I have been in quite a few awkward situations in my life because I generally have the effrontery to say that Citizen Kane is not the greatest film ever made. More than that - I believe that Citizen Kane is vastly overrated. So what if it's cinematically gorgeous? It also happens to be as empty as the world it decries.
My one salvation, however, is that I view the 1962 adaptation of The Trial as Orson Welles's absolute masterpiece. I watched it as a schoolboy, before classes, late at night, and was mesmerised by the endless rows of identical working desks as well as the impassive features of Anthony Perkins. The love scenes with Romy Schneider were something else, and for two hours at least Franz Kafka was well and truly alive. It was extremely gratifying to learn that Orson Welles considered The Trial his greatest triumph.
First, there was a rainy day in London four or five years back. As I reached the Elephant & Castle tube station (on foot and with a broken umbrella), I was soaked to such an extent that I was concerned they might not let me into Southwark Playhouse. Because that was one of the two reasons why I was here - to see Orson's Shadow, a somewhat absurdist play depicting Welles's attempts to talk Laurence Olivier into playing the main part in the future production of Eugene Ionesco's Rhinoceros. A mouthwatering plot, especially for someone who had by that time spent a good five or six years of his life writing about Samuel Beckett and the Theatre of the Absurd.
And my God it was magical. I was sitting in the second row of this intimate semi-circle, with a small bottle of Sauvignon Blanc and with my feet going numb from all the rainwater they had consumed that day. There was an old lady in front me, dressed like a Woodstock survivor, and she was quite animated throughout the whole performance. Clearly there was a lot to be animated about - after all, at some point I stopped shivering (New Zealand wine might have played a part here) to be blown away by the lordly ways of Orson Welles. It takes guts to inhabit a world that makes no sense, and to do so with such inimitable authority.
I walked back to my hotel a different man, if only for that one evening spent in the company of Orson Welles.
And then, years later, I saw this title, Me and Orson Welles, on some list of the best obscure films ever made. Something drew me to it (could be the name of Richard Linklater, could be the idea of Zac Efron being in a good film, but most likely it was a rare chance to see Orson Welles inhabit the world of his own), and another evening was spent in the company of white wine and the great man.
It's a travesty that not too many people have seen Me and Orson Welles because it is such an unlikely triumph. Playful, stylish, unpretentious, with Christian McKay doing this absolutely magical impersonation of the famed director who is trying to adapt Caesar for the theatre stage. Welles is a loveable dictator, by turns charming and ruthless, and you can't resist fading away in his great shadow... Ultimately, it's a bruising experience for everyone involved, not least for an impressionable teenager burned inside by the subtle black and white eroticism of Romy Schneider.
