Undermining the Wealthy
The FBI believed the movie “deliberately maligned the upper class attempting to show that people who had money were mean and despicable characters.” The Bureau said that instead of demonizing Potter, the film should have shown that he was only following the rules issued by State Bank Examiners about making loans. Furthermore, the sympathetic portrayal of George Bailey was nothing more than a subtle attempt to exacerbate the problems experienced by ‘common’ people in society. It was an odd conclusion to make, especially since George and Harry Bailey are also bankers and both men are loved and respected in Bedford Falls.
One of the reasons the FBI focused on It’s a Wonderful Life was because it suspected the creator, Frank Capra, of left-wing sympathies. The Bureau believed that the 1939 Capra movie, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, was a socialist film. Incidentally, that movie also starred James Stewart. Although the screenwriters of It’s a Wonderful Life, Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich, were not suspected, they were found guilty by association because they were seen eating lunch with known Communists such as Lester Cole. Oddly enough, the FBI did not discover that at least three actual Communist Party members had uncredited work on the movie’s script.
The Investigation Was a Product of its Time
The FBI was in the midst of a detailed investigation into Hollywood which officially lasted from 1942 to 1958. Although the Bureau didn’t find out that Albert Maltz, Michael Wilson, and Dalton Trumbo had worked on It’s a Wonderful Life, Maltz and Trumbo, along with Cole, were placed in the Hollywood Ten, a blacklist that denied employment to people suspected to have Communist leanings. Wilson ended up on the list in the 1950s. The first Hollywood blacklist was created on November 25, 1947, a day after ten directors and writers refused to testify before the House un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).
The Hollywood Ten, as they became known, were cited for Contempt of Congress and the ten were fired. In 1950, Red Channels was published. It was a pamphlet that named 151 people in the entertainment industry who were either ‘Reds’ or at least sympathizers. The majority of those named, along with hundreds of others, was barred from working in America’s entertainment industry. The ban lasted until 1960 when Trumbo worked as a screenwriter in the successful movie Exodus and also had a major role in writing Spartacus.
It was the era of the Second Red Scare (1947 – 57) which became known as McCarthyism after the staunchest advocate of anti-Communism, Senator Joseph McCarthy. During this era, hundreds of Americans were accused of Communist ties and were often hauled before the HUAC to answer for their ‘crimes’. While government employees were often questioned in this manner, members of the entertainment industry were arguably the prime targets. While Trumbo managed to find work after a ban of over a decade, others were not so lucky and continued to be banned well into the 1960s. Why did the FBI focus so heavily on Hollywood?