Not only has SF State cinema professor Joseph McBride written three books about filmmaker Orson Welles, at the age of 23 he was given the opportunity to star in one of his films.

McBride has been teaching cinema at SF State since 2003 and has recently released his third book about Orson Welles, titled, "Whatever Happened to Orson Welles? A Portrait of an Independent Career.” His latest work is a memoir of the 40 years spent studying the avant garde filmmaker.

“I finally get to meet my favorite critic,” Welles told McBride when the two met for the first time in the summer of 1970. McBride was working as a reporter for Variety magazine at the time and was originally assigned to interview his favorite director, John Ford.

McBride added that Welles had a copy of his first book, titled "Orson Welles" on his mantelpiece at his Hollywood Hills home.

“He said he thought I was the only one who understood what he was trying to do,” McBride said. Shortly after their first meeting, Welles offered him a role in his latest film.

“I let myself be molded by him,” McBride said. Welles would often pick on him to help him create the part of an anxious, young reporter named Mister Pister.

The film, titled "The Other Side of the Wind," was shot over 6 years and was never finished.

This opportunity opened the door for McBride to study Welles closely for the next 40 years, as he went on to write his next two biographies on the independent filmmaker.

“Professor McBride’s work is one of the standards by which critical biography is measured,” said cinema professor, Jim Kitses. “SF State is lucky to have him."

McBride said he loved to write at an early age and wrote his first book, "High and Inside: An A-to-Z Guide to the Language of Baseball" when he was a teenager. The book was published a few years later.

In 1966, at the age of 19, McBride saw Welles’ film “Citizen Kane” while studying literature at the University of Wisconsin. He said his dedication to writing about film and his focus on Welles’ cinematic career dates back to this experience.

He said he was impressed with Welles’ stylistic approach to filmmaking, and his sophisticated critique of the media. He added he was also intrigued at the fact that Welles made “Citizen Kane” when he was 25 years old.

“His audacity to take on something of that magnitude, especially at such a young age, really impressed me,” McBride said, referring to Welles’ portrayal of William Randolph Hearst. “It was then that I temporarily put aside my ambition of becoming a novelist and decided to write and make films instead.”

Soon after watching "Citizen Kane," he began working on his first biography. By the time McBride was 23, critics labeled him as becoming one of the leading experts on the legendary filmmaker.

“America saw him as shameful and as a tragic failure because he wasn’t a commercial success,” said McBride, adding that he felt it was his duty to report about what the public didn’t know about Welles.

McBride is currently teaching Film and Society at SF State. Some of his students said his class is inspiring them too look at film more critically, just as Welles’ work inspired him when he was in college.

“He helps us look at films a totally different way,” said third-year cinema major Dave Tressel.

In addition to writing 15 books on film, McBride has also written over 20 screenplays including the 1979 cult classic film “Rock ‘n’ Roll High School,” starring the punk rock group the Ramones.

He is also a published biographer, and has written 15 biographies on such cinematic figures as Steven Spielberg, Kirk Douglas, and director John Ford.

McBride kept in contact with Welles while he continued his work writing screenplays and biographies. He said he has been lucky to have the opportunity to do what he loves, and to have the chance to work and study the life of a filmmaker he admired as a young student.

“Having this opportunity to study and write about his life has essentially been a film buff’s fantasy come true,” McBride said.