The Friendship of Buster Keaton & Orson Welles

Silent film star Buster Keaton and father of indie film Orson Welles were unlikely friends. Keaton grew up on vaudeville but had left his alcoholic father behind by the time he was 21. Orson Welles grew up in an upper-class home but also lost his alcoholic father, in a different way, in 1930. Both Keaton and Welles shot their films The High Sign (1921) and Touch of Evil (1958) in Venice, California. Both Keaton and Welles were skilled cinematographers. Both men served alongside each other at the Stage Door Canteen in New York City in World War II. Welles would call Keaton "beautiful", and he was, and his film The General (1926) one of the best of America, and it was. Learn more about these two men of the movies in this documentary from Radio WhoPoo.

*Corrections* Buster is shown with his third wife, Eleanor Norris, who he married in 1940 in the last image. The video incorrectly identifies the woman as his first wife, Natalie Talmadge, who is shown elsewhere in the video.

Sources:

https://silentlocations.com/2017/03/31/keaton-and-orson-welles-a-high-sign-touch-of-evil/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m67zedmhYZE

https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-film-preservation-board/documents/one_week.pdf

Ellis, Chris & Julie (2005). The Mammoth Book of Celebrity Murder: Murder played out in the spotlight of maximum publicity. Constable & Robertson. ISBN 978-0786715688.

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