Who is Rosebud in citizen Kane

Who is Rosebud in citizen Kane (movie)

Rosebud is newspaper magnate's dying word: "Rosebud." & the story of the movie citizen Kane is centred around the mystery of this word .

Citizen Kane is a 1941 American dramatic film, and the first feature film directed by Orson Welles, who also co-authored the screenplay. It was released by RKO Pictures. The story, often considered to be a veiled portrayal of the life of William Randolph Hearst, is fictional.Upon its release, Hearst prohibited mention of the film in any of his newspapers. The film traces the life and career of Charles Foster Kane, a man whose career in the publishing world is born of idealistic social service, but gradually evolves into a ruthless pursuit of power. Narrated principally through flashbacks, the story is revealed through the research of a newspaper reporter seeking to solve the mystery of the newspaper magnate's dying word: "Rosebud."

What is Rosebud in citizen Kane

Orson Welles himself described "Rosebud" as: "It's a gimmick, really, and rather dollar-book Freud."The symbolic sled 'Rosebud' used in the film was bought for $60,500 by film director Steven Spielberg in 1982. Spielberg commented, "Rosebud will go over my typewriter to remind me that quality in movies comes first."

According to Louis Pizzitola, author of Hearst Over Hollywood, "Rosebud" was a nickname that Orrin Peck, a friend of William Randolph Hearst, gave to his mother, Phoebe Hearst. It was said that Phoebe was as close, or even closer, to Orrin than she was to her own son, lending a bitter-sweet element to the word's use in a film about a boy being separated from his mother's love.

In 1989, essayist Gore Vidal cited contemporary rumors that "Rosebud" was a nickname Hearst used for his mistress Marion Davies; a reference to her clitoris, a claim repeated as fact in the 1996 documentary The Battle Over Citizen Kane. A resultant joke noted, with heavy innuendo, that Hearst and/or Kane died "with 'Rosebud' on his lips.