The Lost Roles of Orson Welles

Orson Welles was the bestest and most famousest American Actor ever since that guy who played Eddie in Eddie and Some of His Cruisers. Orson Welles made the entire state of New Jersey think that aliens were attacking it, which shouldn’t really isn’t that impressive in retrospect. He also ate a lot of ham, was a famous burnout, and made a bunch of good movies. His last American film was the Transformers movie (the animated one for all of you creeps who are under twenty-five). He died in 1980 something. I would look it up but does the internet have a database for the birth and death of actors and other such useless information?

Orson turned down a lot of roles. Here’s a few of them. Also, this: Orson Welles almost made a Batman thing and this was entirely real and not an April Fool’s joke at all. 

1) Willy Wonka

Internet. Please stop using this picture.

I know I know. I thought this wasn’t real either, but apparently Orson demanded that the chocolate river be real chocolate (which doesn’t look like chocolate on screen. It looks like bats.), instead of caramel (which looks like chocolate), and that he be able to drink it.  Everyday. That’s not too unusual, drinking a chocolate river everyday, but the really weird thing was that  he demanded that it be refilled each day at seven a.m. Sigh. I really wish this wasn’t real. I mean, it just seems so vulgar… oh well Orson Welles was fat so of course all he did was eat and make weird demands for food. If it looks like a duck then it must eat like a duck….. anywhom. Here are some more better ones.

2) The Bat in The Bat Book Man: 

No. This has nothing to do with the superhero. In 1956 a man named Michael Magnes published a book on bats titled: The Bat Book: The Book on Bats by Michael Magnes. The book was the runaway best seller in 1956 and was full of lots previously unknown information on bats. For instance, bats are mined in caves like cheese. Bats are inter-dimensional creatures that only appear in our dimension in brief blips, and you have to have a special inter-dimensional net to catch them. Bat meat is poisonous when combined with bread.

Orson was set to adapt the book into a Beautiful Mind type deal. He was going to play all of the roles, including the bats. Eventually, in 1958 it came out that Michael Magnes was a fraud, didn’t know anything about bats (but did know everything about shoes), and was found dead in a field with his throat cut. Needless to say the project was abandoned, but if you search hard enough you can find footage of Orson in a bat costume going, “screeeeeeeech!” and flapping his wings.

3) The Paul Newman Story

This picture makes me feel..... funny

In 1972 Orson Welles became convinced that Paul Newman had drowned in a train crash. The fact that Paul Newman was still acting in films, despite his death, greatly disturbed Orson. He knew, just fucking knew, that Paul was a hologram. The first hologram in the world. The stuff of science fiction made real. So Orson was all set to shoot a movie about that when uh… this happened:

Paul Newman

Uh, Orson. Can I talk to you?

Orson Welles

My God! Yeees.

Paul Newman

So, uh, I hear that you’re working on this movie called the Death of Paul Newman.

Orson Welles

I know I know. I should have talked to you, but I wanted my documentary to be untainted  by your point of view. I would have fallen for your lies.

Paul Newman

And the movie

Orson Welles

Documentary

Paul Newman

Whatever

Orson Welles

No! Not whatever! Call the spade the ace and the ace of the spade!

Paul Newman

Yeah, whatever. Your movie is about how I’m dead and how the government made a hologram of me and using that to support genocide across the globe and elect more republicans into office.

Orson Welles

And to deplete the world’s ham supply.

Paul Newman

And the bat supply. In fact, there are a lot of bats in this script as well.

Orson Welles

I once read the book on bats:  The Bat Book: The Book on Bats: By Michael Magnes. I have been enchanted by those delightful creatures ever since.

Paul Newman

It says here that I’m trying to corner the market on the bat pelt industry, as a hologram, and that one bat pelt is worth 1500 hundred bucks.

Orson Welles

Well, adjusting for stagflation that should be higher. Or lower. I’m not sure.

Paul Newman

Well, regardless.

Orson Welles

Irregardless.

Paul Newman

I’m not dead.

Orson Welles

Yes you are.

Paul Newman

No. I’m very much alive. And not a hologram. And a democrat.

Orson Welles

Lies!

(Punches Paul Newman in the gut in an attempt to pass his hand through Newman’s torso)

My God! He’s a man now! They’ve perfected cloning!

(Orson Runs away)

This turned into F for Fake

4) Larry in Hello, Larry

 Hello, Larry is the official sitcom of Portland, Oregon. It’s about a radio shrink who moved from L.A. to Portland because he was too much of a failure. In Portland, he had a call in radio show (ala Frasier), a morbidly obese sound engineer (replaced by Meadowlark Lemon), and uh… that’s about it. A pretty bitchin’ theme song.

Anywhom. Orson didn’t seriously consider this. He heard that there was this place in Portland called Voodoo donuts where they make regular donuts and then put unappetizing things on them like tires, condoms, and stale cereal. Orson was quoting as saying, “Portland should be wiped off the face of the Earth.”

5) Fred in The Flinstones

In 1978, fresh off The Deer Hunter, Michael Cimino was prepping an adaptation of The Flinstones. “Orson (Welles) is Fred,” he said in an interview to the Portland Review. “I will only make this film if Orson is aboard.”

So Orson signed on. It was all dandy until Michael saw the set of Bedrock. It didn’t have enough rocks in it, so he made the crew tear the set down and rebuild it, but rebuild it exactly the same, with the same material, but with three more rocks. They did so. That cost the studio seventeen million dollar. And then Orson said he would only work with “live dinosaurs.”

Michael Cimino

But Orson. Dinosaurs are extinct.

Orson Welles

Pah! And the next thing you’ll be telling me is that Paul Newman is alive.

Michael Cimino

I could have the studio build me a time machine.

Orson Welles

Do it! And bring me more bats

Michael Cimino

You know. I read the book on bats, The Bat Book: The Book on Bats By Michael Magnes and you really shouldn’t be eating bread with that bat. You’ll die in 1985.

Orson Welles

Feh! That book was all hocum and no pocum. I’ll be fine. Why, if I die in 1985 I’ll eat me hat.

And then he did! Eat his hat. Also, die.