Orson Welles is one of the most inscrutable figures in Hollywood history.
set out to tell withTheyll Love Me When Im Dead.
EW caught up with Neville to discuss the films and his lifelong fascination with Welles.
Credit: Courtesy Netflix. Inset: George Pimentel/WireImage
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: You have investigated a lot of famous figures and people adjacent to fame.
I grew up a complete movie nerd.
I watched most of Welles films in high school.
He died on my 18th birthday, and I remember it vividly.
I read Josh Karps book aboutThe Other Side of the Wind, and I loved it.
I thought if I could ever get the rights to that footage, I could make the best documentary.
Were going to have it in three months or less.
Three to four years later, we actually got the footage.
This is something thats been percolating for a long time.
What makes Welles such an intriguing figure to you?Hes the ultimate protean character.
Everything about him is a mirror and reflects something about the world.
I cant think of a more dimensional character than Orson.
We were like kids making this film.
I felt like I fell under that spell.
I drank the Kool-Aid, and Orson seduced me too.
It was a really the best time Ive ever had making a film.
They were trying to get the footage because they wanted to finish the film.
I knew there was way more footage than was ever going to be useful in the feature.
One was going to unlock the other.
It wasnt until Netflix came in that we really became lockstep.
Even if they never finished the feature, I could have never made the documentary.
I dont think they were ever separable, just from a business point of view.
You use footage from this film and other Welles projects in an autobiographical way.
None more so thanThe Other Side of the Wind.
In real time, he was writing his story into the movie.
It was the most meta of stories.
I kept describing the documentary like a matryoshka doll.
It keeps getting deeper and deeper.
I keep revealing the story within the story within the story.
Was it always your intention to tell the story through footage of his work?One hundred percent.
You needed the footage to tell it.
Its the only way to make the story come alive.
Theres an element of tragedy to it, but theres also at the same time a kind of heroism.
I understand why he identified with that.
Theres something so deeply romantic about Orson as an artist in an industry that wants to quantify everything.
You use Alan Cumming as narrator throughout.
Where did that idea come from?Orson loved narrators.
Orson not only narrated every nonfiction thing he did, he narrated a lot of his feature films.
He loved the narratorial voice, and a voice that isnt impartial but is actually a storyteller.
Orson was fundamentally a storyteller.
He loved that strong voice that guided the audience.
He did it again and again.
Everybodys idea of who Orson was is different because Orson was different to every person he met.
He was somebody who not only was full of contradictions, he embraced contradictions.
He was somebody who fully embraced his multitudes.
He made no apologies about it.
Its one thing I wanted to do with the film.
He was like a humanRashomon.
Part of it was that Orson was an actor at heart.
He could act any role in any situation to get whatever effect he wanted, and did.
If he wanted to be charming, he could be the most charming person in the world….
He is somebody who was operating on so many more levels than anybody else.
