Welles's University

“Keep Ted Turner and his g*ddamn Crayolas away from my movie.”

Hope and Stephen discuss some Orson Welles adjacent news including an upcoming Parisian Welles retrospective, the death of one of Orson’s proteges, and the encroaching spectre of AI on the art and legacy of Orson Welles.

Read the articles we reference here:

• BREAKING NEWS: ‘Rare’ Welles BBC interview on his infamous War of the Worlds broadcast: https://nerdist.com/article/rare-orson-welles-war-of-the-worlds-interview-resurfaces/
• Welles retrospective at Cinémathèque Française: https://www.cinematheque.fr/my-name-is-orson-welles.html
• RIP Henry Jaglom: https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/sep/25/henry-jaglom-fiercely-independent-director-and-friend-of-orson-welles-dies-aged-87
• The attempt to reconstruct The Magnificent Ambersons: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/orson-welles-lost-movie-ai-1236361881/
  • The Welles estate response: https://variety.com/2025/film/news/orson-welles-estate-blasts-ai-magnificent-ambersons-ending-1236509523/
  • Tilly Norwood, AI actress: https://variety.com/2025/film/news/ai-actress-tilly-norwood-talent-agents-zurich-summit-1236533454/
    • The SAG-AFTRA response: https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/sag-aftra-slams-ai-actress-tilly-norwood-xicoia-union-1236388942/

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Email us at [email protected] to let us know how we’re doing!
• Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes!, The Matrix Reclamations, and The Lanes Between
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendu

“It was a send-up, Peter – a charade. Sunday-afternoon fun out on the lawn.”

Get ready, class, because we’ve brought in our first guest lecturer - amateur filmmaker and technical director for The Department of Menial Humor, Samuel Dumas - to discuss Welles’s first foray into filmmaking with the 1934 short film The Hearts of Age. We discuss this film’s surrealist influences, the parallels with Welles’s later work (especially his final film The Other Side of the Wind), and finally get into the details of Stephen’s fabled Wellesian bachelor party!

Homework for next week - ‘Voodoo’ MacBeth - https://youtu.be/9wmWBki06yc

Find our guest lecturer, Samuel Dumas, and his work in the following places:

• @iamyourpallbearer on Instagram
• Follow The Department of Menial Humor on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube
• Watch Sam’s short films Epochs of Love and Eyes on You

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Email us at [email protected] to let us know how we’re doing!
• Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes!, The Matrix Reclamations, and The Lanes Between
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“Shakespeare said everything. Brain to belly; every mood and minute of a man’s season… He wrote it with tears and blood and beer, and his words march like heart beats. He speaks to everyone.”

This week, we’re taking our first deep foray into the work of William Shakespeare as we take a look at Welles’s first actually published work (with Roger Hill) - Everybody’s Shakespeare! We’ll be discussing our histories both with the work of Shakespeare and the plays covered - The Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, and Julius Caesar.

Orson Welles as AI? Miss us with that: https://variety.com/2025/digital/news/orson-welles-ai-voice-storyrabbit-audio-storytelling-app-1236406112

Homework for next class - The Hearts of Age: https://youtu.be/pXKIMag5hHE

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Email us at [email protected] to let us know how we’re doing!
• Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
• Follow Hope at @hopelichtner on Bluesky, Instagram, and Tumblr
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes!, The Matrix Reclamations, and The Lanes Between
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“John Brown’s body lies mouldering in the grave, but his soul goes marching on!”

This week, we’re finally getting into The Work™ as we discuss Orson’s “collaboration” with his teacher/father-figure Roger Hill about the life of “prophet–warrior–zealot (and) the most incredible and dynamic figure in American history,” abolitionist John Brown, Marching Song!

Orson Welles “Battle Hymn of the Republic” link: https://youtu.be/KVd1AxViLY4

Homework for next class - Everybody’s Shakespeare by Welles & Hill: https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=miun.afw2961.0001.001&seq=1

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Do you want to hear us cover Bright Lucifer now or in a decade? Email us at [email protected] to let us know!
• Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes!, The Matrix Reclamations, and The Lanes Between
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“My happiness and self-respect seem founded only on an admiration and confidence in that, our play.”

This week, we're talking all about Orson's return to the States following his triumphs on the Irish stage. We'll discuss the vindication of his Todd School production of Twelfth Night and his collaboration with Roger ‘Skipper’ Hill that would become the biography play on the life of John Brown - Marching Song!

Footage from the Todd School production of Twelfth Night: https://youtu.be/fadbbEi_7OE

Homework for next class - Marching Song: https://archive.org/details/marching-song-a-play-by-orson-welles-roger-hill-z-lib.org/mode/2up

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Email us at [email protected] to let us know how we’re doing!
• Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes!, The Matrix Reclamations, and The Lanes Between
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“To stay out of school, I went on the stage. I only fell in love with it afterwards.”

We finally got Orson to Ireland! And while Welles is lost in Eire, Hope and Stephen discuss new resources, Orson's thoughts on Chaplain and Dracula, and a recently-released (at the time of recording, anyway) ranking of Orson's 13 films.

Gold Derby’s 13-film Welles ranking: https://www.goldderby.com/gallery/best-orson-welles-movies-ranked/citizen-kane/

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Email us at [email protected] to let us know how we’re doing!
• Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts or Spotify!
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes!, The Matrix Reclamations, and The Lanes Between
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“I got through school because I paid a boy named Guggenheim to take that sort of drudgery off my shoulders… I graduated magna cum laude.”

We pick back up with Orson as he ends his time at Todd commandeering the school’s drama program, taking a summer trip to his beloved Asia, and coping with the death of his father, with whom he shared a complicated relationship.

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Follow Hope at @hopelichtner on Bluesky, Instagram, and Tumblr
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes! and The Matrix Reclamations
• Track Hope’s work as The Millennial Falcon, the announcer for the Philly Roller Derby
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“I attacked the textbooks rather than mastered them.”

In the first part of our first-ever two-part episode, we discuss Welles’s early years at the Todd School in Woodstock, Illinois, his burgeoning relationship with eventual headmaster Roger Hill, and how Orson spent his summer vacations.

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes! and The Matrix Reclamations
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

“Have you ever wanted to return?”
“To childhood? I’ve been back there ever since I left.”

With all the pomp and circumstance we’re capable of mustering for an episode recorded in the wake of the 2024 US presidential election results, we finally arrive at the advent of the man himself - Orson Welles is born! We talk about the early years of his life growing up in Kenosha and Chicago, the formative death of his mother when he was just nine-years-old, and the travels, arts, and influences that began to form his own auteurist visions.

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes! and The Matrix Reclamations
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y

Class is back in session and your TAs - Hope and Stephen - are back to take a climb up the Welles family tree to see just how far the apple that is Orson fell. We're taking things right up to the birth the man himself, so get ready for a LOT of (necessary!) table setting.

Follow us on our (admittedly limited) socials to keep up with assignments and other exciting Welles-related news:

• @wellesupod on Bluesky and YouTube
• Read Hope’s blog at highimhope.com
• Listen to Hope’s other podcasts - High on Cartoons Presents DuckTakes! and The Matrix Reclamations
• Follow Stephen at @chewywalrus on Bluesky and Letterboxd
• Listen to Stephen’s other podcasts - Disenfranchised Podcast and The Pod and the Pendulum
• Check out Stephen’s novel - Check In, Check Out - on Amazon, now available in paperback or ebook: https://amzn.to/44idk8y