Praise for Christian McKay in Orson Welles

Roger Ebert gives Me and Orson Welles four stars and writes of the actor (also don’t miss Ed Douglas’ chat with McKay):

McKay summons above all the unflappable self-confidence of Welles, a con man in addition to his many other gifts, who was later able to talk actors into appearing in films that were shot over a period of years, as funds became available from his jobs in other films, on TV, on the stage and in countless commercials (“We will sell no wine before its time”). Self-confidence is something you can’t act; you have to possess it, and McKay, in his first leading role, has that in abundance.

He also suggests the charisma that swept people up. People were able to feel that even in his absence; I recall having lunch several times at the original Ma Maison in Beverly Hills, where no matter who I was interviewing (once it was Michael Caine), the conversation invariably came around to a mysterious shadowy figure dining in the shade — Welles, who ate lunch there every single day.