Dalton Trumbo, Spartacus, and the Hollywood Blacklist

Introduction

By the 1950s, America had moved on from the turmoil of World War II and was enjoying a period of peace and prosperity. The Cold War was a looming threat that would escalate fiercely in the 1960s, but in the 1950s Americans were generally content to enjoy themselves. Still, the specter of Communism loomed and had been perceived as an encroaching problem in Hollywood since the 1930s. Following World War II, Senator Joe McCarthy began his crusade to raise awareness about this threat by flaunting a list of Communists he claimed were secretly hiding within the American government. As fear grew that the Soviets had infiltrated American society, the list expanded to include individuals in other spheres—including Hollywood, where writers suspected of propagating Communist ideology and subtly inserting it into American films came under intense scrutiny.

The Hollywood Blacklist actually began in the latter half of the 1940s, but it reached its height in the early 1950s. It represented a period of roughly a decade in which writers accused of Communist sympathies were barred from working in Hollywood, though some still managed to write under pseudonyms. This essay examines how the Blacklist formed; how it led to the stigmatization of Dalton Trumbo; how it inspired him to write the film Spartacus, which would go on to star Kirk Douglas and be directed by Stanley Kubrick; and how the film served as a contemporaneous critique of McCarthyism and the Blacklist, ultimately helping to weaken the crusade against Communism in Hollywood.

The Communist Party and the Blacklist

The United States had been allied with the Soviets in World War II—but once the war was over, American politicians began rethinking that relationship. The Communist Party became a target, though the perceived threat of the Party within the United States did not necessarily reflect reality. For FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, who sought total control over American intelligence, labeling people as Communist was a means of exerting power over them. Joseph McCarthy was politically useful to Hoover because he fueled the idea of a Red Menace.

In the first half of the twentieth century in the United States, Communists were essentially activists who supported labor unions and the working class.² The idea that these same people were plotting the overthrow of the American government and the undermining of American ideals was greatly exaggerated.³ McCarthy and Hoover made it seem as though anyone could be a Communist, and films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) illustrated how effectively that fear played on the public imagination. In reality, the Communist Party was not particularly popular, had high membership turnover, and few Americans had ever met a member.⁴

McCarthy helped fuel the paranoia of the era, frequently appearing on television to frighten Americans. He needed something to generate interest in his reelection campaign, and so he turned to the Red Menace.⁵ The Hollywood Hearings—in which Hollywood writers were charged with Communist subversion—were a way for McCarthy to drum up support for his crusade and thus for his political future.⁶

A witch hunt ensued in which people were summoned to testify before Congress and pressured to name names. Hundreds lost their jobs because they were "suspected" of being Communists or Communist sympathizers.⁷ In reality, most Communists and sympathizers were simply reacting to the hardships of the Great Depression and advocating for social improvements and worker protections. Millions had suffered in the aftermath of the Wall Street Crash of 1929.⁸

The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) had been searching for Communists in Hollywood since the 1930s.⁹ Anti-Communists believed Hollywood was embedding Communist propaganda in its films. Hoover himself believed Hollywood was being used by Communists as "one of the greatest propaganda machines the world has ever seen."¹⁰ Hollywood thus became a natural target during McCarthyism, and the Blacklist was the mechanism used to suppress the spread of alleged Communist propaganda in film. Dalton Trumbo was among those placed on that list—and being on it impacted his life enormously.

Financial Impact of the Blacklist on Trumbo

HUAC created the Blacklist and brought infamy to the Hollywood Ten, one of whom was Trumbo. In 1947, his position as a screenwriter at MGM was threatened when he refused to testify before Congress about whether he was a Communist—even though he stated privately that he was not.¹¹ Trumbo owned a ranch, but to meet his bills—totaling $27,000—he needed to continue his screenwriting career.¹² That career was now in jeopardy. He refused to cooperate with HUAC in the manner it demanded because he viewed HUAC as, ironically, un-American in its witch-hunt approach. Eric Johnston, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, asserted that Trumbo would not be employed as long as he held beliefs aligned with the Communist agenda.¹³ Trumbo was suspended from MGM for being a Communist, and his financial hardship worsened as he became stigmatized in the eyes of the American public: he could no longer obtain legitimate writing work anywhere, as his name was effectively ruined and his reputation destroyed.¹⁴

Trumbo was sent to prison in 1950 for refusing to name names before HUAC. He was deeply grieved by this outcome and felt a profound melancholy about being made into a pariah for taking a principled stand.¹⁵ Following his imprisonment, he still needed to earn a living, but to do so he had to use pseudonyms so that his real name would not be attached to his writing, as "the necessity of secrecy had increased as a result of the hearings."¹⁶ Facing the prospect of financial ruin, Trumbo considered relocating to Mexico. However, even when he did leave the country his financial situation did not improve—it worsened. In Mexico he earned only $15,000 a year while spending more than $20,000 on back taxes, medical bills, educational expenses, and support for friends and family.¹⁷ At that point, Trumbo turned to selling his scripts on the black market.¹⁸

Conclusion

The era of McCarthyism was a time when hostility toward Communism was at its peak, and political leaders like Hoover and Thomas sought to gain or consolidate power by attacking a weaker organization. The Communist Party in America was deemed a target, and HUAC identified Communist writers in Hollywood as enemies of the people. The committee hauled individuals in to testify and to name names. Dalton Trumbo was one who refused—he felt his principles were at stake and that yielding would allow HUAC to tighten its grip on American life and undermine the very ideal of freedom. Trumbo suffered the full consequences of that refusal: he was blacklisted in Hollywood, imprisoned, and financially devastated. The Hollywood Blacklist rendered its targets unemployable. Trumbo was hit hard—both financially and professionally.

After prison and a difficult period in Mexico, however, he returned to Los Angeles determined to defeat the Blacklist. By writing excellent scripts and selling them on the black market, he earned the respect of producers and peers. With Spartacus, he announced his return in unmistakable terms—his name credited at the end of a film that American audiences embraced. The allegorical power of the film, its critique of political persecution, and the bold public act of claiming authorship combined to erode the Blacklist's authority. Trumbo's story stands as a testament to the power of artistic excellence as a form of political resistance.

Bibliography

Ceplair, Larry and Christopher Trumbo. Dalton Trumbo: Blacklisted Hollywood Radical. Lexington: The University Press of Kentucky, 2015.

Griffith, Robert. McCarthyism: The Politics of Fear: Joseph R. McCarthy and the Senate. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1987.

Krutnik, Frank. "Un-American" Hollywood: Politics and Film in the Blacklist Era. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 2007.

McGilligan, Patrick and Paul Buhle. Tender Comrades: A Backstory of the Hollywood Blacklist. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2012.

Schrecker, Ellen. The Age of McCarthyism: A Brief History with Documents. Boston: St. Martin's Press, 1994.

Schrecker, Ellen. Many Are the Crimes: McCarthyism in America. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1998.

Smith, Jeff. Film Criticism, the Cold War, and the Blacklist: Reading the Hollywood Reds. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014.