Citizen Kane: The Complete Screenplay

Front Cover
This is a companion to Citizen Kane - the film that was designed to shock (Kenneth Tynan) - one of the best-known movies in the history of Hollywood. Not only was it Orson Welles's first film as actor and director but most of the cast were also new to the cinema. Yet so controversial was the subject matter that an 842,000 US dollar bribe and concentration wrath of the Hearst newspaper empire combined in an attempt to strangle its distribution. The authorship of the film is still a subject of conflict. Pauline Keal's essay, Raising Kane, dissects a maze of Hollywood lore to re-evaluate these and other stories about the making of this film. Her account is followed by the original screenplay, illustrated with over 40 stills and frame enlargements, together with notes on the difference between the script and the final film.

From inside the book

Contents

The Shooting Script
6
by Herman J Mankiewicz and Orson Welles
147
Notes on the Shooting Script prepared by Gary Carey
296
Copyright

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About the author (2002)

Orson Welles was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin on May 6, 1915. He was as an actor, writer, director, and producer on radio, film, and television. He began his career on stage, directing and acting in plays under the Federal Theatre Project and then with his company Mercury Theatre. From 1938 to 1940, he wrote, directed, and acted in the Mercury Theatre of the Air, and as part of its programming, he broadcast H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds. He co-wrote, produced, directed, and starred in the movie Citizen Kane. He was also the director of the movies The Magnificent Ambersons, The Lady from Shanghai, Touch of Evil, and Chimes at Midnight. In addition to playing major roles in some of these films, he also starred in The Third Man and appeared in Someone to Love. He received a Special Oscar in April 1971 for "superlative artistry and versatility" and a Life Achievement Award from the American Film Institute in 1975. He died on October 10, 1985 at the age of 70.

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