If one could transform Hollywood and politics into two material objects and place them next to each other, the odds are that something bewildering may happen. One would inspect Hollywood, then politics, and move back to Hollywood once more without being able to distinguish the two from one another. In both, one would observe attractive people reading from scripts, lacking individual thoughts, and cashing in morality for fame. Making such sweeping stereotypical statements about these two concepts may seem unfair, and of course, not all the individuals working in Hollywood are bad, and not all politicians are corrupt. But what is Hollywood, if not dramatic? And what is modern cinema, if not an unrequited yearning to return to the Golden Age of Hollywood? Various factors came together to produce this Golden Age, but Smash Mouth had it wrong when they exclaimed all that glitters is gold.
October 1929 was a rather depressing time to be living in America. The bricks that made up Wall Street came crumbling down, crash landing on the American economy. In fact, living in America, and most other regions worldwide, became so awful that people thought it only fitting to give it a name. The Americans did not want to seem dramatic, so they settled for “The Great Depression”. At the height of this calmly named era, roughly one-quarter of Americans could not find a job. One would assume that luxuries such as treating the family to a film in the cinema would be a thing of the past, or at least a rarity, during such trying times. But one would be wrong. During the 1920s and ‘30s, major studios released more films than any other decade, averaging 800 a year, roughly 300 more than the annual average of today. In a sense, it was the Great Depression that gave rise to the Golden Age of Hollywood, with an estimate of 80 million Americans losing themselves in the big screen each week.
This cinematic anomaly may present itself as incredibly contradictory at first. How is it that during a time of poverty, a triviality such as moving pictures on a screen could sustain itself and flourish? Only when one looks through such a contradiction, examining the foundations that lie thereunder, does it begin to make sense. The early 1920s saw great strides in cinema, with individuals viewing it literally from a whole new perspective. It was in 1922 that colour introduced itself to the screen through the use of the beam-splitting camera. During filming, the light that entered the camera would be split into different wavelengths. Half of these gnarly waves would continue straight while the others took a 90-degree turn-off.This split produced two film negatives, chemically treated, dyed red or blue, and glued together. This handy invention became an overnight sensation as individuals lined up to watch all the moving colours on the screen.
Five years later, Warner Brothers released The Jazz Singer, the first film to include sound and dialogue. With colour and sound, film was the closest thing to reality after, well, reality. During this awful time, it is safe to assume that many individuals were searching for a way to temporarily forget about their doubts. Quickly, cinema became a means of escapism. With illusions of reality far greater than one’s own, it was almost predictable that one would long to fade into fantasy. The cost of becoming lost made this all blend together with seamless ease. At the time, going to the movies was cheap entertainment. One could receive four hours worth of cinema magic for the price of a pack of cigarettes.
At the height of the Golden Age of Hollywood, five kings ruled the land, dominating film, production, and exhibition until 1948. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the largest studio during the 1930s, was the ruler of big-budget musicals, comedies, melodramas and literary adaptations. One will see this name attached to classics such as The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind. The second king, Paramount Pictures, was known as the most ‘European’ studio due to its habit of luring filmmakers from Germany and the United Kingdom into its palace. The third king, Warner Brothers, prided themselves in creating films for the working class, turning out low-budget gangster movies, musicals and melodramas. The fourth king, 20th Century Fox, made its name through its noble knight and chief director John Ford, who won back-to-back Best Director Oscars for The Grapes of Wrath and How Green Was My Valley. The final king, RKO, enjoyed living in jest and became the home of comedies and musicals like Citizen Cane. These five kings ruled side by side, or more technically, through vertical integration. However, powerful kings are often blinded by greed, and film studios are no different.
These major studios introduced a process known as block booking, which entails studios forcing movie theatres to buy licences for multiple films in one go. The Federal Trade Commission shook their heads vigorously to this practice that the United States Department of Justice sued these major studios in 1938. The case was settled in 1940, but the government, still suspicious of these studios, laid down three mandatory rules. Studios could no longer block-book short films with feature films, nor could they block-book more than five films at a time. Along with this came a complete ban on blind buying, allowing theatres to view a movie before deciding if they wanted to book it. The rules were simple: as long as the major studios followed these rules, the government would not resume prosecution. But alas, kings will be kings, and in 1945, the case was reopened. In United States v Paramount Pictures, the kingdom ended as the major studios were found to be in violation of Antitrust laws. By owning the production studios and movie theatres, these studios exercised an unfair monopoly on moviegoers’ escapism. The studios were forced to part ways, break up their businesses, sell their theatres, and focus on production and distribution.
While this breakup may be viewed as one of the crucial events that led to the fall of the Golden Age, not everyone was choked up about it. During the early 1920s, these studios began feeling the weight of public and political pressure to create moral standards for motion pictures. This pressure came with a fear that the government would interfere with their precious dream world after Mutual Film Corporation v Industrial Commission of Ohio. It was held that the First Constitutional Amendment, the right to freedom of speech, did not apply to motion pictures. Studios began to fear the looming possibility of censorship bills and, in an attempt to stay ahead, chose to self-regulate the industry.
In 1927, a code of standards was published, prohibiting 11 topics from appearing on the big screen and placing serious caution tape on 25 more, one of these being interracial romance. This is a small glimpse into the Golden Age of Hollywood which suggests that if one spent enough time picking at this surface, the gold paint would fall away and reveal a lump of coal. However, during the Depression, film studios ignored these unenforceable codes because sex, violence and hedonism sold. This became too much for the powers that be, and in 1934 the Motion Picture Production Code Administration was born. This required all films released after 1 July 1934, to obtain a certificate of approval from the administration before release. From this date until 1948, true censorship was placed on the back of every studio.
If one was a white male, the Golden Ages were truly golden. But if one was a woman, it was physically out of reach. During the era of silent films, women were active in writing and worked as scenarists. However, with the arrival of sound in 1927, nearly all female Hollywood writers vanished. Some claimed that this disappearance was due to a lack of writing skills, arguing that women were simply unable to master the art of the screenplay. A truer version of this tale is that male industry workers were unwilling to partner with females during filmmaking. From 1910 to 1920, females comprised roughly 40% of the cast, 20% of writers, 12% of producers, and 5% of directors. By the 1930s, female acting roles were cut in half, and female producers and directors were close to zero, with Dorothy Arzner being the only remaining female director in the United States. This phenomenon, this evaporation of the female influence, occurred predominantly due to the snap of five fingers. With the monopolisation held in the palm of the major studios, the control of who was involved in the industry fell under a small group of men. Male producers hired male directors and male writers. The bromance was intense.
While women disappeared from the film industry, the case was slightly different for any race that was not white because, you guessed it, they were never truly there. While blackface was mostly eliminated from movies by the end of the 1930s, it regularly appeared in cartoons. Similarly, when it came to portraying individuals of Asian descent, it was decided that the best people to cast were not those of Asian descent. The best people for the job were white actors with their faces painted yellow, tape strapped to their eyes, with glasses and false buck teeth. A tragic example is the personal favourite, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, as Mickey Rooney ticked all these discriminatory boxes with his character Mr Yunioshi. The lack of equal opportunity casting often forced Black actors into stereotypical and limiting roles: the maid, the comic relief, the uncredited one-liner. With all the odds against these actors, it is incredible to recognise how so many still shined. Etta Moten Barnett’s 1933 performance of “My Forgotten Man” in Gold Diggers led to former president Franklin D Roosevelt requesting she perform for his birthday. This performance made her the first African American to perform in the White House during the 20th century. In 1940, Hattie McDaniel became the first African American woman to win the Best Supporting Actress Academy Award for her performance in Gone with the Wind. Last, but not least, is Sidney Poitier, who, in 1964, became the first African American male to win the Best Actor Academy Award for Lilies of the Field.
The Golden Age of Hollywood marks a time of cinematic revolution. The introduction of colour and sound occurred at the perfect moment, when society craved to escape to another reality. It seems that those in Hollywood who longingly speak of that golden time that once was are actually referring to a nostalgic façade that clouds the reality of the past. One cannot be blamed for looking back at the past, escaping from current reality in a manner identical to before. But to long for something, one must know it truly and embrace all the darkness consuming the light.
