"A splendidly entertaining, definitive work."
--Entertainment Weekly
In this first installment of his masterful biography, Simon Callow captures the chameleonic genius of Orson Welles as only an actor/director deeply rooted in the entertainment industry could. Here is Welles's prodigious childhood; his youth in New York, with its fraught partnership with John Houseman and the groundbreaking triumph of his all-black
Macbeth;
the pioneering radio work that culminated in the notorious 1938 broadcast of
War of the Worlds
; and finally, his work in Hollywood, including an authoritative account of the making of
Citizen Kane
. Rich in detail and insight, this is far and away the definitive look at Orson Welles--a figure even more extraordinary than the myths that have surrounded him.