Too Much Johnson is a 1938 comedy film written and directed by Orson
Welles. The film was made three years before Welles directed Citizen
Kane, but it was never publicly screened. The film was believed to be
lost, but a print was re- discovered in 2013 in an Italian warehouse.
The film is scheduled to be released in October 2013 and will be avail-
able online as well.
The film was not intended to stand by itself, but was designed as the
cinematic aspect of Welles's Mercury Theatre stage presentation of
William Gillette's 1894 comedy about a New York playboy who flees from
the violent husband of his mistress and borrows the identity of a
plantation owner in Cuba who is expecting the arrival of a mail order
bride.
Welles planned to mix live action and film for this production. The
film was designed to run 40 minutes, with 20 minutes devoted to the
play's prologue and two 10-minute introductions for the second and
third act. Welles planned to create a silent film in the tradition of
the Mack Sennett slapstick comedies, in order to enhance the various
chases, duels and comic conflicts of the Gillette play.
This was not the first time that Welles directed a film. In 1934,
while still attending The Todd School for Boys, he co-directed (with
friend William Vance) a short avant garde film called The Hearts of
Age.
Welles never completed the editing of Too Much Johnson and put the
footage in storage. He rediscovered the footage three decades later
at his home outside of Madrid, Spain. "I can't remember whether I had
it all along and dug it out of the bottom of a trunk, or whether some-
one brought it to me, but there it was", he later recalled. "I
screened it, and it was in perfect condition, with not a scratch on
it, as though it had only been through a projector once or twice be-
fore. It had a fine quality. Cotten was magnificent, and I immediately
made plans to edit it and send it to Joe as a birthday present."
Welles, however, never allowed the footage to be seen publicly,
stating the film would not make sense outside of the full context of
the Gillette play.
In 1971, a fire broke out at Welles's home and the only known com-
plete print of Too Much Johnson was destroyed.
A copy was discovered in Italy in 2013 and restored by George Eastman House.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwfxH2r7SS0
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/11/movies/early-film-by-orson-welles-is-rediscovered.html?_r=0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Too_Much_Johnson