Rather mixed results from the audience, some gave a standing ovation, some sat down and politely clapped. Some sat down and looked disapprovingly at the event.
He did “name names” to the House on UnAmerican Activities Committee (HUAC).
So what do with these old-timers that might have great artistically, but have questionable political/racial histories?
Death … I mean re-education camps! AmIright?
CMC
Why is there something that has to be done?
There is nothing we can do but hail his great work and denounce his bad decisions made during the years of the Hollywood blacklist.
First de Havilland, and now Kazan. Could we just fast forward this discussion to Polanski, where it always ends up?
For starters, they should never invite Elia Kazan to the Oscars again. And that goes double for Fatty Arbuckle.
Drugging and raping thirteen year old girls has never been OK; so no, he doesn’t get a pass.
Why should we denounce someone who told the truth about communists?
It is not that simple.
Really? I assumed this discussion would end up somewhere in the vicinity of Columbus and Robert E. Lee.
Well, some of it was truth and some made up, we will never know the extent Hollywood was infiltrated by Commies. Certainly it was more than people think today, but not as much as was alleged.
I have no argument with HUAC or the FBI investigating Soviet agents working within the government. But I don’t see any reason why they needed to investigate communists working in Hollywood. As far as I know, there’s no reason why a communist filmmaker can’t make a movie which advocates for his political ideology. Just as there’s no reason why a filmmaker who’s a socialist or a liberal or a conservative or a libertarian can’t do the same.
Yes, but the names he named were already known, so he didn’t really harm anyone. Several of the people he named told him to name them - why should his career be ruined, too?
Because the entire concept of the US government going after people for their political views is wrong, and anti-American.
Granted, I wasn’t around then. But that has always been my understanding of the objection to the HUAC. It was witch hunt for wrongthink that was approved by the government due to fears from the Cold War, and assuming “believing communism was better than capitalism” meant “Russian operative.”
What do you think?
Today, the cancel culture is blacklisting more people, for less reason, than the studio executives ever did.
People are frighteningly ignorant of the histories of their own political movements.
You’re right. Colin Kaepernick, for instance, was blacklisted by the NFL for taking a knee.
This seems very similar to your thread on Olivia de Havilland.
I, for one, am opposed to setting aside any more public parkland for statues of Elia Kazan triumphantly riding a horse.
What would you want done to him?