The History of the 20th Century Via You Tube: Orson Welles Shills

The news of Ernest Gallo's death at the age of 97 immediately made me think of Orson Welles. Like so many children of the late 70s/early 80s, my first awareness of the auteur behind what some consider to be the greatest Hollywood film ever made came from his appearences in telelvision commercials for Gallo and Paul Masson wines.

It's well-known that Welles spent a chunk of the 70s nearly destitute, living in the guest room of the house Peter Bogdanovich shared with Cybill Shepherd (I've read that years later, Quentin Tarantino offered the same favor to a down-on-his-luck Bogdanovich, but I don't know if it's true; Bogdanovich filed for bankruptcy in 1985, and it would have been at least another seven years before Q.T. would have been in a position to help him out). The story, as it's often told, is one of aged alcoholic, too far gone to find proper employment, mooching off his young protege. The fact that Welles spent roughly the last seven years of his life shilling cut-rate booze and frozen vegetables is supposed to be the punchline to his downward spiral. That's a cute narrative, but I don't entirely buy it.

Welles had moved back to Hollywood in 1970 after an 11-year stint in Europe, during which he produced The Trial and dabbled in television. The next decade saw Welles receiving an honororary Oscar and an AFI Lifetime Achivement award, and spotily working for hire, as he struggled to finish his last feature, The Other Side of the Wind. That project (in which Bogdanovich co-starred alongside a mutual friend of he and Welles, John Ford) was produced with Iranian cash. It fell into a legal mess just shy of completion when the Shah of Iran was deposed, and Welles was forced to give it up. Welles allegedly gave Bogdanovich instructions for how he'd like to see the film completed before he died.

It was during this era, when Welles was working on the film on which he and Bogdanovich collaborated, that Welles would have been staying at Bogdanovich's house. During the same time, according to Cybill Shepherd's autobiography (parts of which are worth reading for 70s cinema completists, as a woman's first-hand account of the American New Wave), Bogdanovich and Shepherd were both in the midst of professional crisises. After their two follow-ups to The Last Picture Show, Daisy Miller and At Long Last Love, both flopped, bad press was essentially tearing the couple's personal and professional alliance apart. At Welles' advice, Shepherd moved to New York for a while, took acting classes, shot her role in Taxi Driver, and eventually had an affair with Elvis. Bogdanovich stayed behind and made what, to my mind, are his most interesting films, Saint Jack and They All Laughed. Orson Welles was hardly an imposition in this household -- he was a friend and mentor to two kids who needed his help.

Which is not to deny that the fact Orson Welles, in 1976, was actually broke. A cursory glance at his IMDB profile shows that he would have earned no income as a director between 1971 and 1974 (and it's doubtful whether or not he would have been able to pay the rent on the film that broke that streak, F is For Fake), and was otherwise barely meeking out a living on the occasional TV cameo or voiceover. Add it all up, and it seems clear that shilling wine was Welles' only option if he wanted to ever move out of Casa Bogdanovich.

Outtakes from the Masson commercials (see above) have become something of a sensation on You Tube -- it's easy to laugh a drunk old man, especially one who has seemingly fallen so far. But for Welles, who claimed to call two steaks and a pint of scotch his nightly dinner, drinking wine on television must have been something of an ideal gig. Say there are no second acts in American lives, but don't bedrudge an old man the chance to pay his rent.

Regardless, I think this fake ad for Rosebud Peas is funnier than watching the real Welles slur. Note that this Welles is voiced by Maurice LaMarche, the same actor whose voice was dubbed over Vincent D'Onofrio's Welles impersonation in Ed Wood.