Citizen Kane Scene 3 Summary

  • When the newsreel stops, a room full of men try to figure out how they can change the newsreel to make it more entertaining. One man suggests that they change the title.
  • After all, everyone already knows that Charles Kane is dead. So the reel has to add something new.
  • The guy (Mr. Ralston) wants to know what Kane's final words were. Apparently, the last word he ever said was, "rosebud." The guy wants to know what Kane meant by this word, so he asks his men to investigate what it could possibly mean.
  • So now, we've got a nice mystery powering its way through this movie: what does "rosebud" mean?
  • We look in on a woman named Miss Alexander (Charles Kane's ex-wife) who's crying in a restaurant. Another man named Mr. Thompson sits down with her to ask her some questions. She yells at him to go away.
  • Thompson gets on a phone and tells his boss that Alexander won't say a word about Kane or anything else. Before leaving, Thompson asks a waiter about "rosebud," and the waiter confirms that the former Mrs. Kane has never heard of anyone or anything called "rosebud."