Orson Welles — who would have turned 100 this May — directed, wrote and acted in theater, radio and film throughout his life and career.
IU is celebrating his centennial with several events and an exhibition entitled “100 Years of Orson Welles: Master of Stage, Sound and Screen,” according to an IU press release.
The exhibit opened Tuesday at the Lilly Library and will run through May 20. It tells the story of Welles’s life and career through photographs, scripts, letters, sketches and personal items, according to the University.
Welles is well known for his radio broadcast of H.G. Wells’s “War of the Worlds” which, according to the History Channel’s website, caused panic across the United States when many believed the fictional story was true.
The exhibit also has some of Welles’s unfinished, unmade or unreleased films including “The Little Prince” and “Heart of Darkness,” according to the University.
Craig Simpson is the curator of Lilly Library’s ?exhibit.
“People often complain, ‘Well, he never made another ‘Citizen Kane,’” Simpson said in the release. “Well, he never wanted to make another ‘Citizen Kane.’ He made many different great films and all kinds of different works of theater and radio. He was constantly challenging himself and evolving.”
In addition to the exhibit, several films involving Welles will be screened by IU Cinema from April 28 to May 6, Welles’s birthday, according to the release.
The film series is entitled “Orson Welles: A Centennial Celebration and ?Symposium.”
Another symposium for scholars and Welles enthusiasts will take place April 29 to May 3, according to the University.
IU’s Chancellor’s Professor Emeritus James Naremore is set to participate in the symposium alongside several other notable Welles scholars.
“Today Welles is widely regarded by film-lovers as one of the two or three greatest motion-picture directors America has ever produced, but he was truly a man of all media, a figure appropriate for celebration by The Media School,” Naremore said in the release.
Kathrine Schulze
