Film industry seeking war, Senator Nye charges (9-9-41)

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 9, 1941)

FILM INDUSTRY SEEKING WAR, NYE CHARGES
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Willkie challenges legal authority and charges partiality
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Washington, Sept. 9 (UP) –
Senator Gerald P. Nye (R-ND) charged today that motion picture producers have a financial stake in a British victory and that this may be influencing them to put propaganda into their product designed to get the United States into war.

Senator Nye, the first witness at an investigation into alleged propaganda in movies and radio, presented a statement asserting that the motion picture industry “has a very selfish interest” in the European war.

Senator Nye said that without undertaking to name all the Hollywood pictures he considered to contain propaganda, he suggested the following would “bear investigation:”

Convoy, Flight Command, Escape, I Married a Nazi, That Hamilton Woman, Man Hunt, The Great Dictator, Sergeant York.

Brokers quoted

He urged a Senate Interstate Commerce Subcommittee, before which he appeared to recommend Senate approval of a full-fledged inquiry into the situation. The series of hearings starting today technically concerned a resolution by Senator Nye and Senator Bennett C. Clark (D-MO) calling for such an investigation. The resolution has not been approved by the Senate.

Senator Nye asserted that Goodbody & Co., a Wall Street investment house, recently studied the movie industry and reported to its clients:

…quite directly that, if Britain lost this war, a number of the leading motion picture companies would be wiped out.

Senator Nye continued:

Now it follows that I feel that this selfish interest in dollars may be playing a considerable part in prompting some of the picture producers in visiting film propaganda upon a people with a view of getting America into that frame of mind which will make certain that America will not let Britain fall.

Willkie files letter

Wendell L. Willkie, counsel for the movie interests, contended in a brief filed with Chairman D. Worth Clark (D-ID) that the subcommittee’s inquiry was:

…unauthorized and invalid.

He asserted that the inquiry violated the first amendment of the Constitution which guaranteed free speech and free press.

The brief expanded contentions made last night in a letter in which Mr. Willkie asserted tio Senator Clark that the subcommittee was proceeding:

…with doubtful legal authority.

Mr. Willkie said the method of the committee’s creation:

…dies hot establish the impression of impartiality.

He added that the impression “naturally” has arisen that one objective of the investigation is to influence the industry to alter its policies to fit the view of non-interventionists.

Mr. Willkie also filed a letter asking the privilege of cross-examining witnesses.

Make appeal

He added that Austin C. Keough, general counsel for Paramount Pictures, told him after discussing the question with Senator Clark of Idaho, that the privilege would be accorded.

Mr. Willkie said:

I have since been advised that it would be denied. I should like to present this request orally, but if your Committee, which of course has sole control of the procedure and from which we have no appeal, decides otherwise, I am using this method of bringing this request to your attention.

Senator Clark “respectfully” declined Mr. Willkie’s request for permission to cross-examine witnesses. He noted that Senate practice for “more than a hundred years” was contrary to it.

Mr. Willkie’s brief cited three major contentions that the subcommittee is exceeding its power.

  1. The group is actually attempting to inquire into alleged movie propaganda whereas the limit of its authority is to determine whether a resolution should be recommended authorizing such an investigation.

  2. Assuming such power had been granted the group, the inquiry would be invalid because expressions of opinion and sentiments on public and political questions, not involving obscenity or tending to induce crime, do not come within the scope of the functions of Congress.

  3. Such an inquiry would clearly be an attempt to deprive and abridge the rights of free speech and dissemination of opinions and personal sentiments.

Senator Nye, in a 41-page statement, asserted that the production, distribution and exhibition of moving pictures:

…is in the hands, for the most part, of four or five individuals, each one of them, I believe an American citizen, but in the majority born abroad, in lands that have been saturated with hate, with fear, with prejudice amd with persecution.

They have power

He said:

The power is theirs if they want to exercise it, to make the great majority of theatergoers in the United States feed upon propaganda, propaganda which might readily be the natural consequences of the individual likes and dislikes of causes the producers would portray in their pictures.

Senator Nye urged the newsreels be included in the inquiry. He described the March of Time as:

…not a newsreel, but part-actuality, part-fiction, part-scenic, part-faked and part-acted.

Senator Nye commented on what he described as:

…the determined effort that has been put forth to convey to the public that the investigation asked is the result of a desire to serve the un-American, narrow cause of antisemitism.

He said:

I bitterly resent this effort to misrepresent our purpose and to prejudice the public mind by dragging this racial issue to the front.

Senator Nye said he was without information that would permit him “even to insinuate” that foreign money is being spent here for radio and film propaganda, but added:

I only know that what is coming from the moving picture studios in the way of pictures portrays a lot of glory for war, magnifies many times the glory of certain peoples engaged in that war.

More pictures planned

He said additional pictures of that sort are being planned.

One reported to me by splendid authority would portray a shipload of British children and pregnant British mothers loaded on board a refugee ship in London, their destination Canada.

That picture, I am told, will portray the Nazis gleefully wringing their hands and glorying in the opportunity and the plan to destroy this ship and its cargo, and thus destroy two generations with one stroke.

He denied that movie and newspaper propaganda are similar, rebutting what he said was a charge that the next step after a movie investigation would be an inquiry into press propaganda. The difference, he said, is that, for the most part, newspapers are individually owned.

Senator Nye said Darryl F. Zanuck of 20th Century Fox had circulated a notice among employees asserting that it was “imperative” that the Hollywood Bowl be crowded for a meeting at which Mr. Willkie spoke on national unity, so that Mr. Willkie would know that:

…the good Americans of Hollywood can turn out as strongly as the bums and the other subversive elements turned out for Mr. Lindbergh.

Even before the President traded 50 destroyers to Britain, Senator Nye said, Harry Warner of Warner Bros. circulated a petition urging him to do so. He also charged that Mr. Warner blocked appointment of a member of the House of Representatives – whom Senator Nye did not name – as official movie censor to succeed Joseph Breen because the representative voted against the Lend-Lease Bill.

Senator Nye suggested inquiry into the replacing of director Frank Borzage as director of The Mortal Storm by Victor Saville.

Senator Nye said:

There is a rumor that Saville is a British agent operating here on motion picture lots.

He added:

I have evidence that leads me to most earnestly, want to know whether M. G. Levee is employed by the industry and its devoting all of his time to the activity of arranging immigration visas.

Willkie protests

While Senator Nye was reading his statement, Mr. Willkie released a written reply accusing the North Dakotan of wishing:

…to foster and create public prejudices against the motion picture industry, and thus attempt to high pressure it to stop producing accurate and factual pictures on Nazism.

Secondly, Mr. Willkie alleged, Senator Nye is attempting to influence the industry to alter its portrayal of:

…accurate and factual pictures on our national defense program.

Third, he contended, Senator Nye:

…is obviously seeking to divide the American people into discordant racial and religious groups, in order to disunite them over the United States foreign policy…

Mr. Willkie said that since radio was included in the realm of the proposed Nye-Clark inquiry:

The investigation and harassment of free expression in the United States is a procedure, once accepted, that may be applied to the theater, to newspapers and magazines and finally to the right of public officials and private citizens to speak freely. As American citizens, we protest this as vigorously as possible.

Mr. Willkie made these contentions in his letter to Senator Clark of Idaho.

  1. The administration has not asked it to produce films designed to influence the public mind in the direction of participation in the European war.

  2. The industry is opposed to Nazi dictatorship in Germany and abhors everything which Hitler represents.

  3. Everything has been done by the industry to present to the people truthful portrayals of the defense effort and there will be no change in this policy.

  4. The industry does not weigh its actions against its pocketbook in acting on international questions.

  5. Producers have no faith in the “unrealistic and false” thesis that America’s trade hopes lie in a world where Nazism survives.

  6. Of more than 1,100 feature pictures produced since the outbreak of war, only 50 have had anything to do with the issues involved or with ideological beliefs of the participants. Some of the 50 films, he added, do portray Nazism:

…for what it is – a cruel, lustful, ruthless and cynical force.

  1. The industry is not guided by subversive motives.

Mr. Willkie said he would seek to introduce his letter into the record.

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 12, 1941)

MOVIES AIDING PRO-WAR CAUSE, FLYNN CHARGES
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Isolation viewpoint suppressed, he tells Senate committee
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Washington, Sept. 12 (UP) –
John T. Flynn, economist and columnist, charged yesterday that the motion picture industry has “suppressed” the non-interventionist side of the national war debate and has created a “tremendous engine” of war propaganda.

Mr. Flynn, a member of the America First Committee, was the third isolationist witness to testify before a Senate subcommittee investigating alleged film propaganda. He said eight companies which control film production and distribution are lending their entire effort to the pro-war cause.

He said economic control of the industry bears a strong resemblance to a fascist setup and warned that if this country gets into war, a fascist form of government “which will take over” the cinema industry, may gain control.

Three films cited

Mr. Flynn’s vitriolic attack covered the industry in general and many Hollywood personalities in particular. He lashed out at Edward G. Robinson “who for a long time was champing at the bit to get going to war,” Alexander Korda, Charles Chaplin and others.

He assailed the “insidious” propaganda of films such as Disraeli, That Hamilton Woman and Underground, and said the influence is particularly dangerous because moviegoers are helpless against it.

He asked:

Why is it that no picture is produced depicting the tyrannies and oppressions in India where, at this moment, there are 20,000 Indian patriots in jail?

‘Maybe he wrote both’

He testified against a backdrop of continued bickering and sniping between Wendell L. Willkie, counsel for the industry, and non-interventionist Senators Gerald P. Nye (R-ND) and Bennett C. Clark (D-MO). Mr. Willkie subsequently commented that Mr. Flynn’s testimony:

…is merely a redraft of Senator Clark’s of Thursday, or perhaps John Flynn wrote both.

The committee adjourned the hearing late yesterday until Monday, when Jimmy Fidler and George Fisher, newspaper and radio commentators on motion pictures, will be heard.

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 14, 1941)

CHAPLIN SUBPOENAED IN WAR FILM PROBE

Washington, Sept. 12 (UP) –
The Senate subcommittee investigating alleged pro-war propaganda in motion pictures today subpoenaed Charles Chaplin, noted star whose picture The Great Dictator had been listed by sponsors of the inquiry as one of the films that the committee should consider.

Mr. Chaplin, who is a British subject although he has long lived in this country, was directed to appear before the committee on Oct. 6.

Also subpoenaed to appear that day were William R. Wilkerson, the publisher of The Hollywood Reporter, a movie trade paper, and Anatole Litvak, a director at the Warner Brothers Studios.

Jimmy Fidler and George Fisher, radio reviewers of motion pictures, were scheduled as witnesses for Monday when the hearings will resume.

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Parry

I DARE SAY —
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’Win with Willkie’ slogan now of the embattled movies
Hollywood picks him as choicest male star in fight against Senate isolationists
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By Florence Fisher Parry

The movies, the best picker of personalities on earth, inevitably would get Mr. Willkie! He is, to date, their choicest male star. His role is the most important role they have ever assigned.

It can well prove to be one of the most important he has ever elected to play. For it is that of Legal Representative at a Senate hearing, the outcome of which can affect our whole system of democracy, raising as it does the great subject of freedom of speech, freedom of opinion, and the right to engage in free enterprise.

Last Tuesday, there began an official Senate investigation into alleged “propaganda” in movies and radio to engender a war spirit in their audiences. The investigation was incited by Senator Gerald P. Nye, whose claims are that the motion picture producers have a financial stake in a British victory, and that this is influencing them to put propaganda into their product designed to get the United States into war.

Pictures like Flight Command, Escape, I Married a Nazi, That Hamilton Woman, Man Hunt, The Great Dictator, Sergeant York are specifically cited as pictures that would bear investigation.

Wendell Willkie was engaged by the motion picture industry to represent it at this absurd and unjust hearing.

Just how seriously (and ably) Mr. Willkie is defending the movies’ interests may be gathered from the following:

It appears that the “investigators” complained that, in contrast to movie practice, radio was required to allot to each side of opposing “parties” equal radio time; to which Mr. Willkie retorted that, if this practice were extended to the pictures, then was he to assume that for every anti-Nazi picture produced, the movies would be required to make a picture defending Hitler?

Mr. Willkie further brought out the fact that, of the 1,100 feature pictures produced since the outbreak of the war, only 50 have had anything to do with the issues involved.

Low comedy

Now I do not know whether or not Mr. Willkie ever before attended any Senate hearing which touched on the movies; I do not know, as a matter of fact, how much Mr. Willkie himself knows about movies in general and the attacked pictures in particular.

But I do know that he will never be the same again after he leaves that investigation! There is something about a Senate investigation of the movies that has in it all the elements of a Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera. Nothing in the realm of farce comedy could approach it for sheer inanity.

It was my good (or bad) fortune to attend two of the Senate hearings on the Neely Bill (block booking) before it went to the House and Senate. The Senators who sat in on the hearing were some of our most distinguished Senators. With all due respect to their profound knowledge on other subjects, I can attest here that what they knew about the movies you could put in a small 5¢ thimble.

I was never witness to such an exhibition of complete ignorance of an industry. One of the Senators gravely admitted that he hadn’t seen a movie for over five years. Not one of the four Senators had seen ONE of the many pictures mentioned during the week’s hearings. Their questions were questions which any 10-year-old movie fan could answer. Yet they were gravely met to pass on a critical question affecting profoundly the very existence of the fifth major industry in the world.

During the testimony of one of the most important (and deservedly so) men in the entire picture industry, the Senator whose bill bore his name sat with his nose buried in a large book before him, and never listened to one word of the carefully piled testimony. A shrill little minority of small independent exhibitors was allowed to appropriate most of the time. The hearing was a shocking farce, and I devoutly prayed at the time that it was not a fair example of the usual Senate hearing.

Smear campaign

Be all this as it may, the movies are again the victim of an organized smear campaign politically inspired and designed to heckle and impair the functioning of one of the most powerful instruments of public opinion on earth. There is not a fair-minded moviegoer in America whose voluntary testimony would not dismiss the whole charge against the producers.

I am one of many moviegoers who happen to have seen all of the major pictures under indictment; and it would be as unfair to accuse them of containing war propaganda as to accuse the news broadcasters on our radio or the news writers on our newspapers of being war propagandists, or our book publishers of being war propagandists.

Flight Command, Dive Bomber are factual informative pictures designed to acquaint the laymen with the technicalities of flying.

Escape is a picturization of a bestseller which touched only casually upon the war.

That Hamilton Woman is a love story made over from an old movie. The fact that it tells of the romance of Lord Nelson is “purely coincidental.”

The Great Dictator resolved our fearful and troubled hearts into good healthy laughter.

Sergeant York is not a war picture in essence. It gives far greater accent to sequences not in any way related to war. It does not even HINT of the present war. It is a story of one man’s heroism in the last war.

If these pictures are “war propaganda,” better close your studios, producers; close your printing presses, publishers; close your stations, broadcasters; and free speech and free opinion scurry for cover! The witch hunters are at large again!

Just why the movies are the scapegoat again is anybody’s puzzle. They are always the scapegoat. The motion picture industry has put forth one of the finest efforts of the past two years, on meeting the crisis of war. Cut off from normal distribution, threatened with strangulation, it went right on with “business as usual,” and risked the profits of a lifetime in order to keep the movie theaters going.

With a spirit of unexcelled cooperation, the studios have assisted the government in an educational program which, far from inspiring war hysteria, has done more than any other agent to calm the public by informing it what is happening; what is going into our defense program; what we are spending our money for, paying increased taxes for, sending out boys off to.

Shame, hecklers!

Last week, I saw one of the greatest of these defense pictures: Dive Bomber. Photographed in inspired technicolor, produced in cooperation with the U.S. Navy (which afforded Warner Brothers unparalleled opportunity to set down the true picture of aviation in defense times), this picture could serve as a magnificent example of the service which the movies are rendering in letting us see what’s going on here.

That this and other superb efforts of the motion picture industry could be sued against the producers is as shocking as it is unfair.

WHAT, pray, would Senator Nye and his cohorts wish the movie industry to do? IGNORE as movie material the most topical subject ever vouchsafed it?

WHY THE MOVIES? Would this same Senate group recommend that the radio desist from giving the war news? The publishers desist from accepting the manuscripts of any authors who might dare to use the war as a background for fiction or nonfiction? The newspapers from allowing war news to make even the inside pages of their publications?

I assert: NOT ONE OF THESE is less culpable than the motion picture industry is; not one is less deserving of attack or Senate inquiry.

Senator Nye accuses the industry of “desiring a British victory” because it has a “stake” in it?

In God’s name, WHO HAS NOT? If feeling that a British victory is necessary to secure democracy on this earth is subject to Senate investigation, then, Senator Nye, you’d better begin calling more to your Senate hearing than the motion picture producers!

Since when has it been a matter of investigation for the free people of America to express sympathy for the war effort of the Allies? To devoutly pray for a British victory? To assert the “stake” we feel we have in Great Britain’s survival? To deplore and fear a Nazi world conquest?

What would the Senator from North Dakota have our movies espouse? A Hitler victory? Or would he be content if we but arbitrated that the movies devote one half of their war “material” to celebrating the benign effects of Hitlerism upon a subjugated world?

One pro-British film and one pro-Nazi film, equal footage to both? Is that the proposal, Senator Nye?

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 15, 1941)

SERGEANT YORK ASSAILS NYE FOR ATTACK ON LIFE STORY

Milwaukee, Sept. 15 (UP) –
Sergeant Alvin C. York, hero of World War I, last night denounced critics of the motion picture depicting his life and declared that the common man in America is not an isolationist.

Referring to Senator Gerald P. Nye’s charge that the picture Sergeant York is war propaganda, Sergeant York said:

If the story of my life is propaganda, then also is this convention, because the simply story of my life revolves around the same great experience that yours does.

Must fight to hold them

Sergeant York spoke before a patriotic-religious meeting conducted by the American Legion, which is holding its 23rd national convention here.

Sergeant York said that American history is filled with stories of the nation’s fight to keep alive basic freedoms. Liberty and democracy, he said, are awarded only to people who fight to win them, and:

…fight eternally to hold them.

Sergeant York said:

If our lives are propaganda, then Senator Nye should start tearing up all the history books in the country.

The World War I hero said that he had followed testimony in the current Senate hearing on a proposed investigation of the movie industry as a monopoly and propaganda agency.

‘Throwing Christians to lions’

He said:

It seems to me that men like Harry Warner, Jesse Lasky and Louis B. Mayer are being persecuted not because they hate Hitler but because they are being unfair to him.

Of Senator Burton K. Wheeler, the Montana isolationist leader, Sergeant York said:

He used to be a common man but he has been in the big city too long.

He added that Mr. Wheeler:

…has forgotten the wishes of the people who elected him.

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In film inquiry –
‘PATRIOT SCARE’ MOVE CHARGED
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Senate prober cites act by movie agent
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By Louis J. Schaefle, United Press staff writer

Washington, Sept. 15 –
Chairman D. Worth Clark (D-ID) of the Senate committee investigating alleged propaganda in the movies, today made public a letter asserting that the federal government and asked for reports on the names of theaters refusing to show the picture, The Land of Liberty.

The Land of Liberty was described by its distributor, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, as an educational film comprising bits of famous historical movies made in the past 10 years and pieced together to present a connected review of American history.

Mr. Clark read into the record of today’s hearing a letter from Laurice Saffle. Seattle branch manager of Loew’s, Inc., to Fulton Cook, owner of the Bungalow Theater in St. Maries, Idaho. The letter was on the letterhead of MGM whose pictures are distributed by Loew’s.

Mr. Cook had protested the branch office manager’s attempt to “force” him to rum the picture.

Mr. Saffle wrote Mr. Cook:

I note your letter of May 10 and I notice that among other eliminations you ask that we take out Land of Liberty. I wonder if you realize just what this subject is and why we ask that you play it?

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer is distributing the picture, at its expense and putting it in place of one of our own features, on which we might show a profit.

Says U.S. wants names

We are going this at the request of the United States government, who feel that every man, woman and child uin America should see this subject during these times of national defense. In fact, they are so interested in the playing of the subject that we have been asked to wire immediately the names of those exhibitors who eliminate it. All rentals on the picture are turned over to the government.

In view of the above I am going to ask that you reconsider and try to find a date for this subject.

It was not indicated what branch of the government had made the alleged request for names of exhibitors who declined to show the picture.

U.S. aide denies request

Lowell Mellett, director of the Office of Government reports which handles government educational films, said that juis office had nothing to do with the production or distribution of The Land of Liberty and “most certainly” had not asked for the list of exhibitors who declined to show it.

Mr. Mellett said that the film was produced by the industry and was being distributed by MGM under sponsorship of the Motion Picture Operators and Producers of America.

Chairman Clark also charged that a “mass attack” on the committee by newspaper:

…smacks of conspiracy.

Fidler charges ‘censorship’

The first witness today was Jimmy Fidler, Hollywood radio commentator and columnist who testified that the movie industry has sought to censor his work.

Mr. Fidler related that CBS refused to let him “spank” George Brent over the air for permitting publication of an article giving his Sheridan.

CBS also refused to let him advise Laramie Day, starlet of the Dr. Kildare series, to stick to the series, at a time when she was seeking to get Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to give her biggest roles, Mr. Fidler testified.

Radio firm replies

He cited these examples of what he described as “censorship” ion which he claimed the movie industry cooperated with CBS and NBC, whose networks he had used.

Mr. Fidler said the Brent-Day incident occurred five week after he started a new series with Columbia this year, and that as a result he shifted over to MBS.

When Mr. Fidler mentioned the incident, a CBS statement was issued to reporters. It said:

Columbia was beset by legal difficulties and dangers so long as Jimmy Fidler was on the air because of Fidler’s desire to destroy values and reputations in order to build up a big audience to which he sponsor could advertise.

Columbia raps Fidler

In addition, he was actually trying, on a one-sided basis, to get over into the realm of controversy and Columbia does not sell time for the one-sided discussion of controversial issues; it give the time free in order to maintain fair discussion of all sides of such issues.

Columbia is responsible for what is aired over its network and has the right to maintain a certain character and to insist upon proper standards of what is broadcast into American homes. Columbia did not wish to profit by broadcasting scandal and gossip. Jimmy Fidler did want to profit that way.

Columbia is well satisfied that CBS and Fidler have parted company and does not believe that Fidler will succeed in deceiving the public with a false issue of free speech.

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 17, 1941)

FILM PROBE HIT BY ROOSEVELT
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Government pressure in industry denied
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Washington, Sept. 17 (UP) –
President Roosevelt said yesterday that neither he nor, to his knowledge, any of his subordinates in the government have brought pressure on the motion picture industry for production of propaganda films.

He made clear that he had little sympathy with the current investigation by a Senate subcommittee into alleged propaganda films. The subcommittee was told that a Loew’s Inc. official claimed federal officials were exceedingly desirous that the film The Land of Liberty be shown.

Mr. Roosevelt recommended top the reporters a cartoon published in The Washington Star. It depicted Charlie Chaplin – who is to testify later – with a Senate committee subpoena in his hand and commenting:

Now what could I possibly tell those past-masters about comedy?

Chaplin’s comedy The Great Dictator had been criticized before the committee as a propaganda picture.

The President then read this telegram which he said was sent to an unidentified Senator on Sept. 10:

Have just been reading book called Holy Bible. Has large circulation in this country. Written entirely by foreign-born, mostly Jews. First part full of warmongering propaganda. Second part condemns isolationism. That fake story about Samaritan dangerous. Should be added to your list and suppressed.

He implied that the telegram expresses approximately his attitude toward the inquiry.

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 24, 1941)

Senators find real issue –
FIDLER DENIES GOWN SOLD TO ALICE FAYE FELL APART

Washington, Sept. 24 (UP) –
Jimmy Fidler, Hollywood commentator, denied today that a gown which his wife’s dress shop told to Alice Faye fell apart the first time she wore it.

Fidler telegraphed Senator Ernest W. McFarland (D-AZ), member of the Senate interstate commerce subcommittee investigating “movie propaganda” that Miss Faye wore the gown to the premiere of her picture, Hollywood Cavalcade, and to a dinner immediately afterward and was “muich in evidence at both places.”

Besides, he added, the blonde Miss Faye didn’t pay for the gown until 40 years later.

The Alice Faye gown controversy entered its second day before the committee when Mr. McFarland opened the hearing by reading into the record Fidler’s telegram. The message was in reply to a charge made yesterday by Harry Brand, west coast advertising representative of 20th Century Fox, that the gown fell apart the first time Miss Faye wore it and caused her much humiliation and embarrassment.

Fidler’s message related how two years ago he and his wife considered Mr. and Mrs. Brand intimate friends. When Mrs. Fidler and Gladys Parker, New York dress designer, opened a gown ship, Fidler said, Brand himself conceived the idea of special gowns for the stars, the idea being to name the gowns according to screen roles.

Fidler quoted Brand as promising:

I’ll get you Alive Faye because her picture Hollywood Cavalcade will be premiered soon.

Fidler added:

The gown was widely photographed and both the shop and Miss Faye received much publicity. As for Brand’s unfair charge that it fell apart at the first wearing ancd caused Miss Faye much humiliation, that is not true…

Asks publicity for message

The shop informs me that Miss Faye did not pay her bill until 40 days later. She had ample time to report any faults or request any repairs or changes, if such were needed.

If such a thing as Brand describes happened why did Mrs. Brand, 60 days later, give a cocktail party for 50 of her personal friends to introduce Parker gowns?

He requested Senator McFarland to read the telegram into the record since Brand’s telegram yesterday had caused much publicity that could damage the Parker Gown Shop.

Down to ‘real issue’

Senator McFarland commented that apparently the investigating committee had finally got down to a “real issue.”

After the saga of the allegedly perishable garment was read into the record, the subcommittee resumed questioning Nicholas M. Schenck, president of Loew’s, Inc., the world;s most far-flung entertainment enterprise.

Mr. Schenck denied that the federal government attempted to “force” exhibitors to play The Land of Liberty, a film panorama of American history.

Complaint of pressure

He said Maurice Saffle, MGM branch manager at Seattle, had “no right” to inform an exhibitor in St. Maries, Idaho, that the government wanted the names of all exhibitors who declined to push the picture.

During the first week of hearings, the exhibitor sent letters to the subcommittee complaining that pressure was being exerted on him to show “propaganda” films, although they were money-losers.

Mr, Schenck said the film was “good” and “patriotic,” but added that the branch manager had no right to bring the federal government into discussion because it had nothing whatever to do with the film.

Profits derived from exhibition of Liberty, he pointed out, were donated to charities, with some of them going to “Bundles for Britain.”

Chairman D. Worth Clark (D-ID) read to Mr. Schenck from a monograph prepared by the temporary national economic committee a statement that the five major film producers control at least 25% of the first-run seating capacity of American theaters and virtually all on “key” or metropolitan areas.

Mr. Schenck said the movie industry sent $50,000 to Britain after the German blitz raids last year.

He testified that somebody had suggested that he discharge the Seattle manager.

Mr. Schenck testified:

I said:

Over my dead body.

Senator Tobey (R-NH) suggested:

He was just a little overzealous?

Mr. Schenck said:

That’s all.

Fidler charge denied

He denied that he had ever discussed the picture with any representative of the government, He talked only to Edward Flynn, the United States commissioner to the New York World’s Fair, he added.

Mr. Tobey asked the witness about Fidler’s testimony that representatives of the industry woithdraw advertising from the Los Angeles Times because of Fidler’s column.

Mr. Schenck said:

I never knew anything about it. I understand it is a local matter – a business matter. Never would I tolerate any of our men threatening any newspaper because they criticized our pictures.

He asked the committee rto question Howard Dietz, in charge of publicity for his company.

Guild denounces probe

When the hearing recessed for luncheon, Wendell L. Willkie, counsel for the movie producers, made public a telegram from Kenneth Thomson, executive secretary of the Screen Actors Guild, telling of the adoption of a resolution condemning the:

…actions of the subcommittee as an immediate threat to free thought, free speech, and to the very fundamental of liberty upon which our great nation was founded.

It also demanded that the inquiry be stopped.

The resolution charged that the subcommittee had:

…quickly indicated that it desired to breed religious and racial discord in our nation.

…and sought to:

…destroy the unit of the vast majority of the American people who support the foreign policy of the nation.

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Well, look at how the Nazis were treating Hollywood. The Nazis were certainly clamoring for war with Hollywood. An interesting observation would be to see if Hollywood was making pro-War, anti-Nazi films before Operation Barbarossa. The Communist Party urged all Communists to promote anti-War attitudes and avoid opposition to Nazi Germany prior to Operation Barbarossa. In fact, my old Biology teacher, Joe Doggett, published his review of Johnny Got His Gun by Trumbo with this in mind(http://brothersjudd.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/reviews.detail/book_id/282/Johnny%20Got%20H.htm). Had Hollywood been motivated by the Communists at this time, it would not have been making pro-War, anti-Nazi movies prior to Barbarossa.

When I think of Hollywood back then and see Hollywood today, I admit that I become depressed to see how the mighty have fallen.

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The Pittsburgh Press (September 26, 1941)

MOVIE PROBERS CHALLENGED BY MEMBER TO TEST THEIR AUTHORITY ON SENATE FLOOR
…
Zanuck denied government influences production of films
…
Washington, Sept. 26 (UP) –
Senator Ernest W. McFarland (D-AZ), the only pro-administration member of the Senate subcommittee investigating the movies, today accused fellow committee members of seeking to create prejudice against the British and challenged them to test their investigating authority before the Senate.

Mr. McFarland shouted:

I venture to say that on the Senate floor you won’t get 18 votes!

…as the crowd in the huge Senate caucus room applauded.

The current inquiry into charges that the movies have engaged in war-inciting propaganda and monopolistic practices is being conducted by a subcommittee of the Senate Interstate Commerce Committee to determine technically whether a formal inquiry should be recommended to the Senate.

‘Will ask for Dies probe’

Mr. McFarland said:

Talk about Hitler creating prejudice. I am going to ask the Dies Committee to investigate who is giving this information to Senator Nye about government control of the movies.

Senator Gerald P. Nye (R-ND) is the co-author of the investigation resolution.

After Mr. McFarland’s outburst, Chairman D. Worth Clark (D-IA) said:

Thank you, Senator. I notice people never holler unless they’re badly hurt.

Mr. McFarland said:

You’re the one who is going to be hurt before this is over.

The exchange came when Mr. McFarland asked Senator Charles W. Tobey (R-NH) to reveal the “authoritative sources” from which he said yesterday he received information that the British Supply Council in Washington had refused to employ persons of Irish, German or Jewish descent.

Policy denied by British

Mr. Tobey said:

I’ll bring the witnesses here this afternoon.

Mr. McFarland said:

I consider that that creates more race prejudice than any picture that could be put on the screen.

He said the British denied to him ever following such a policy.

Darryl F. Zanuck, native of Wahoo, Neb., who became “boy wonder” of the movie industry as vice president in charge of production at 20th Century Fox, was the first witness today. He denied Hollywood had been asked by the government to make propaganda pictures that would arouse a war spirit in America.

Cites gangster pictures

Expressing the hope that Senator Nye would find “no cause for suspicion” in his Midwest Methodist Church background, Mr. Zanuck said:

I wish our country would never have to fight another war. I want this country to go to war only if that is an absolute necessity either to defend ourselves now or to prevent a future attack.

He continued:

The daily newspaper has always furnished me and my associates ideas for motion pictures. I made the first gangster pictures which helped uncover the rottenness of the underworld in our various cities.

I suppose the underworld thought those pictures were unfair propaganda against the gangster, just as some now feel our war pictures are unfair propaganda against Hitler.

‘Absolute falsehood’

The inquiry was thrown into a momentary uproar yesterday when Wendell L. Willkie, counsel for the industry, angrily accused Senator Clark of telling an “absolute falsehood.”

The 1940 Republican presidential candidate made the charge after Mr. Clark had branded as “campaign oratory” Mr. Willkie’s promises during his race for the White House that he would do all in his power to help keep the United States out of war.

Mr. Willkie shouted:

When you say that you speak an absolute falsehood, you’ve made statements over this country that never were said, that bear no semblance to the facts.

Mr. Clark replied calmly that the record would bear out his contention.

The exchange occurred while Harry Warner, head of Warner Bros. one of the largest producers in Hollywood, was on the witness stand.

He had defended the right of the industry to produce realistic pictures of Nazi terrorism based on facts; denied that the so-called “propaganda” films were produced at the behest of the government; said his company had cooperated with the government on national defense and would continue to do so; denied the industry consulted on “propaganda” films, and admitted that two years ago he closed theaters controlled by his organization to newsreels containing German propaganda.

Book sales cited

In a statement issued today, Mr. Willkie charged that the Senate inquiry is an attempt:

…to suggest to the American people what they should read and see.

He said the book-reading public has demonstrated with its dollars that it prefers pro-British and anti-German literature just as movie-going audiences have shown their preference for similar type films.

Mr. Willkie said at least 36 of the “bestseller” books of the past two years might be termed anti-Nazi or pro-British – books such as William Shirer’s Berlin Diary, Douglas Miller’s You Can’t Do Business With Hitler and Winston Churchill’s Blood, Sweat and Tears.

On the other hand, he said, only four could be termed sympathetic toward Nazism, including Mein Kampf by the “unspeakable Adolf Hitler,” Anne Lindbergh’s Wave of the Future, Gottfried Leske’s I Was a Nazi Flier and René de Chambrun’s I Saw France Fall.

Publisher testifies

The committee called James G. Stahlman, publisher of the Nashville Banner, to testify about an alleged attempt of advertising representatives of Loew’s Inc. to censor Jimmy Fidler’s movie column. Senator Clark read a letter that Mr. Stahlman, who then was president of the American Newspaper Publishers Association, wrote to Will H. Hays, motion picture industry chief, in Sept. 1938.

The letter asserted that W. A. Crull, local manager of Loew’s Vendome Theater in Nashville, requested the paper to “censor” Mr. Fidler’s column because it had given unfavorable publicity to Marie Antoinette, a picture starring Norma Shearer.

Advertising threat aired

At the conclusion of the conference with Mr. Crull, the letter continued, Mr. Stahlman was asked when Mr. Fidler’s column expired. The publisher asserted that the column “wouldn’t be canceled.”

The letter said the conference was followed by a request from the theater’s advertising agency that the advertising for Marie Antoinette be withdrawn from the Banner. A postscript added that the advertising was reinserted, however.

Mr. Clark asked whether any other newspapers had received similar “threats.” Mr. Stahlman produced a letter by Robert B. McNitt, editor of McNaught Syndicate, which handles the Fidler column.

The letter asserted that Howard Dietz, MGM advertising manager, had called the McNaught Syndicate and discussed the Fidler column.

Executive denied charge

Mr. Dietz, according to the letter, was “greatly incensed about the Fidler column” and proposed to take:

…whatever steps were necessary to stop Fidler from talking, as he did, about MGM, its artists and its pictures.

Mr. Dietz issued a statement to the press while Mr. Stahlman was testifying. It said:

It’s a tempest in a teapot, a mountain out of a molehill, or choose your own cliché. I never wrote to the Banner. MGM never withdrew advertising. The postscript in Mr. Stahlman’s letter bears out what I say. His complaint died aborning before his letter was even mailed. MGM stands shoulder to shoulder with Mr. Stahlman fighting for the freedom of the press. And let’s have freedom of the screen too.

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MR. NYE’S NEW LOGIC

Accustomed as we are to eccentricities and inconsistencies on the part of public men, we are nonetheless flabbergasted by Senator Nye.

Some days ago, Mr. Nye made certain remarks about the movie industry which appeared to us, and to others, to be a calculated attempt to incite antisemitic feeling against Hollywood. Along with Colonel Lindbergh, who made a blanket indictment of the Jews as warmongers, he was quickly showered with criticism. Among those who denounced the invidious references to the Jews was Wendell Willkie.

Now comes Mr. Nye, neither bloody nor bowed, but full of pious indignation. It is Mr. Willkie, he says, who is guilty of raising the racial issue!

Here is something new in dialectics. Under the Nye formula, not he who utters a slander but he who challenges the slanderer is the culprit. It is a conception that has the merit of originality, but it could hardly be said to make sense.

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The Pittsburgh Press (October 24, 1941)

‘Jukebox’ movies clean, producer tells Wheeler

Chicago, Oct. 24 (UP) –
The Soundies Distributing Corp. of America today denied a recent charge by Senator Burton K. Wheeler (D-MT) that the “jukebox” movies which it makes are “lewd and lascivious.”

Gordon Mills, the president of the company, sent a telegram to Mr. Wheeler challenging him to present the source of information on which his indictment of the miniature films are made.

The telegram said:

We do not believe you could possibly make the statement if you knew the facts.

The telegram asked Mr. Wheeler and a Senate subcommittee investigating alleged propaganda in the motion picture industry:

…to see each and every picture that we have released for use in these machines.

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