The Magnificent Ambersons


The Magnificent Ambersons is a 1918 novel written by Booth Tarkington which won the 1919 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. It was the second novel in his Growth trilogy, which included The Turmoil and The Midlander. In 1925 the novel was first adapted for film under the title Pampered Youth. In 1942 Orson Welles wrote and directed an acclaimed film adaptation of the book. Welles's original screenplay was the basis of a 2002 TV movie produced by the A&E Network.

Plot summary

The story is set in a largely fictionalized version of Indianapolis, and much of it was inspired by the neighborhood of Woodruff Place.
The novel and trilogy trace the growth of the United States through the declining fortunes of three generations of the aristocratic Amberson family in an upper-scale Indianapolis neighborhood, between the end of the Civil War and the early part of the 20th century, a period of rapid industrialization and socio-economic change in America. The decline of the Ambersons is contrasted with the rising fortunes of industrial tycoons and other new-money families, who derived power not from family names but by "doing things". As George Amberson's friend says, "don't you think being things is 'rahthuh bettuh' than doing things?"
The titular family is the most prosperous and powerful in town at the turn of the century. Young George Amberson Minafer, the patriarch's grandson, is spoiled terribly by his mother Isabel. Growing up arrogant, sure of his own worth and position, and totally oblivious to the lives of others, George falls in love with Lucy Morgan, a young though sensible debutante. But there is a long history between George's mother and Lucy's father, of which George is unaware. As the town grows into a city, industry thrives, the Ambersons' prestige and wealth wanes, and the Morgans, thanks to Lucy's prescient father, grow prosperous. When George sabotages his widowed mother's growing affections for Lucy's father, life as he knows it comes to an end.

Reception

The Magnificent Ambersons received the 1919 Pulitzer Prize.
"The Magnificent Ambersons is perhaps Tarkington's best novel," said Van Wyck Brooks. " a typical story of an American family and town—the great family that locally ruled the roost and vanished virtually in a day as the town spread and darkened into a city. This novel no doubt was a permanent page in the social history of the United States, so admirably conceived and written was the tale of the Ambersons, their house, their fate and the growth of the community in which they were submerged in the end."

Adaptations

Radio

The Campbell Playhouse presented Orson Welles's one-hour radio adaptation of The Magnificent Ambersons on October 29, 1939. The cast included Welles, Walter Huston, Ray Collins, Everett Sloane, Bea Benaderet, Nan Sunderland, and other members of the Mercury Theatre company.

Film

The Magnificent Ambersons was adapted by Jay Pilcher for a Vitagraph Pictures feature film titled Pampered Youth, directed by David Smith and starring Cullen Landis, Ben Alexander, Allan Forrest, Alice Calhoun, Emmett King, Wallace MacDonald, Charlotte Merriam, Katheryn Adams, Aggie Herring and William Irving. After Vitagraph was purchased by Warner Bros., the 70-minute film was reedited to 33 minutes and released with the title Two to One. The original film is considered lost.
Orson Welles adapted the story for his second feature film, The Magnificent Ambersons, starring Joseph Cotten, Dolores Costello, Anne Baxter, Tim Holt, Agnes Moorehead and Ray Collins, with Welles providing the narration. Welles lost control of the editing of the film to RKO Pictures, and the final version released to audiences differed significantly from his rough cut of the film. More than an hour of footage was cut by the studio, which also shot and substituted a happier ending. Although Welles's extensive notes for how he wished the film to be cut have survived, the excised footage was destroyed. Composer Bernard Herrmann insisted his credit be removed when, like the film itself, his score was heavily edited by the studio. Even in the released version, The Magnificent Ambersons is often regarded as among the best American films ever made.
In 2002, the A&E Network aired its original film The Magnificent Ambersons, directed by Alfonso Arau and starring Madeleine Stowe, Bruce Greenwood, Jonathan Rhys Meyers, Gretchen Mol, Jennifer Tilly, Dina Merrill and James Cromwell.