Acting Up

Discuss this on our boards!

Acting Up
by James Hall, Senior Associate Editor

March 10, 2003

"Leaning Left"

James Hall If it's not Hollywood actors disagreeing with the president these days, then it's the world's democracies. First it was Germany and France. Now it's Turkey that's throwing a monkey wrench into the US war effort. Turkish parliamentarians said they were obliged to vote against the opening of bases to the US by 90% public opposition to the war with Iraq. Drat these foreign democracies anyway - how dare they exercise their freedom to oppose our will? Give us a good dictatorship or absolute monarchy to work with instead, like Saudi Arabia.

It appears that President Bush's big mistake was not clearly articulating the need for collective action against Iraq to Europe and other places. The real problem with telling everyone you'll act alone if you have to is that they might take you at your word, and let you act alone. Now the president is a cowboy riding into danger without his posse.

But forget foreign democracies. You've never heard so much howling from the Right as when Susan Sarandon led an anti-war rally in New York recently or when Sean Penn jetted to Bagdad to see Iraqi children in hospitals. Or heard scoffing when anti-war actor Mike Farrell argued articulately for a slowing down of the Bush administration's rush to war.

Actors aren't qualified to have political opinions or lead dissent, they tell us. Hollywood is irrelevant to the nation's political drama..

But there's a serious disconnect between what the Right preaches and what it practices. Where was conservative outrage when an actor named Ronald Reagan had the gall not only to express his political opinions but also to run for office? Where was the contempt when another actor-Charleton Heston---raised a musket and in a voice sculpted by stage and screen, dramatically projected "…out of my cold, dead hands!"

It seems that the Right is never so angry with Hollywood as when someone in it expresses a liberal opinion. But let conservative actors like Mel Gibson and Arnold Schwarzenegger express conservative values in public or act in movies with conservative values. Then they purr like kittens.

There was a time when Hollywood strictly served the government's interest, turning out film after patriotic film during World War II. Actors like John Wayne and Ronald Reagan turned out these films, while other actors like Jimmy Stewart volunteered for active service. None of this, of course, stopped Washington from going after Hollywood during the McCarthy era, when it became fashionable to attack producers, writers, and actors and blacklist those who were too liberal, even socialist, in their political persuasions.

During Vietnam, Hollywood returned the favor, joining numerous other Americans in protesting the war and in particular the way it was fought. Though even then Hollywood could speak with a disparate voice, and a conservative star like John Wayne could film a pro-government version of the war like "Green Berets." But conservatives continued to decry movies like "Apocalypse Now" for their liberal flavor.

Well, the pendulum has swung and once again patriotic movies like "Black Hawk Down," "The Patriot," and "We Were Soldiers" all demonstrate that the Right has a voice in Hollywood at least as large as the Left. Still, it appears that right-wing desires for a blacklist may be back. Liberal actor Martin Sheen says that NBC executives have expressed concern about his anti-war statements, and Sean Penn is suing a Hollywood producer who dropped him from a $10 million dollar role after his trip to Bagdad. The Screen Actors Guild <www.sag.org> has just released a statement defending a right that supposedly belongs to every American---the right of actors to speak their minds.

We ought to have the freedom to speak out as we like, on what we believe, whether we're Ronald Reagan or Martin Sheen, Charlton Heston or Mike Farrell, Mel Gibson or Sean Penn. Any attempt to short-circuit freedom and stop free speech diminishes us all and makes us just a bit more like those whom we oppose. ***

James Hall
Orlando, FL USA

Photo of the author courtesy of staff files