The Miracle of St. Anne
The Miracle of St. Anne | |
---|---|
Directed by | Orson Welles |
Written by | Orson Welles |
Starring | Marcel Achard Georges Baume Frédéric O'Brady Maurice Bessy |
Running time | Unknown |
Language | English |
The Miracle of St. Anne was a short film, now lost, made by
Production
The Blessed and the Damned premiered in Paris at the Théâtre Edouard VII and attracted positive notices. Le Monde described it as "a stage masterpiece"), but the show was a financial flop. Jonathan Rosenbaum speculates its failure was due to the language barrier (the play and film were in English). After the play's failure in Paris, Welles toured Germany with it.[1]
Welles described The Miracle of St. Anne to his biographer Peter Bogdanovich:
The Unthinking Lobster takes place in
MGM. Little pieces of film are sold as holy amulets...Except for the trade in sacred relics, business is terrible. The industry is only saved by the arrival of an archangel who goes into a conference with the studio heads, and makes a deal with them: heaven is prepared to suspend any further miracles in Hollywood if, in exchange, Hollywood stop making religious pictures."[2]
Welles later hoped to realise the whole of The Unthinking Lobster as a full-length
The Miracle of St. Anne was filmed in the park of
The only known copy of the film was owned by Welles, and has long been believed to be lost, although a short clip of the footage is in circulation among private collectors.[citation needed]
The second one-act play, Time Runs..., was a retelling of Faust, with Welles as Doctor Faustus and the young Eartha Kitt as Helen of Troy.
After the failure of The Blessed and the Damned in Paris, Welles dropped Time Runs... from the show and toured Germany with The Unthinking Lobster, which was performed in Act I, and Act II consisted of numerous scenes and sketches, including a heavily condensed version of The Importance of Being Earnest.
Publication
The Unthinking Lobster was published in Paris in 1952, paired off with a two-act play written by Welles, Fair Warning (which Welles never performed, but which had several staging in Ireland). Neither of these plays was ever published in English. Time Runs... was never published at all.[3]
See also
References
- ^ Jonathan Rosenbaum (ed.), Orson Welles and Peter Bogdanovich, This is Orson Welles (DeCapo Press, New York, 1992 [rev. 1998 ed.]) p. 407
- ^ a b Jonathan Rosenbaum (ed.), Orson Welles and Peter Bogdanovich, This is Orson Welles (DeCapo Press, New York, 1992 [rev. 1998 ed.]) p. 406
- ^ Orson Welles, Miracle à Hollywood (The Unthinking Lobster) and À Bon Entendeur (Fair Warning) (La Table Ronde, Paris, 1952)
Bibliography
- Jonathan Rosenbaum (ed.), Orson Welles and Peter Bogdanovich, This is Orson Welles (DeCapo Press, New York, 1992 [rev. 1998 ed.]) pp. 405-7, 411
- Orson Welles [trans. Serge Greffet], Miracle à Hollywood - A bon entendeur (La Table Ronde, Paris, 1952) - French-language edition of two plays written by Welles; Miracle à Hollywood was a French title for The Unthinking Lobster
External links
- The Miracle of St. Anne at IMDb