesar
, a terrifying tragedy …’
New York Times
3 January 1938.

26.
‘… a masterpiece of low comedy acting …’ John Anderson,
New York Journal-American
1 January 1938.

27.
‘… a series of glittering fragments …’ John Gassner,
One-Act Play Magazine
January 1938.

28.
‘Bully boy Dekker
is quite familiar to me …’ ‘Shuffling Through the Winners: in which a Visiting Critic tells what he likes and what he does not like, about the Times Square Shows’
New York
Times
23 January 1938.

29.
‘… still the great comfort …’ Richard Watts, ‘Elizabethan Romp’
New York Herald Tribune
3 January 1938.

30.
‘… some of his current actors have come to him …’ Brooks Atkinson,
New York Times
3 January 1938.

31.
‘We’re all a little skittish now …’ Quoted in a profile,
New York Times
20 February 1938.

32.
‘God keep them from all Broadway entanglements …’
New York Daily News
9 January 1938.

33.
‘… during February and March, the Mercury Theatre …’ From John Houseman, op. cit.

34.
‘He’d had his hair just done …’ Norman Lloyd in an interview with S.C.

35.
‘With a voice
that booms like Big Ben’s …’ ‘Marvelous Boy’,
Time Magazine
9 May 1938.

36.
‘He is an intuitive showman …’
New York Times
7 November 1938.

37.
‘1) I found Welles …’ from letters page,
New York Times
20 November 1938.

38.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, you may have heard some rumours …’ Quoted by Andrea Nouryeh, op. cit.

39.
‘Most of us in our hearts …’ ibid.

40.
‘I wouldn’t be happy
if I couldn’t …’ Quoted in an interview with Harold Stagg,
New Haven Ledger
21 January 1938.

41.
‘She timed her entrance …’
New York World Telegram
9 April 1938.

42.
‘My god the ceiling’s fallen in …’ Quoted by Vincent Price in an interview with S.C.

43.
‘One of Mr Shaw’s more interminable …’
New York Times
30 April 1938.

44.
‘the truth is that the production …’
New York Post
30
April 1938.

45.
‘Mr Welles as Shotover plays much better …’
New York Sun
30 April 1938.

46.
‘The Mercury Company act out
Heartbreak House
…’ and ff. From
Sights and Spectacles
by Mary McCarthy.

47.

THE SUMMING UP
…’
New York Times
July 1938.

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