The Third Man Theme The Third Man Theme "The Third Man Theme" (also known as "The Harry Lime Theme") is an instrumental written and performed by Anton Karas for the soundtrack to the 1949 film "The Third Man". "The Third Man" is a 1949 British film noir, directed by Carol Reed. One night after a long day of filming "The Third Man" on location in Vienna, Reed and cast members Joseph Cotten, Alida Valli and Orson Welles had dinner and retired to a wine cellar. In the bistro, which retained the atmosphere of the pre-war days, they heard the zither music of Anton Karas,
The Adventures of Harry Lime office, demanding to be paid for the scripts which "he" had ghostwritten for Welles. When Welles was asked about it later, he smiled: "Don't pay him. They weren't very good scripts." The episodes which were adapted into short stories were: Welles also tried to convert one episode script into a film script for producer Alexander Korda. When that fell through, the story was adapted into a novel and published in France as "Une Grosse Légume" in 1953. The novel was ghostwritten by Maurice Bessy and published under Welles's name. It has never been published in English. The Adventures of Harry