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New Deal Cowboy: Gene Autry and Public Diplomacy. By Michael Duchemin

2017; Oxford University Press; Volume: 48; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1093/whq/whx031

1939-8603

Travis D. Stimeling,

Cinema and Media Studies

A star of radio, records, motion pictures, and live appearances, the singing cowboy Gene Autry (1907–1988) was a dominant figure in the twentieth-century popular culture landscape, appealing not only to the young boys who formed the core audience for western entertainments, but also to women, middle-class whites, and even international audiences. Manipulating contemporary media outlets to promote himself as a wholesome, earnest, and honest American cowboy, Autry’s rise to international stardom paralleled the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, whose use of the media to promote the virtues of his New Deal programs has been widely documented. In New Deal Cowboy: Gene Autry and Public Diplomacy, the former curator of the Autry National Center of the American West, Michael Duchemin, argues that the connections between Autry and Roosevelt run much deeper than their clever use of the media. Rather, Duchemin argues that the subject matter of Autry’s films—as well as Autry’s public persona as represented in his eponymous radio, film, and live performance character—actively reinforced the themes of New Deal propaganda, thus making Autry a key Roosevelt ally. Using as his primary evidence the plots of the more than four dozen films that Autry appeared in between 1934 and his enlistment in the U.S. Army, Duchemin reveals that Autry’s screenwriters frequently introduced plotlines addressing the Roosevelt administration’s latest concerns, from infrastructure development and the promotion of tourism in the U.S. West during the height of the Great Depression to Pan-Americanism and war readiness on the eve of World War II. Additionally, New Deal Cowboy draws upon the extensive business records held by the Autry National Center to suggest that the savvy Autry was not simply a shill for the New Deal but may have seen his embrace of the New Deal as a way to reinforce his brand in a crowded western entertainment marketplace.