Was Booing Elias Kazan Justifiable At The Oscars?

[Reigh Kaufman]

Okay, most of you who know me from my posts will know that I seldom get involved in an argument in any serious way, preferring, as I do, to share the love with my fellow Schmoes...However, on another forum (best/worst/favourites/etc) under the '
Favourite Ed Harris performances'topic I stated, rather too passionately, that I would not piss on Ed Harris if his nostrils and backs of his knees were on fire. The response, something that has been gestating inside me for three years, was due to Ed Harris booing and refusing to stand up when Elias Kazan came out to achieve his lifetime achievement award. My problem was, and I would like to emphasise that Kazan was 83 and in very poor health, that whilst I accepted that he testified at Senator Andrew McCarthy's 'reds in the beds' hearings, surely the duress (fear of losing his career, family, livelihood etc) should go some way to explaining his actions - and remember the climate we now live in is far different to that of Kazan's. And even if it is not forgivable, should people like Harris be allowed to boo an elderly old man (director of Eastn of Eden, Giant and On the Waterfront, lest we forget) for something he knows nothing about...Spielberg applauded along with half the academy, the other half - with honourable mention to that fucker Chris Rock and Susan-even-though-I-am-a millionaire-many-times-over-I-won't-forget-those-who-crossed-the-picket-line-Sarandon just aimed their hate at the guy. Am I wrong? Please, somebody tell me I am right...Discuss.

[thingsgoinon]

I say yes(justifiable)for all the reasons I already stated on that Ed Harris thread.

This may be out of context, it was part reply to you, but here was my last statement :

Woa, I'm not persecuting him for his beliefs, but for his actions...HUGE difference... the Mcarthy hearings were no joke, and people who were 'turned in' got blacklisted and had their lives ruined by fools like that who were just saving their own asses... duress my ass , thats the time when it is most important for a person to stand up for what is right. William Wallace ring a bell Mr Scotland ? What do you think, he should have just bellied up too, and turned rebels in just to save his own ass?

So yes I BOOO the dying 83 year old..


Has Mr Kazan ever apologized or expressed regret for what he did? If so, then I would say , yes, at least let the man have some peace.... it would be a huge burden of guilt to carry around I would think if one truly realized the wrongs of such actions....

Now RK ,you certainly can't be faulted for your ideal of wanting to let the guy bow out gracefully, but people also have a damn good(and justifiable) reason for their anger at him.




[This message has been edited by thingsgoinon (edited 07-26-2002).]

[thingsgoinon]

I read your comments RK on the other thread and replied...now I am confused where to reply next tho...hehe....

[The Heart Collector]

Ok, yes, thingsgoinon... you make valid points, but it isn't as if every single person accused in the blacklists was a poor little innocent soul being set up by the government.

[bmain77]

who cares if everyone one the black list was a card carrying member of the communist party. That still wouldn't make what happened right. It is yet another embarassing moment in the histroy of the united states. We seem to thrive on paranoia.

As for booing they guy, I have mixed opinions. I'd like to say I would have been strong enough to stand up the heat that this guy was probably under, but I don't know. His whole livlihood was in the balance and far be it from us to hold a grudge against the guy. None of us know how we would react in his situation.

That being said I also more than understand why people are pissed at him. He ruined a lot of lives to save his career.

[thingsgoinon]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by The Heart Collector:
Ok, yes, thingsgoinon... you make valid points, but it isn't as if every single person accused in the blacklists was a poor little innocent soul being set up by the government.</font>

I've never heard of any Mcarthy target was a genuine threat to the security or well being of the USA...ever..as Bmain pointed out , it was all hysterics and paranoia... I will admit I don't know detailed info on the whole thing,so if I am wrong, I can be corrected.

[charliebobo]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by bmain77:
who cares if everyone one the black list was a card carrying member of the communist party. That still wouldn't make what happened right. It is yet another embarassing moment in the histroy of the united states. We seem to thrive on paranoia.

As for booing they guy, I have mixed opinions. I'd like to say I would have been strong enough to stand up the heat that this guy was probably under, but I don't know. His whole livlihood was in the balance and far be it from us to hold a grudge against the guy. None of us know how we would react in his situation.

That being said I also more than understand why people are pissed at him. He ruined a lot of lives to save his career. </font>

Took the words right out of my mouth

[The Heart Collector]

http://www.123cuba.com/Communist-Film.html

[The Heart Collector]

I found this on Amazon.com, it illustrates the situation perfectly:


<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">You have to admire the beauty of what was accomplished here. We would not see it's like again until the demonization of Linda Tripp and Ken Starr. Only criminal conspiracies require the ethos that informing is evil. There's no other segment of society where it's considered evil to tell the truth about wrongdoing. But American's have a soft spot in their hearts for outlaws anyway, witness Butch & Sundance and the Godfather movies. So if you cloak your illicit enterprise in some noble trappings you can get most folks to buy into the anti-informing dogma. Since most of the Intelligentsia was anti-anti-communist, there was fertile ground for them to plant the idea that Communists & Fellow Travelers were well intentioned liberals, their opponents were close minded Neanderthals and anyone who would inform on the good Left to the evil Right, was a traitor.

Indulge me now in a brief thought experiment. Let's just change one thing about our whole scenario & see how much different we think reactions would be now. Let's say that there was a sizable percentage of folks in Hollywood in the 30's who were committed Nazis. They truly believed in their socialist principles and acted out of the best intentions. They sought to sneak party dogma into their films, raised money for the party, tithed part of their salaries, participated in marches and petition drives & what not. Then suddenly, the Hitler/Stalin pact is announced, and many of them realize that they've been duped. The ideology they were so devoted too, turns out to be capable of compromising with their sworn enemies. But others are unfazed. They stay in the party and remain devoted. They turn on a dime and go from advocating isolation to demanding American entry into the war. Then word starts to slip out that millions of people are being murdered by the State for their beliefs. Murder on a scale previously unimaginable for mankind. Many more leave the Party, their consciences finally singed. But others stay on, still devoted to the Cause and the downfall of the U.S.. Finally, after W.W.II ends, the government begins to realize that this enormous conspiracy has been going on in it's midst. Slowly and none too sure-footedly, the investigations begin. An intrepid few risk the ire of their friends, coworkers and the bulk of the Intellectual class and when they are called to testify, they admit to their own participation in the conspiracy and warn that others remain involved. They are vilified within their own milieu and when the scare dies down and those they sought to expose are accepted back into the industry, their own careers are destroyed. But forty years later, one of their number is to be honored by the Academy.

Now here's where our thought experiment pays off. Our Elia Kazan doppleganger exposed a Nazi plot to subvert the US government. Those he informed on stayed in the Party despite the Holocaust & continued to support the Nazi regime. They refused to cooperate with government investigations and covered up for friends and for the Party.

Can we still see hip Hollywood walking out of the ceremony or sitting on their hands? No, we can't imagine that can we? Suddenly, we imagine a heroes welcome for this brave soul. Hell, they'd be fighting for the movie rights to his story. </font>

[thingsgoinon]

Wow ,this is one of those rare occasions where I am at a loss for words....I just don't feel informed enuff to debate, and definately don't agree with that writers statements....looks like I have a new project.....

[JoBlo]

BUMP! (for new forum purposes)

[Buck Turgidson]

Ed Harris did not boo, at least not that I saw. He and his talented wife, Amy Madigan, and some other people, like Nick Nolte, did what I did: stared daggers at the gutless old son of a bitch. He made his bed in the 50's, he should lie in it. He bet on the wrong horse.

In point of fact, I have had Martin Scorsese and Robert DeNiro on personal probation ever since that time. (I'm sure they're broken up about it...) I guess they were just bullshitting in Guilty By Suspicion, huh?

The only person who I excuse from my scorn, (Kathy Bates and that oaf Kurt Russell can kiss my ass...), for applauding is Warren Beatty, who has repeatedly stated that he disagreed w/ Kazan's decision to testify, but that he treasures their work together, and feels like he shouldn't turn his back on a friend. See, that's what a friend does. Too bad Elia Kazan isn't worthy of that kind ofloyalty. He sure never showed it to anyone else.

[Buck Turgidson]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by The Heart Collector:
Our Elia Kazan doppleganger exposed a Nazi plot to subvert the US government. Those he informed on stayed in the Party despite the Holocaust & continued to support the Nazi regime. They refused to cooperate with government investigations and covered up for friends and for the Party.

</font>


Jesus, what a load of self-aggrandizing shit. Elia Kazan sniveled out a list of people he had been to meeting with, all of whom already were known to the Committee. He was made to jump through hoops for publicity purposes, and to save his own career, he did. He didn't uncover the Rosenbergs or anybody else. He named names of people he'd had idle jabberings about Dialectical Materialism with in back rooms years before.

[Reigh Kaufman]

I think it's amazing that most of you who think he was a piece of shit are saying this now that we live in a different political climate to that of Kazan. I don't know what most of you do for a living, buit I'll presume that some of you work in an office and have access to e-mails. Now, say one day a mandate goes around that the communal e-mail system has been abused by somebody (porn, say) and unless you inform on the person who sent the e-mails you will all be fired. i'm taking a bit of a leap of faith here, but some of you must have children, a mortgage, bills to pay, and no union to defend you. You have to think fast -- your employment record is going to be stained (Kazan's would have been permanently useless)and you may be endangering all that you've worked hard for. You know only one thing -- you are innocent.


Take the pressure you would be feeling insuch an (wasily) imaginable situation, times that by a million, add the hatred of millions of people, then get back to me if you think you are capable of defying a Government committee.

Also, and i want to make this absolutely clear, I don't agree with what Kazan did. At all. However, it is easy for me to sit here in my office in Scotland, where I know nothing like this could ever happen in my lifetime, and say -- no way would I rat out a bunch of strangers. No fucking way!

I'm a pretty moral person, but even I don't know how I would react under such extreme duress. Think about it, be honest, then respond if you still think you would have had the balls to go through the rest of your entire life (as it must have seemed at the time) with the venom of your fellow countrymen spat at you day in, day out. Think on those terms, then post. Heroes like that are very, very,very rare.

[BubbaStrangelove]

booing an elderly man? sounds like the work of a commie!

live and let die.

[[SD] Bob Plisskin]

Your argument there RK is fundamentaly flawed, I definately would point out who had been using porn because it to me is morally wrong (albeit our history includes the sticky hands jokes) but America was brought up on the very idea of Freedom of speach, it seems to me that you Americans have simply traded one dictatorship for another, illustrated by the lack of true rights which you really have, if the FBI/CIA wanted to stop you doing something they could. Ideally a communist lifestyle throughout the world would be perfect, but because of the greed of powerful men a communist power could never actually be truly communist and fair.

During the 50's or whatever the American government frowned upon communism and it's sympathisers simply because it was unknown to them, no matter that the Red Army helped them substantially in the second world war. People have to realise that a person is not the government they are lead by, many people are way to quick to judge, and that's a problem which will exist forever.

Were they right to boo and old man? no. Were they right to boo a symbol of the governments oppression of a nation which thought it was free? yes.

&lt;OB&gt;

[Grebdron]

Man, you guys act like America is the only country with political problems. I guess I should move to the Utopia you live in. No Elia Kazan shouldn't have dropped names, and those actors/actresses that booed him had every right to. If he believed in what America is supposed to stand for, he would have refused to testify, even at great personal jeopardy. Alot of people will scream when they think one of their rights is being infringed upon, but will do nothing when faced with the moral dilemma of standing up for someone else's rights. Hypocrisy run rampant. I'll bet Kazan would have screamed very loudly if someone had tried to tell him he could not make the movie he wanted to. And who cares if he only named names that were already known, it's the principle that he violated.

[[SD] Bob Plisskin]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Grebdron:
Man, you guys act like America is the only country with political problems.</font>

I think not, I only raised the point of American governmental hypocrasy because it was relevant to the point in hand, heck the same can be said of all countries on the Earth. Except C.R.A.P. (the communist republic of astaral populaces) which is made up of exactly 0 citizens as the land exists on the moon.

&lt;OB&gt;

[BubbaStrangelove]

well, i think the key here is that he wasn't accepting an award for his testimony.

has anyone heard, or seen a transcript of his testimony? are we sure that he wasn't led into naming names, like they tried to do with Hoffa (at least in the Nicholson version of the story http://www.joblo.com/ubb/smile.gif )?

[Buck Turgidson]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by Reigh Kaufman:
I think it's amazing that most of you who think he was a piece of shit are saying this now that we live in a different political climate to that of Kazan. I don't know what most of you do for a living, buit I'll presume that some of you work in an office and have access to e-mails. Now, say one day a mandate goes around that the communal e-mail system has been abused by somebody (porn, say) and unless you inform on the person who sent the e-mails you will all be fired. i'm taking a bit of a leap of faith here, but some of you must have children, a mortgage, bills to pay, and no union to defend you. You have to think fast -- your employment record is going to be stained (Kazan's would have been permanently useless)and you may be endangering all that you've worked hard for. You know only one thing -- you are innocent.


Take the pressure you would be feeling insuch an (wasily) imaginable situation, times that by a million, add the hatred of millions of people, then get back to me if you think you are capable of defying a Government committee.

Also, and i want to make this absolutely clear, I don't agree with what Kazan did. At all. However, it is easy for me to sit here in my office in Scotland, where I know nothing like this could ever happen in my lifetime, and say -- no way would I rat out a bunch of strangers. No fucking way!

I'm a pretty moral person, but even I don't know how I would react under such extreme duress. Think about it, be honest, then respond if you still think you would have had the balls to go through the rest of your entire life (as it must have seemed at the time) with the venom of your fellow countrymen spat at you day in, day out. Think on those terms, then post. Heroes like that are very, very,very rare. </font>


Yes, they are very rare. But there were men and women like that at the time: John Garfield, Arthur Miller, and many others. They stood up for what they believed in, in spite of the costs.

I have no idea what I'd do in that situation. I know if I knuckled under and did what I was told, I wouldn't be so Goddamned proud of it as the years went by. I know that for a fact.

[electriclite]

The people who refused to stand or clap basically exercised a right that Americans are allowed to enjoy: Choice.

Now Kazan probably would've been screwed either way whether he testified or not. The only difference is instead of screwing his own career he screwed the ones of many other people working Hollywood.

But let me define what "screwed" meant in terms of blacklisted Hollywood talent: Loss of livlihood, the inability to work in the profession they loved, immersion into drugs and alcohol and suicide.

Many of these men who were blacklisted had families who had to witness the debasment of their parents and watch them slowly destroy their lives, or saw them end them.

What Kazan did in the 50's didn't just stay in the 50's, it lives on in the memories of the families who watched their their fathers and mothers suffer because Kazan couldn't stand up for his rights or the rights of his peers.