this man has been portrayed countless
times most famously or infamously in one
of the most recognized films of all time
Citizen Kane
but the depiction of him seen in this
film is not necessarily accurate hi I’m
Rebecca Brayton and welcome to
watchmojo.com and today we’re speaking
with kenneth white about the uncrowned
king it’s a sensational rise of William
Randolph Hearst explaining me what is so
misunderstood about his character
there’s almost another book in why
Hearst is so misunderstood a lot of its
in Citizen Kane the movie people think
that’s a biography of William Randolph
Hearst but even narsing Wells who made
it said that in the end it didn’t really
bear a lot of resemblance to her Sonne
life he lived a long time 80 years he
accumulated over that time a lot of
commercial enemies in the newspaper
business a lot of people who work for
him and maybe didn’t like the experience
and wrote about him also he went into
politics and tried to run for the
presidency unsuccessfully several times
and accumulated a lot of political
enemies as well and and people would
write about him critically as happens
with any public figure but Hearst was
never one to respond he never wrote his
own autobiography he rarely sat for
interviews never really responded to
criticism tell me how the character of
Charles Foster Kane differs from the
character of William Randolph Hearst
Charles Foster Kane was seen as sort of
a dark and defeated individual who had a
lot of wealth and was essentially ruined
by his wealth and his power and it all
went to his head the Hearst on on the
contrary was a guy who worked really
hard all his life had a strong sense of
purpose knew what he wanted to do in the
world wanted to make a difference for
good in the world and had people around
him all the time people who worked with
him throughout his whole career and I
think had a fulfilled life and died a
reasonably happy man Orson Welles who
made Citizen Kane is probably a lot more
like Charles Foster Kane than Hearst
himself as well started out a Boy Wonder
and died sort of broken and alone
and I think it may have more to do with
his own situation than with William
Randolph Hearst when you began writing
this book and researching it was your
original goal to dispel rumors about his
character I wasn’t really gonna write
about Hearst per se in the first place I
was gonna write about a newspaper war
this particular episode when Hearst goes
to in New York and takes on Joseph’s
posters one of the biggest things that
ever happened in the history of the
North American precedent I wanted to
write about that and all the exciting
things that you know that happened at
the time it was not only the
spanish-american war which was America’s
entry onto the world stage as a military
power it was the most exciting election
in US history in 1896 you had William
Jennings Bryan who is more more
charismatic in his day than than even
Obama in our day and as there was all
kinds of great murders and scandals and
disputes and just wonderful stuff to
write about so I was I was gonna do that
but as I got deeper and deeper into it
Hearst
began to emerge as a very different
character from the Charles Foster Kane
character and the guy I was used to
reading about so I changed focus and got
more interested in him and tried to
figure him out and what was really
happening with his newspaper and I found
this very engaging young man very
intelligent very public-spirited who was
actually producing a great newspaper
even you know though we thought that
well we thought something entirely
different
times most famously or infamously in one
of the most recognized films of all time
Citizen Kane
but the depiction of him seen in this
film is not necessarily accurate hi I’m
Rebecca Brayton and welcome to
watchmojo.com and today we’re speaking
with kenneth white about the uncrowned
king it’s a sensational rise of William
Randolph Hearst explaining me what is so
misunderstood about his character
there’s almost another book in why
Hearst is so misunderstood a lot of its
in Citizen Kane the movie people think
that’s a biography of William Randolph
Hearst but even narsing Wells who made
it said that in the end it didn’t really
bear a lot of resemblance to her Sonne
life he lived a long time 80 years he
accumulated over that time a lot of
commercial enemies in the newspaper
business a lot of people who work for
him and maybe didn’t like the experience
and wrote about him also he went into
politics and tried to run for the
presidency unsuccessfully several times
and accumulated a lot of political
enemies as well and and people would
write about him critically as happens
with any public figure but Hearst was
never one to respond he never wrote his
own autobiography he rarely sat for
interviews never really responded to
criticism tell me how the character of
Charles Foster Kane differs from the
character of William Randolph Hearst
Charles Foster Kane was seen as sort of
a dark and defeated individual who had a
lot of wealth and was essentially ruined
by his wealth and his power and it all
went to his head the Hearst on on the
contrary was a guy who worked really
hard all his life had a strong sense of
purpose knew what he wanted to do in the
world wanted to make a difference for
good in the world and had people around
him all the time people who worked with
him throughout his whole career and I
think had a fulfilled life and died a
reasonably happy man Orson Welles who
made Citizen Kane is probably a lot more
like Charles Foster Kane than Hearst
himself as well started out a Boy Wonder
and died sort of broken and alone
and I think it may have more to do with
his own situation than with William
Randolph Hearst when you began writing
this book and researching it was your
original goal to dispel rumors about his
character I wasn’t really gonna write
about Hearst per se in the first place I
was gonna write about a newspaper war
this particular episode when Hearst goes
to in New York and takes on Joseph’s
posters one of the biggest things that
ever happened in the history of the
North American precedent I wanted to
write about that and all the exciting
things that you know that happened at
the time it was not only the
spanish-american war which was America’s
entry onto the world stage as a military
power it was the most exciting election
in US history in 1896 you had William
Jennings Bryan who is more more
charismatic in his day than than even
Obama in our day and as there was all
kinds of great murders and scandals and
disputes and just wonderful stuff to
write about so I was I was gonna do that
but as I got deeper and deeper into it
Hearst
began to emerge as a very different
character from the Charles Foster Kane
character and the guy I was used to
reading about so I changed focus and got
more interested in him and tried to
figure him out and what was really
happening with his newspaper and I found
this very engaging young man very
intelligent very public-spirited who was
actually producing a great newspaper
even you know though we thought that
well we thought something entirely
different
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