Dalton Trumbo Hollywood Rebel

As a screenwriter, novelist, and political activist, Dalton Trumbo stands among the key American literary figures of the 20th century—he wrote the classic antiwar novel Johnny Got His Gun, and his credits for Spartacus and Exodus broke the anticommunist blacklist that infected the movie industry for more than a decade. By defining connections between Trumbo’s most highly acclaimed films (including Kitty Foyle, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, and Roman Holiday) and his important but lesser-known movies (The Remarkable Andrew, He Ran All the Way, and The Boss), the author identifies how for nearly four decades Trumbo used the archetype of the rebel hero to inject social consciousness into mainstream films. This new critical survey—the first book-length work on Trumbo’s screenwriting career—examines the scores of films on which Trumbo worked and explores the techniques that made him, at the time he was blacklisted in 1947, Hollywood's highest-paid writer. Hanson reveals how Trumbo dealt with major themes including rebellion, radical politics, and individualism—while also detailing lesser-known areas of Trumbo’s screenwriting, such as his troubling portrayal of women, the dichotomy between his proletarian attitude and bourgeois lifestyle, and the almost surreptitious manner in which he included antiestablishment rhetoric in seemingly innocuous scripts. An extensive filmography is included.

James Dalton Trumbo (1905--1976) is widely recognized for his work as a screenwriter, playwright, and author, but he is also remembered as one of the Hollywood Ten who opposed the House Un-American Activities Committee. Refusing to answer questions about his prior involvement with the Communist Party, Trumbo sacrificed a successful career in Hollywood to stand up for his rights and defend political freedom. In Dalton Trumbo, authors Larry Ceplair and Christopher Trumbo present their extensive research on the famed writer, detailing his work, his membership in the Communist Party, his long campaign against censorship during the domestic cold war, his ten-month prison sentence for contempt of Congress, and his thirteen-year struggle to break the blacklist. The blacklist ended for Trumbo in 1960, when he received screen credits for Exodus and Spartacus. Just before his death, he received a long-delayed Academy Award for The Brave One, and in 1993, he was posthumously given an Academy Award for Roman Holiday (1953). This comprehensive biography provides insights into the many notable people with whom Trumbo worked, including Stanley Kubrick, Otto Preminger, and Kirk Douglas, and offers a fascinating look at the life of one of Hollywood's most prominent screenwriters and his battle against persecution.

This illustrated filmography analyzes the plots and players of the more than forty motion pictures about the legendary Missouri outlaw Jesse James (1847-1882), from the silent era to the 21st century. Among the films and actors covered are Jesse James (1939) with Tyrone Power, Kansas Raiders (1950) with Audie Murphy, The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid (1972) with Robert Duvall, and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007) with Brad Pitt. Each evaluation compares Hollywood's version of history to the hard facts. A brief biography of the outlaw provides an overview of his life and career. Also examined are European films, made-for-television movies and continuing TV series that have featured episodes involving Jesse James.

The Oscar-winning screenwriter who broke the Hollywood blacklist. Soon to be a major motion picture starring BRYAN CRANSTON (Breaking Bad), DIANE LANE (Under The Tuscan Sun), ELLE FANNING (Maleficent), JOHN GOODMAN (Argo), LOUIS C.K. (Louie) and Academy Award winner HELEN MIRREN. Dalton Trumbo was the central figure of the infamous 'Hollywood Ten,' the screenwriters who, during the McCarthy era, were charged by the House Committee on Un-American Acitivities for their associations with the Communist Party. Due to their refusal to cooperate during the investigation, Trumbo and his fellow screenwriters were declared in contempt of Congress and were ultimately blacklisted from Hollywood and some were even jailed. Although Trumbo was one of several hundred writers, directors, producers, and actors who were deprived of the opportunity to work in the motion picture industry from 1947 to 1960, he won an Oscar under the pseudonym Robert Rich for The Brave One in 1956, and he was the first to see his name on the big screen again in 1960 with Exodus, one of the year's biggest movies. All his life Trumbo was a radical of the homegrown, independent variety. From his early days in Colorado, where his grandfather was a county sheriff, to his time in Los Angeles, where he organized a bakery strike and was even a bootlegger, to his time as an author when he wrote the powerful pacifist novel Johnny Got His Gun, to his heyday as a top-paid (and frequently broke) Hollywood screenwriter-where his credits include Roman Holiday, Spartacus, Papillon, Lonely Are the Brave, Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, The Brave One, and Kitty Foyle-his life rivaled anything he had created. Written with Dalton Trumbo's full cooperation, at a moment when he himself did not know how much time he had left, Trumbo is a candid tale of a colorful figure who was at the epicenter of a tumultuous period in recent American history.

Dalton Trumbo was the highest paid screenwriter in Hollywood when he was investigated as a Communist during America's Red Scare of the 1940s. He was ultimately sent to jail and placed on an industry blacklist that would make him unhirable. His exile lasted 13 years during which time he was forced to write screenplays under assumed names. While on the Hollywood blacklist Trumbo's writing won two Academy Awards, Oscars the public would never know about. This book tells the incredible, and often forgotten, life of Dalton Trumbo.

The first book-length survey of cinema's vital role in the Cold War cultural combat between the U.S. and the USSR. Focuses on 10 films--five American and five Soviet, both iconic and lesser-known works--showing that cinema provided a crucial outlet for the global "debate" between democratic and communist ideologies.

The Searing Portrayal Of War That Has Stunned And Galvanized Generations Of Readers An immediate bestseller upon its original publication in 1939, Dalton Trumbo?s stark, profoundly troubling masterpiece about the horrors of World War I brilliantly crystallized the uncompromising brutality of war and became the most influential protest novel of the Vietnam era. Johnny Got His Gun is an undisputed classic of antiwar literature that?s as timely as ever. ?A terrifying book, of an extraordinary emotional intensity.?--The Washington Post "Powerful. . . an eye-opener." --Michael Moore "Mr. Trumbo sets this story down almost without pause or punctuation and with a fury amounting to eloquence."--The New York Times "A book that can never be forgotten by anyone who reads it."--Saturday Review

The true story that inspired the major motion picture starring Bryan Cranston and Helen Mirren. Dalton Trumbo was the central figure in the "Hollywood Ten," the blacklisted and jailed screenwriters. One of several hundred writers, directors, producers, and actors who were deprived of the opportunity to work in the motion picture industry from 1947 to 1960, he was the first to see his name on the screen again. When that happened, it was Exodus, one of the year's biggest movies. This intriguing biography shows that all his life Trumbo was a radical of the homegrown, independent variety. From his early days in Colorado, where his grandfather was a county sheriff, to Los Angeles, where he organized a bakery strike, to bootlegging, to Hollywood, where he was the highest-paid screenwriter when he was blacklisted (and a man with constant money problems), his life rivaled anything he had written.