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There are others whom the waves of thought and art in the forties, when they retreated, left stranded. Brando, like Welles neurotically overweight, and by some mysterious choice out of things, respecting no one and least of all his own profession and his incomparable gifts, hides on a dirt hill ove…

There are others whom the waves of thought and art in the forties, when they retreated, left stranded. Brando, like Welles neurotically overweight, and by some mysterious choice out of things, respecting no one and least of all his own profession and his incomparable gifts, hides on a dirt hill ove…

When I think of large talents that were beached by a crisis in their lives, I think first of Clifford Odets. There is one sorrow that must pain men so stranded most: that they were unable to live up to the image of themselves that once gave them their pride. Clifford was what Orson was not, a celeb…

I made a point of catching the commercial. Orson offered the nation his assurance of the product’s worth with a voice as resonant as ever—a beautiful instrument indeed—and his presence was, in some grotesque way, still imposing. I couldn’t help wondering—as I do with any sponsoring of a product whe…

In other words, I continued to think like a Communist. The theatre is a weapon. A play must teach a lesson. The third-act climax must send the audience home with hope and courage born of a sweeping revolutionary insight. Only I and those like me had the answers. I continued to regard the society ar…