Xanadu (Citizen Kane)
Encyclopedia
Xanadu is the fictional estate of Charles Foster Kane
, the title character of the film Citizen Kane
. The estate gets its name from the real ancient Mongolia
n city, Xanadu
, known for its splendor. Hearst Castle
in San Simeon, California
is the obvious inspiration for Xanadu, due to the Hearst
/Kane comparison that is central to the film.
s of the Gulf
coast" in Florida
, Xanadu is described as being the world's largest private estate; "cost: no man can say" according to the newsreel
at the beginning of the film. The newsreel also states that Kane specifically conceived the estate for Susan Alexander, his second wife. Ironically, however, Susan grew to hate Xanadu, calling it "forty-nine thousand acres [76 square miles, 200 km²] of nothing but scenery and statues." The newsreel's pompous description of Xanadu (a pastiche of the "Timese" style of March of Time films of the period), is as follows:
The estate also boasts a championship-quality golf
course and a Venetian
-style canal
with gondolas. The extensive zoo and aquarium
were stocked with a menagerie
of animals including monkeys, horses, giraffes, birds, octopuses, elephants and donkeys. The estate is enclosed by a metal partition that is entered through a gateway with a giant letter "K" written above it. Central to the estate is Xanadu proper, the castle
-like mansion
that served as Kane's home and repository for his enormous collection of antiquities
and objets d'art
. Xanadu has at least a few dozen butlers and maidservants.
Oheka Castle
was used for some exterior shots of Xanadu seen in the opening newsreel. However, most shots of Xanadu were surrealistic
, highly stylized matte paintings
. Xanadu makes great use of Gothic architecture
and, except in the opening newsreel, it always appears in the film at night with fog
surrounding it, giving it an "ominous" look. This is appropriate since Xanadu becomes something of a prison, rather than a castle, for Kane in the film. Considering the size of the building, very little of the interior was shown, presumably due to the film's limited budget and the fact that little of the interior was needed for the required scenes. The interior — shown to include enormous and sparsely decorated rooms with gigantic fireplaces and so on — seems to be as gloomy and imposing as the exterior, again emphasizing its status as a prison. Xanadu's interior especially does not appear at all homely or cozy, symbolizing the emptiness
of Kane's later life.
The estate is featured in the opening and closing shots of the film, and is where Kane dies, virtually alone. Though he is still fabulously wealthy at the time of his death, Xanadu, still unfinished according to the newsreel, has already fallen into visible disrepair, presumably from neglect and its impractical size. After his death, Xanadu is abandoned and its vast estates and holdings are cataloged and auctioned. Kane's personal effects, including a sled
that reveals the meaning of "rosebud," are incinerated.
with his Neverland Ranch
— have been compared to Kane, with their inability to spend wisely and their gradual disconnection from the everyday world. Xanadu's symbolic meaning of a prison built for oneself resonates to this day. Bill Gates' house
has been nicknamed "Xanadu 2.0" in reference to the fictional mansion of this article.
When similarly stylized Gothic buildings appear in film, Xanadu is often considered a source of inspiration and the similarity is often noted by critics. This includes Hogwarts
in Roger Ebert
's review of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
.
Charles Foster Kane
Charles Foster Kane is a fictional character and the subject of Orson Welles' 1941 film Citizen Kane. Welles played Kane , with Buddy Swan playing Kane as a child...
, the title character of the film Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane
Citizen Kane is a 1941 American drama film, directed by and starring Orson Welles. Many critics consider it the greatest American film of all time, especially for its innovative cinematography, music and narrative structure. Citizen Kane was Welles' first feature film...
. The estate gets its name from the real ancient Mongolia
Mongolia
Mongolia is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest...
n city, Xanadu
Xanadu
-Description of Xanadu by Toghon Temur :The lament of Toghon Temur Khan , concerning the loss of Daidu and Heibun Shanduu in 1368, is recorded in many Mongolian historical chronicles...
, known for its splendor. Hearst Castle
Hearst Castle
Hearst Castle is a National Historic Landmark mansion located on the Central Coast of California, United States. It was designed by architect Julia Morgan between 1919 and 1947 for newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst, who died in 1951. In 1957, the Hearst Corporation donated the property to...
in San Simeon, California
San Simeon, California
San Simeon is a census-designated place on the Pacific coast of San Luis Obispo County, California. Its position along State Route 1 is approximately halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, each of those cities being roughly 230 mi away...
is the obvious inspiration for Xanadu, due to the Hearst
William Randolph Hearst
William Randolph Hearst was an American business magnate and leading newspaper publisher. Hearst entered the publishing business in 1887, after taking control of The San Francisco Examiner from his father...
/Kane comparison that is central to the film.
Appearance in the film
Built on an immense "private mountain" located on the "desertDesert
A desert is a landscape or region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation, less than enough to support growth of most plants. Most deserts have an average annual precipitation of less than...
s of the Gulf
Gulf of Mexico
The Gulf of Mexico is a partially landlocked ocean basin largely surrounded by the North American continent and the island of Cuba. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United States, on the southwest and south by Mexico, and on the southeast by Cuba. In...
coast" in Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
, Xanadu is described as being the world's largest private estate; "cost: no man can say" according to the newsreel
Newsreel
A newsreel was a form of short documentary film prevalent in the first half of the 20th century, regularly released in a public presentation place and containing filmed news stories and items of topical interest. It was a source of news, current affairs and entertainment for millions of moviegoers...
at the beginning of the film. The newsreel also states that Kane specifically conceived the estate for Susan Alexander, his second wife. Ironically, however, Susan grew to hate Xanadu, calling it "forty-nine thousand acres [76 square miles, 200 km²] of nothing but scenery and statues." The newsreel's pompous description of Xanadu (a pastiche of the "Timese" style of March of Time films of the period), is as follows:
The estate also boasts a championship-quality golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
course and a Venetian
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
-style canal
Canal
Canals are man-made channels for water. There are two types of canal:#Waterways: navigable transportation canals used for carrying ships and boats shipping goods and conveying people, further subdivided into two kinds:...
with gondolas. The extensive zoo and aquarium
Aquarium
An aquarium is a vivarium consisting of at least one transparent side in which water-dwelling plants or animals are kept. Fishkeepers use aquaria to keep fish, invertebrates, amphibians, marine mammals, turtles, and aquatic plants...
were stocked with a menagerie
Menagerie
A menagerie is/was a form of keeping common and exotic animals in captivity that preceded the modern zoological garden. The term was first used in seventeenth century France in reference to the management of household or domestic stock. Later, it came to be used primarily in reference to...
of animals including monkeys, horses, giraffes, birds, octopuses, elephants and donkeys. The estate is enclosed by a metal partition that is entered through a gateway with a giant letter "K" written above it. Central to the estate is Xanadu proper, the castle
Castle
A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble...
-like mansion
Mansion
A mansion is a very large dwelling house. U.S. real estate brokers define a mansion as a dwelling of over . A traditional European mansion was defined as a house which contained a ballroom and tens of bedrooms...
that served as Kane's home and repository for his enormous collection of antiquities
Antiquities
Antiquities, nearly always used in the plural in this sense, is a term for objects from Antiquity, especially the civilizations of the Mediterranean: the Classical antiquity of Greece and Rome, Ancient Egypt and the other Ancient Near Eastern cultures...
and objets d'art
Work of art
A work of art, artwork, art piece, or art object is an aesthetic item or artistic creation.The term "a work of art" can apply to:*an example of fine art, such as a painting or sculpture*a fine work of architecture or landscape design...
. Xanadu has at least a few dozen butlers and maidservants.
Oheka Castle
Oheka Castle
Oheka Castle, also known as the Otto Kahn Estate, is located on the Gold Coast of Long Island, in Huntington, New York. It was the country home of financier and philanthropist Otto Kahn. Built by Kahn between 1914 and 1919, it was and remains the second largest private home in the United States,...
was used for some exterior shots of Xanadu seen in the opening newsreel. However, most shots of Xanadu were surrealistic
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
, highly stylized matte paintings
Matte (filmmaking)
Mattes are used in photography and special effects filmmaking to combine two or more image elements into a single, final image. Usually, mattes are used to combine a foreground image with a background image . In this case, the matte is the background painting...
. Xanadu makes great use of Gothic architecture
Gothic architecture
Gothic architecture is a style of architecture that flourished during the high and late medieval period. It evolved from Romanesque architecture and was succeeded by Renaissance architecture....
and, except in the opening newsreel, it always appears in the film at night with fog
Fog
Fog is a collection of water droplets or ice crystals suspended in the air at or near the Earth's surface. While fog is a type of stratus cloud, the term "fog" is typically distinguished from the more generic term "cloud" in that fog is low-lying, and the moisture in the fog is often generated...
surrounding it, giving it an "ominous" look. This is appropriate since Xanadu becomes something of a prison, rather than a castle, for Kane in the film. Considering the size of the building, very little of the interior was shown, presumably due to the film's limited budget and the fact that little of the interior was needed for the required scenes. The interior — shown to include enormous and sparsely decorated rooms with gigantic fireplaces and so on — seems to be as gloomy and imposing as the exterior, again emphasizing its status as a prison. Xanadu's interior especially does not appear at all homely or cozy, symbolizing the emptiness
Emptiness
Emptiness as a human condition is a sense of generalized boredom, social alienation and apathy. Feelings of emptiness often accompany dysthymia, depression, loneliness, despair, or other mental/emotional disorders such as borderline personality disorder...
of Kane's later life.
The estate is featured in the opening and closing shots of the film, and is where Kane dies, virtually alone. Though he is still fabulously wealthy at the time of his death, Xanadu, still unfinished according to the newsreel, has already fallen into visible disrepair, presumably from neglect and its impractical size. After his death, Xanadu is abandoned and its vast estates and holdings are cataloged and auctioned. Kane's personal effects, including a sled
Sled
A sled, sledge, or sleigh is a land vehicle with a smooth underside or possessing a separate body supported by two or more smooth, relatively narrow, longitudinal runners that travels by sliding across a surface. Most sleds are used on surfaces with low friction, such as snow or ice. In some cases,...
that reveals the meaning of "rosebud," are incinerated.
Cultural influence
Xanadu has been used in recent times to represent the foolish excess of lavish lifestyles such as Kane's. Various celebrities — for example Michael JacksonMichael Jackson
Michael Joseph Jackson was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ, Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records...
with his Neverland Ranch
Neverland Ranch
Neverland Valley Ranch is a developed property in Santa Barbara County, California, most famous for being a home of American entertainer Michael Jackson from 1988 to 2005. Jackson named the property after Neverland, the fantasy island in the story of Peter Pan, a boy who never grows up...
— have been compared to Kane, with their inability to spend wisely and their gradual disconnection from the everyday world. Xanadu's symbolic meaning of a prison built for oneself resonates to this day. Bill Gates' house
Bill Gates' house
Bill Gates' house is a large mansion in the side of a hill overlooking Lake Washington in Medina, Washington. The house is noted for its design and the technology it incorporates...
has been nicknamed "Xanadu 2.0" in reference to the fictional mansion of this article.
When similarly stylized Gothic buildings appear in film, Xanadu is often considered a source of inspiration and the similarity is often noted by critics. This includes Hogwarts
Hogwarts
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry or simply Hogwarts is the primary setting for the first six books of the Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling, with each book lasting the equivalent of one school year. It is a fictional boarding school of magic for witches and wizards between the ages of...
in Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
's review of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (film)
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, released in the United States and India as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, is a 2001 fantasy film directed by Chris Columbus and based on the novel of the same name by J. K. Rowling. The film is the first instalment in the Harry Potter film series,...
.