It took more than 70 years for the scars to heal, but it looks as if the descendents of William Randolph Hearst have finally forgiven Orson Welles for traducing the newspaper baron in his 1941 Citizen Kane. It has been announced that, as part of the San Luis Obispo Film Festival, a screening of the great film is to take place at the Hearst Castle in California.
Wendy Eidson, director of the festival, commented: "I tossed out the idea of screening Citizen Kanethere as a joke, and they didn't laugh. I was sort of floored."
But it sounds as if the Hearst clan may have its own agenda. Steve Hearst, William Randolph's great grandson, said the screening would offer "a great opportunity to draw a clear distinction between WR and Orson Welles, between the medieval, gloomy-looking castle shown in Citizen Kaneand the light, beautiful, architecturally superior reality".
The Hoover family currently has no plans to screen J Edgarat their own homestead.
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