`Around the World With Orson Welles” does not loom large in the director’s legend. It is an obscure British television series he directed and in which he appeared. But its video release, like that of the haunting 1951 short film, “Return to Glennascaul,” is an engaging detour, a rediscovered missing link in Welles’ estimable filmography.
“Around the World” was one of two television series Welles did for the BBC in 1955 (the other was “The Orson Welles Sketchbook”). According to Frank Brady’s biography, “Citizen Welles,” Welles loved doing the show and accepted a fee of only 75 pounds per program.
This video contains five approximately 30-minute episodes that visit, respectively, Paris and the St. Germain des Pres quarter, London, Spain and the Basque country. (According to the video box, the series’ last episode, “The Third Man Returns to Vienna,” unfortunately has been lost).
Each episode is in part home movie, travelogue and cinematic essay on subjects ranging from aging and bullfighting to a Basque game akin to jai alai.
Welles is a traveler and not a tourist. Don’t expect visits to the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben or other well-trodden attractions. Instead, he guides us into the heart of a country, its culture and people, from Paris’ sidewalk cafes (where actor Eddie Constantine winks at the camera) to a Spanish bull ranch.
But wherever Welles travels, viewers will gladly follow, if only to relish his love of language and to hear the rich music of his voice consider such phrases as “a pride of lions” and “a rumination of cows.” His digressions, among them “a word for old-fashioned travel . . . that takes long enough to give you the chance to see where you’re going before you get there,” are alone worth the trip.
The centerpiece of most of the episodes is an extended conversation with a local. In Paris, it is artist Raymond Duncan, brother of legendary dancer Isadora Duncan, who lives according to the principle, “Make everything that you need for yourself and attempt to not need what you cannot make.” In the first of two episodes set in Basque country, he speaks with Lael Tucker, author of “Lament for 4 Virgins.” When her adolescent son chuckles at Welles’ mention of the title, Welles amusedly rebukes him, “Why are you laughing? It’s your mother’s book.”
In “London,” the weakest of the episodes, encounters with six almshouse widows and “those dotty old soldier men in scarlet tunics,” the Chelsea pensioners, are hampered by poor sound and heavy accents.
Not recommended for animal activists is the episode in which Welles and British drama critic Kenneth Tynan and his wife illuminate and reflect on the history, “spectacle” and art of the bullfight, with Welles providing color commentary on a contest in progress.An interesting sidenote of the Paris episode is the appearance of a young Art Buchwald at his Herald Tribune desk composing his “Paris After Dark” column. In London, Welles appears outside the venerable Hackney Empire theater, and makes reference to filming a movie nearby; perhaps his aborted production of “Moby Dick.”
Welles is an ingratiating interviewer and the people whom he engages in conversation are not the least bit intimidated by his commanding presence. In London, he is briefly heckled outside a pub.
One programming advisory: the second Basque episode repeats content from the first. Fast forward through the bit about the pigeons for delightful encounters between Welles and Basque children.
“Around the World With Orson Welles,” an Image Entertainment release, is available Tuesday on VHS for $19 at 800-4-MOVIES. It is available March 14 on DVD for $21 at 800-624-3078.
