Conquest of the Useless: Reflections from the Making of Fitzcarraldo
Page 29
I looked around, and there was the jungle, manifesting the same seething hatred, wrathful and steaming, while the river flowed by in majestic indifference and scornful condescension, ignoring everything: the plight of man, the burden of dreams, and the torments of time.
PERSONS AND PLACES
Mario Adorf: German-Italian actor. Played the role of the captain until the first phase of shooting was broken off.
Gustavo Cerff Arbulù: Peruvian production assistant. Worked previously on Aguirre.
Belém: Belém do Para, Brazilian provincial capital at the mouth of the Amazon. Not to be confused with Belén!
Belén: A floating quarter of Iquitos, located on rafts and pilings.
Uli Bergfelder: Expert on old Provençal poetry, film designer, set decorator. Longtime Herzog collaborator.
Les Blank: American director. Numerous documentaries, including Spend It All, Chula Vista. Made the film Burden of Dreams about the creation of Fitzcarraldo.
Franz Blumauer: Fashion and costume designer from Vienna. Later did costumes for opera productions, among others Tannhäuser.
Camisea: Indian name: Shivankoreni. Machiguenga village at the confluence of the Río Camisea and the Río Urubamba.
Claudia Cardinale: Italian film star. Played the role of Molly in the film.
Dr. Claude Chiarini: French Foreign Legionnaire, doctor and neurologist. On staff of a mental hospital near Paris. Collaborated with Herzog on earlier films as a photographer.
Francis Ford Coppola: Producer and director of films such as Apocalypse Now and The Godfather.
Zézé D’Alice: Brazilian sound assistant.
Carlos Diegues: Brazilian director of films such as Os Heredeiros and Bye Bye Brazil.
Lotte Eisner: Film historian, studied archeology, fled in 1933 on the day of Hitler’s seizure of power. Mentor to the New German Cinema. Publications such as The Haunted Screen and monographs on Murnau and Fritz Lang.
Miguel Ángel Fuentes: Mexican actor. Played Cholo.
Abel Gance: French film pioneer, made Napoleon and other films.
Henning von Gierke: Painter, set designer, opera director. Longtime Herzog collaborator.
Maureen Gosling: Longtime collaborator of Les Blank. Cutter, director of Blossoms of Fire and other films.
Rui Guerra: Brazilian director of Os Fuzis, Erendira. Acted in Aguirre.
Jerry Hall: American model, married to Mick Jagger at the time.
Rudolph Herzog: Son of Werner Herzog, known in childhood as Burro. Professional magician. Director and producer of films such as Cat and Mouse.
Tilbert Herzog: Till, Werner Herzog’s older brother, helped with the financing of Aguirre.
Paul Hittscher: German captain and shipowner in Iquitos, Peru, restaurant owner. Played the captain.
Huerequeque: Huerequeque Enrique Bohorquez, owner of a bar on the Río Nanay. Played Huerequeque.
Mick Jagger: British rock star. Played Wilbur until the filming was broken off. The role was later cut out of the script.
Werner Janoud: Worked as a miner. Fled at eighteen from the Ger man Democratic Republic, spent three years biking from Canada to Peru. Photographer. Longtime personal friend.
Dagoberto Juarez: Brazilian sound engineer.
Edmund Erwin Kemper: Mass murderer, serving eight consecutive lifetime sentences in Vacaville, California.
Klaus Kinski: Played Fitzcarraldo. His filmography includes more than two hundred films. Earlier a stage actor and reciter of poetry. Directed his own film, Kinski Paganini.
Raines Klausmann: Swiss cameraman (second camera). Later collaborated several more times with Herzog, for instance on Scream of Stone.
Joe Koechlin von Stein: Peruvian businessman, ecologist. Helped with the financing of Aguirre. The first impulse for Fitzcarraldo came from him.
José Lewgoy: Brazilian actor, usually in soap operas. Played the rubber baron Don Aquilino.
Tom Luddy: U.S. amateur golf champion, political activist. Director of the Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley. Collaborator of Coppola. Founder and director of the Telluride Film Festival.
Laplace Martin: Brazilian engineer, expert for heavy loads, resigned during the filming.
Thomas Mauch: Cameraman from the very beginning of Herzog’s career, worked on Signs of Life, Even Dwarfs Started Small, Aguirre. Also cameraman for Edgar Reitz and Alexander Kluge; later director and producer of his own films.
Errol Morris: American director of Vernon/Florida, Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control, Fog of War, among others.
Sepp Mosmeier: Pastry chef, opera fan. Founder and president of the Munich Black-and-Yellow soccer club.
Grande Otelo: Brazilian actor, played the forgotten stationmaster.
Dr. Parraga: Peruvian doctor. Established the medical outposts in both jungle camps.
Rui Polanah: Brazilian actor, originally from Mozambique. Played the role of a rubber baron.
Pongo de Mainique: Rapids in the upper reaches of the Río Urubamba.
Pongo de Manseriche: Rapids on the Río Marañón.
Beat Presser: Photographer from Basel. Numerous exhibitions and publications, among them Alpentraum and Kinski. Director of video productions. Longtime Herzog collaborator.
Resortes: Mexican actor.
Jason Robards: American actor. Played Fitzcarraldo until he withdrew on account of illness, which led to Herzog’s breaking off the first attempt at making the film.
Glauber Rocha: Brazilian director of Antonio das Mortes, Terra em transe, and other works.
Gloria Saxer: Peruvian wife of Walter Saxer. Provided catering for Fitzcarraldo and other films.
Walter Saxer: Line producer from St. Gallen (Switzerland), Herzog collaborator from the early films on. Director of a sound studio, producer, screenwriter for Scream of Stone.
Volker Schlöndorff: German director. His films include Young Törless, The Tin Drum, Homo Faber.
Anja Schmidt-Zähringer: Responsible for continuity. Longtime Herzog collaborator for organization.
Werner Schroeter: Director of film, theater, and opera; credits include The Death of Maria Malibran and Day of the Idiots. Staged the excerpt from Ernani for Fitzcarraldo in the Teatro Amazonas in Manaus.
Larisa Shepitko: Ukrainian director in the former USSR of films such as The Ascent and Wings. Gymnast and basketball player on the national team.
George Sluizer: Dutch director of Utz and other films. Producer. Director of production for the Brazilian part of the shooting.
Walter Steiner: Sculptor in wood, two-time world champion in ski flying, from Wildhaus (Switzerland). Lead actor in The Great Ecstasy of Woodcarver Steiner.
Lucki Stipetic: Herzog’s younger brother and closest collaborator, starting with Aguirre. Producer, director of film production and worldwide distribution. Previously independent businessman.
Gisela Storch: Costume designer. Longtime collaborator.
Hans-Jürgen Syberberg: German director of Ludwig—Requiem for a Virgin King and Hitler.
Miguel Vazquez: Special effects, Mexico.
Jorge Vignati: Peruvian cameraman, director of documentaries, assistant director for Fitzcarraldo. Longtime collaborator on Aguirre and The Dark Glow of the Mountains, among others.
César Vivanco: Peruvian from Cuzco. Directed the construction of the camp on the Río Marañón and the Río Camisea. Previously collaborator on Aguirre.
Raimund Wirner: German gaffer.
Kitty Witwer: Former Playboy Bunny, sheriff, warden of a San Francisco prison.
Credits
Frontispiece photograph © Kramer O’Neill
Copyright
CONQUEST OF THE USELESS. Copyright © 2009 by Krishna Winston. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any in
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FIRST EDITION
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN: 978-0-06-157553-2
EPub Edition © May 2010 ISBN: 978-0-06-201646-1
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