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Stagedirect To Shoot Lost Eden, An Evening With Orson Welles February 15 Through 23 At Seattle's Odd Duck Studio

January 31, 2002

First performed at the 2001 Seattle Fringe Festival, Lost Eden portrays the young Orson Welles at a fateful moment in his precocious career

PORTLAND, OR StageDirect - America's leading producer of fringe theater on video - has arranged to shoot Lost Eden at Seattle's Odd Duck Studio February 15 through 23. Written and performed by Marcus Wolland, the one-man show depicts Orson Welles in the spring of 1942 as he struggles-long distance from Brazil-for editorial control of The Magnificent Ambersons (the Welles film following Citizen Kane). In his absence, The Magnificent Ambersons was chopped from 132 to 88 minutes, rendering the masterpiece a flop and undermining Welles' Hollywood career. The film's original cut-which Welles deemed better than Citizen Kane-remains at large and is arguably the greatest loss in American cinematic history.

"Lost Eden is a must-see for Orson Welles fans or anyone interested in the history of American movies," says StageDirect Artistic Director Jeff Meyers. "It's a brilliant performance and definitely the cream of last year's Fringe Festival."

Lost Eden finds the 27-year-old Welles in a Rio de Janeiro hotel room while on location for It's All True. (Shortly after filming The Magnificent Ambersons, Welles was asked by the U.S. Office of Inter American Affairs to film It's All True, a project to promote goodwill between the U.S. and South America in light of World War II. Had Welles not ventured to South America, the editing of The Magnificent Ambersons would likely have gone his way.) Lost Eden condenses the events of spring 1942 into a single evening, as Welles recounts his precocious career in the guise of writing a memoir. His intimate conversation with the audience is interspersed with phone calls to Hollywood to rescue The Magnificent Ambersons.

"It's inconceivable that Welles accomplished so much by the age of 27," says Wolland, Lost Eden's writer and sole performer. "It's been humbling and exhilarating to inhabit this remarkable man, and I'm especially gratified by the level of confidence StageDirect has shown in the production."

Wolland says Lost Eden is benefiting from a recent surge of interest in Orson Welles. The American Film Institute named Citizen Kane the "top movie of all time," and Vanity Fair ran a feature story on The Magnificent Ambersons in its January 2002 issue. A four-hour miniseries based on Welles' original script of The Magnificent Ambersons is also slated to run this year on A&E Networks.

Lost Eden will become the third StageDirect production taped in Seattle. Previous shows include The Haint and Mass Murder, both taped at Seattle's Northwest Actors Studio.

What: Straight Edge Theatrics presents Lost Eden, an Evening with Orson Welles
Where: Odd Duck Studio, 1214 10th Avenue (10th and Union), Seattle
When: February 8, 9, 14, 15, 16, 21, 22 and 23
Price: General Admission: $12 / Students and Seniors: $10
Extra: StageDirect live taping of Lost Eden: February 15, 16, 22 and 23

StageDirect captures the best of small-stage, fringe theater for distribution on VHS and DVD. Established in 2001, the Portland-based company scours the Western Hemisphere for high-caliber, offbeat shows that challenge the American stereotype of "theater." Every effort is made during taping and editing to preserve the intimacy and uncommon energy of live performance. StageDirect videos are available through the company's web site: www.stagedirect.com.

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Jody Nichols
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jody@mediacabin.com