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No place for Peace-Mongers: Charlie Chaplin, Monsieur Verdoux (1947) and Czechoslovak Communist Propaganda

2009; Routledge; Volume: 29; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/01439680903145546

1465-3451

Jindřiška Bláhová,

European history and politics

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Acknowledgements This article was written with the kind support of the Grant Agency of Charles University in Prague – GAUK (grant no. 258126). I would like to thank my colleague Dr Richard Nowell for insightful and invaluable comments on the draft of this article. Notes Notes 1. bž, Hollywood mezi dvěma válkami, Kino, 20 July 1950, 349. 2. Rudolf Myzet, Vyprávění o Chaplinovi II, Filmové noviny, 20 September 1947, 10. 3. The Czechoslovak film monopoly also mediated contact between Moscow and Sherover and helped to organize a screening of Monsieur Verdoux for Soviet artists in the USSR at the end of 1947. Distribuce v roce 1948. Ředitel Státní půjčovny filmů Josef Hlinomaz generálnímu řediteli Československé filmové společnosti Lubomíru Linhartovi, Praha, 25. 1. 1948. National Archives of the Czech Republic, Prague (hereafter NAČR), Central Committee of the Czechoslovak Communist Party Archive (hereafter A ÚV KSČ), 19/7, Archival Unit (hereafter AU) 660, l. 43–46. Dovoz amerických filmů do SSSR, Praha, 25. 11. 1947. NA?R, Ministry of Information Files (hereafter MI) 861, board 231, inventory number (hereafter IN) 506-Rusko. 4. bž, Starý Chaplin stále živý, Filmové noviny, 31 May 1947, 7. Charlie Chaplin Festival included the short comedies The Vagabond, The Count (both 1916), The Cure, The Adventurer, Easy Street and The Immigrant (all 1917). The films were sold to the Czechoslovak film company by the Prague-based firm PDC. The films were screened again in early 1954 as a part of the Exhibition of Satire and Humour. Pamětní protokol, Praha, 20. 11. 1946. NA?R, MI, 861, board 234, IN 559, sign. USA filmy-různé 1945–48. Exhibition of Certain Charlie Chaplin Pictures, Prague, 25. 2. 1955. Department of State Files, Record Group 59, National Archives, College Park, MD (hereafter NARA, RG59), Decimal File (hereafter DF), 1955–59. 811.452/2-2555. 5. On analysis of Chaplin's socio-political world view see Philip G. Rosen, Chaplin's world view, Cinema Journal 9 (Autumn, 1969), 2–12. 6. This study makes use of the following Czechoslovak newspapers and magazines: Filmové noviny, Filmová práce, Kino (all three were official papers of the Czechoslovak film monopoly), Rudé právo (Communist Party paper), Svět práce, Práce (trade unions newspapers) and Tvorba (a weekly for ‘politics, science and culture’ published by the Central Committee of the Communist Party). Articles that were published in these periodicals in the period under examination can in principle be seen as echoing the official cultural policy of the Communist party. After the Communist coup in February 1948, all press was controlled by the Czechoslovak Communist Party through the Ministry of Information. Censorship was introduced and practiced. All press was censored by the so-called press division of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. The editors-in-chief of individual newspapers were selected by the Communist party and were held personally responsible for any ‘ideological’ lapses. In 1950, the position of ‘supervising editor’ was established. Those ‘editors,’ who were reliable politically, controlled all articles. Without their approval no article was published. In 1953, censorship fell under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Interior Affairs. All the newspapers and magazines that are referred to in this study were thus directly or indirectly under the control of the Communist party during the period under examination. Although official censorship did not exist before the 1948 coup, the Communist party exercised significant power over the press in this period. It did, however, employ different strategies. One way that it controlled the media was though the allocation of paper. Newspapers or magazines were simply put out of business by means of cutting their supply of paper. 7. Uta G. Poiger, Jazz, Rock and Rebels (Los Angeles, University of California Press, 2000). 8. Reinhold Wagnleitner, Coca-Colonization and the Cold War: the cultural mission of the United States in Austria after the Second World War, trans. Diana M. Wolf (Chapel Hill, NC, University of North Carolina Press, 1994). 9. Petr Mareš, Politika a ‘pohyblivé obrázky’. Spor o dovoz amerických filmů do Československa po druhé světové válce. Iluminace, 1 (1994), 77–95. 10. Jindřiška Bláhová, Hollywood za železnou oponou. Jednání o dovozu nových hollywoodských filmů mezi MPEA a ČSR; 1946–1951. Iluminace, 4 (2008), 19–62. 11. Pavel Skopal, Filmy pana velvyslance. Československé filmové publikum a americký Státní department (1945–1960). Iluminace, 3 (2008), 175–188. 12. On Chaplin and FBI, see: John Sbardellati and Tony Shaw, Booting a tramp: Charlie Chaplin, the FBI, and the construction of the subversive image in Red Scare America, Pacific Historical Review, 72(4), 495–530. 13. Historians have traditionally portrayed Chaplin as an innocent victim of the Red Scare in America. D. William Davis somewhat complicates this straightforward story by showing that Chaplin and United Artists mobilized the political antagonism that surrounded Chaplin and his films for marketing and economic purposes. D. William Davis, A tale of two movies: Charlie Chaplin, United Artists and the Red Scare, Cinema Journal 1 (Autumn 1987), 47–62. 14. Petr Mareš, Politika a ‘pohyblivé obrázky’, 82. 15. In 1939, Germany exported 92 films, while the US exported 89. American films accumulated 60% of all the revenues that were paid for foreign films that were distributed in Czechoslovakia. In the period 1925–1930, the share of the market for the US films fluctuated between 40% and 50%. Jiří Havelka, Čs. filmové hospodářství 1939 (Nakladatelství Knihovny Filmového kurýru, Praha, 1940). Zpráva o poradě o americké smlouvě a o dovozu amerických filmů, Praha, 15 March 1946, NA?R, MI, 861, board 233, IN 559. 16. Zpráva o poradě o americké smlouvě a o dovozu amerických filmů, Praha, 15 March 1946, NA?R, MI, 861, board 233, IN 559. 17. Jiří Havelka, 50 let Československého filmu (Československý státní film, Praha, 1953), 178. In 1947, there were 65 Hollywood, 24 Czechoslovak, 33 Soviet, 31 British and 26 French films screened in Czechoslovak cinemas. Rozbor některých předpokladů distribuční politiky. Praha, 17 March 1950. National Film Archive, Czechoslovak State Film Files (hereafter NFA, ČSF) (unprocessed), ČSF—distribuční politika 1950; Jiří Havelka, Čs. filmové hospodářství 1945–1950 (Československý státní film, Praha, 1953). 18. Alfred Harding, Prague Likes American Films But There's Class Problem, Motion Picture Herald, 20 March 1937, 57. 19. For instance, one of the most popular stars was Rita Hayworth. The front pages of March (14 March 1947) and December (5 December 1947) issues of the magazine Kino featured the diva whereas the December one reprinted a picture that was signed by Hayworth and dedicated to the magazine's readership. 20. Justine Faure, Americký přítel. Československo ve hře americké diplomacie 1943–1968 (Nakladatelství Lidových novin, Praha, 2005), 98. 21. Hollywood films gradually disappeared from Czechoslovak cinemas as a result of a distribution policy that had been designed in response to both the economic needs of the film industry and to shifts in Czechoslovak foreign policy during the escalation of the Cold War. In 1948, 20 American films were distributed in Czechoslovakia (MPEA films and films imported by independent distributors). This number dropped to 12 in 1949 and then to only three in 1950. Rozbor některých předpokladů distribuční politiky. Praha, 17 March 1950. NFA, ČSF (unprocessed), ČSF—distribuční politika 1950. Zpráva o průběhu a výsledcích distribuce za rok 1949, Praha, 28. 4. 1950. NA?R, A ÚV KSČ, 19/7, AU 666. 22. G. Kozincev, Lidové umění Charlie Chaplina, Filmová práce, 15 June 1946, 6; Bohumil Brejcha, Světoobčan Charlie Chaplin, Filmová práce, 23 November 1946, 4; Rudolf Myzet, Vyprávění o Chaplinovi, Filmové noviny, 13 September 1947, 10; Rudolf Myzet, Vyprávění o Chaplinovi II, Filmové noviny, 20 September 1947, 10; Jaroslav Brož, O Chaplinových začátcích historicky, Filmové noviny, 31 May 1947, 3; ro, Charlie Chaplin: Ztratil jsem víru v Hollywood, Filmové noviny, 10 January 1948, 3 or Jak žijí … Záběry ze života, práce i oddechu, Kino, 23 May 1947, 418. 23. Czech Tycoon of Films Here to Reap Ideas, Los Angeles Times, 30 September 1946, A8. 24. This invitation followed the final round of negotiations that had been conducted in New York between the Motion Picture Export Association (MPEA) and Czechoslovakia concerning the importation of Hollywood films to the Eastern Bloc country. 25. John Edgar Hoover to the Office of European Affairs State Department, Washington, 3.10.1946. NARA, RG59, DF 1940–44, 860f.4061 MP/10-346; Rudolf Myzet, Vyprávění o Chaplinovi, Filmové noviny, 13 September 1947, 10. 26. Zpět z Ameriky, Kulturní politika, 25 October 1946, 4. 27. Bohumil Brejcha, Světoobčan Charlie Chaplin, Filmová práce, 23 November 1946, 3–4. 28. Throughout the 1930s, Chaplin was part of the anti-fascist and pro-leftist community in Hollywood. This group was composed of mostly German emigrants like Hanns Eisler, Lion Feuchtwanger or Salka Viertel. Chaplin's close friends included many Hollywood radicals such as the screenwriters Dalton Trumbo or Paul Jarrico. Charles J. Maland, Chaplin and American Culture (Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 1989), 221–223. 29. bž. Charlie Chaplin—trn v oku amerického měšt'áka, Filmová práce, 21 July 1945, 5. 30. See Charles J. Maland, Chaplin and American Culture; David Robinson, Chaplin: his life and art (New York, McGraw Hill, 1989); Charles Spencer Chaplin, My Autobiography (New York, Simon and Schuster, 1964); or Colin Chambers, Here We Stand: politics, performers and performance: Paul Robeson, Isadora Duncan and Charlie Chaplin (London, Nick Hern, 2006). 31. Maland, Chaplin and American Culture, 190. 32. Ibid., 191. 33. Ibid., 193. 34. Kino, 26 December 1947, 1036. 35. Maland, Chaplin and American Culture, 261 36. Co nás zajímá, Kino, 14 April 1949, 98. 37. Jaroslav Brož, Chaplin a americká veřejnost, Svět práce, 22 June 1948. 38. bž, V záři reflektorů, Kino, 4 December 1952, 475. 39. Emil Radok, Umění, v němž se slučuje oheň a voda, Práce, 11 June 1948, 2. 40. G. V. Alexandrov, Buržoasní film ve službách reakce, Kino, 16 February 1950, 80. 41. K. Vaněk, Chaplinův ‘Monsieur Verdoux’, Rudé právo, 11 June 1948. 42. Jaroslav Dvořáček-Josef Schneider, Nové filmy—Monsieur Verdoux—tragická komedie, Filmové noviny, 18 June 1948, p. 4. 43. Ibid. 44. Chaplinův Monsieur Verdoux, Filmové noviny, 3 May 1947, 4. 45. K. Vaněk, Chaplinův ‘Monsieur Verdoux’, Rudé právo, 11 June 1948. 46. Jaroslav Dvořáček-Josef Schneider, Nové filmy—Monsieur Verdoux—tragická komedie, Filmové noviny 18 June 1948, 4. 47. Ibid. 48. K. Vaněk, Chaplinův ‘Monsieur Verdoux’, Rudé právo, 11 June 1948. 49. Co nás zajímá. Kino, 14 April 1949, 98. 50. Miroslav Kroh, Monsieur Verdoux, Tvorba 18 June 1948, 479. 51. Karel Vaněk, A ještě Monsieur Verdoux, Tvorba, 30 July 1948, 600. 52. rdk, Znovu několik slov k podivuhodnému filmu ‘Monsieur Verdoux’, Práce, 19 June 1948. 53. Bohumil Brejcha, Světoobčan Charlie Chaplin, Filmová práce 23 November 1946, 4. 54. Jaroslav Brož, Chaplin a americká veřejnost, Svět práce, 2 June 1948. 55. K. Vaněk, Chaplinův ‘Monsieur Verdoux’, Rudé právo, 11 June 1948. 56. Ibid. 57. Chaplinův Monsieur Verdoux, Filmové noviny, 3 May 1947, 4. 58. Faure, Americký přítel, 95–100. 59. Ibid., 99. 60. Irving A. Maas to the US Ambassador to Prague Ellis O. Briggs, Washington, 10 August 1951. NARA, RG59, DF1950–1955, 849.452. 61. U.S. Bans Travel to Czechoslovakia, Calls Conditions There Hazardous, New York Times, 2 June 1951, 1–2. 62. Hnusná role Hollywoodu, Kino, 29 March 1951, 146. 63. Oleg Mašinskij, Vývozci jedu, Kino, 7 June 1951, 274–275. 64. Hollywood útočí na mír, Kino, 9 June 1949, 173. 65. I Chaplinovy grotesky na indexu, Kino, 26 April 1951, 195. 66. Atlantická výchova, Kino, 26 April 1951, 195. 67. I Chaplinovy grotesky na indexu, Kino, 26 April 1951, 195. 68. Stanislav Šteindler, Stýská se nám po hollywoodském filmu?, Kino, 4 December 1952, 476. 69. Ivana Lažanská, Americká kultura, Rudé právo, 22 November 1950, 5. 70. Oleg Mašinskij, Vývozci jedu, Kino, 7 June 1951, 274–275; Grigorij Alexandrov, Hollywood ve službách válečných štváčů, Rudé právo, 4 February 1951, 5; A. Andrejev, Reakční umění ve službách amerického imperialismu, Kino, 15 March 1951, 130. 71. Jindřich Puš, Film zbraní pravdy, Kino, 22 December 1949, 396. 72. Václav Kopecký, O socialistickém realismu, Kino, 9 June 1949, 1163. 73. Josef Štrych, Dopis první, Kino, 23 June 1949, 189. 74. Bohumil Brejcha, Světoobčan Charlie Chaplin, Filmová práce, 23 November 1946, 4. 75. Emil Radok, Umění, v němž se slučuje oheň a voda, Práce, 11 June 1948, 2. 76. Chaplin o Ridgwayovi a ostatních, Kino, 18 December 1952, 483. 77. Po Darwinovi i Chaplin na indexu v Tennessee, Kino, 11 August 1953, 3. 78. See for example Paul Swann, The little state department: Washington and Hollywood's rhetoric of the postwar audience, in: David W. Elwood and Rob Kroes (eds), Hollywood in Europe, Experience of Cultural Hegemony (Amsterdam, VU University Press, 1994), 193–194; and Marsha Siefert, From Cold War to wary peace: American culture in the USSR and Russia, in: Alexander Stephan (ed.), The Americanization of Europe. Culture, diplomacy, and anti-Americanism after 1945 (New York, 2007), 185–217. 79. G. Avarin, ‘Filosofie’ Hollywoodu, Kino, 12 October 1950, 480. 80. Nicholas J. Cull, The Cold War and the United States Information Agency: American propaganda and public diplomacy, 1945–1989 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2008), 71. 81. ČTK, Další tři černoši v USA zavražděni, Rudé právo, 7 February 1951, 3. 82. Americký imperialismus—dědic Hitlera, Rudé právo, 1 February 1951, 1. 83. Ibid. 84. Ibid. 85. Jiří Žák, Americké rejdy v západním Německu skončí krachem, Rudé právo, 9 February 1951, 2. 86. Americký imperialismus—dědic Hitlera, Rud? právo, 1 February 1951, 1. 87. Hnusná role Hollywoodu, Kino, 29 March 1951, 146. 88. Mich. Makljarskij, Čelověk s licom modeli, Sovetskoje Iskusstvo, 8 January 1949, 4; Yank Win, Lose In ‘Curtain’ Areas, Variety, 12 January 1949, 3 and 9. 89. Iron Curtain Lands after Chaplin Films, The Hollywood Reporter, 18 October 1954, 1.