Dalton Trumbo | |
|---|---|
 Trumbo at theHouse Un-American Activities Committee hearings in 1947 | |
| Born | James Dalton Trumbo (1905-12-09)December 9, 1905 Montrose, Colorado, U.S. |
| Died | September 10, 1976(1976-09-10) (aged 70) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Occupation |
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| Spouse | |
| Children | 3, includingChristopher |
James Dalton Trumbo (December 9, 1905 – September 10, 1976) was an Americanscreenwriter who scripted many award-winning films, includingRoman Holiday (1953),Exodus (1960),Spartacus (1960), andThirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944). One of theHollywood Ten,[1] he refused to testify before theHouse Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1947 during the committee's investigation ofCommunist influences in the motion picture industry.[2][3][4][5]
Trumbo, the other members of the Hollywood Ten, and hundreds of other professionals in the industry wereblacklisted by Hollywood. He continued working clandestinely on major films, writing under pseudonyms or other authors' names. His uncredited work won twoAcademy Awards forBest Story: forRoman Holiday (1953), which was presented to afront writer, and forThe Brave One (1956), which was awarded to apseudonym used by Trumbo.[6][7] When he was given public screen credit for bothExodus andSpartacus in 1960, it marked the beginning of the end of the Hollywood Blacklist for Trumbo and other affected screenwriters.[8] He finally was given full credit by the Writers' Guild forRoman Holiday in 2011, nearly 60 years after the fact, and 35 years after his death.[9][10]
Trumbo was born inMontrose, Colorado, on December 9, 1905, the son of Orus Bonham Trumbo and Maud (née Tillery) Trumbo. His family moved toGrand Junction, Colorado, in 1908.[11]
His paternal immigrant ancestor, a Protestant of Swiss origin named Jacob Trumbo, settled in thecolony of Virginia in 1736.[12] Orus Trumbo worked variously as a shoe clerk and collection agent, never earning enough to keep the family far from poverty.[13]
Trumbo graduated fromGrand Junction High School. While still in high school, he worked forWalter Walker as a cubreporter for theGrand Junction Daily Sentinel, covering courts, the high school, the mortuary and civic organizations.[14] He attended theUniversity of Colorado at Boulder in 1924 and 1925, working as a reporter for theBoulder Daily Camera and contributing to the school's humor magazine, yearbook, and newspaper. He was a member ofDelta Tau Delta International Fraternity.[15]
In 1924, Orus Trumbo relocated the family to California. Shortly after, he fell ill and died, leaving Dalton to support his mother and siblings.[13] For nine years after his father died, Trumbo worked the night shift wrapping bread at a Los Angeles bakery and attended theUniversity of California, Los Angeles (1926) and theUniversity of Southern California (1928–1930).[16] During this time, he wrote movie reviews, 88 short stories, and six novels, all of which were rejected for publication.[17]
Trumbo began his professional writing career in the early 1930s, when several of his articles and stories were published in mainstream magazines, includingMcCall's,Vanity Fair, theHollywood Spectator andThe Saturday Evening Post.[18] Trumbo was hired as managing editor of theHollywood Spectator in 1934. Later he left the magazine to become a reader in the story department atWarner Bros. studio.[17]
His first published novel,Eclipse (1935), was released during theGreat Depression. Writing in thesocial realist style, Trumbo drew on his years in Grand Junction to portray a town and its people. The book was controversial in his hometown, where many people took issue with his fictional portrayal.[19]
Trumbo started working in movies in 1937 but continued writing prose. Hisanti-war novelJohnny Got His Gun won one of theearly National Book Awards: the Most Original Book of 1939.[20] It was inspired by an article Trumbo had read several years earlier: an account of a hospital visit by thePrince of Wales to a Canadian soldier who had lost all his limbs inWorld War I.[21]
During the late 1930s and early 1940s, Trumbo became one of Hollywood's highest-paid screenwriters, at about $4,000 per week while on assignment,[22] and earning as much as $80,000 in one year.[17] He worked on such films asThirty Seconds Over Tokyo (1944),Our Vines Have Tender Grapes (1945), andKitty Foyle (1940), for which he was nominated for anAcademy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
Aligned with theCommunist Party USA before the 1940s, Trumbo was anisolationist. He joined the Communist Party in 1943, and remained active until 1947. He reaffiliated himself with the party in 1954.[22][23][24] His novelThe Remarkable Andrew featured the ghost of PresidentAndrew Jackson appearing to caution the United States against getting involved inWorld War II and in support of theNazi-Soviet pact.[25]
Shortly afterOperation Barbarossa, the Axis invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, Trumbo and his publisher decided to suspend reprintingJohnny Got His Gun until the end of the war. During the war, Trumbo received letters from individuals "denouncing Jews" and usingJohnny to support their arguments for "an immediate negotiated peace" withNazi Germany; Trumbo reported these correspondents to theFBI.[26] Trumbo regretted this decision, which he called "foolish". After two FBI agents showed up at his home, he understood that "their interest lay not in the letters but in me".[26]
In a 1946 article titled "The Russian Menace" published in Rob Wagner'sScript Magazine, Trumbo wrote from the perspective of a post-World War II Russian citizen.[27] He argued that Russians were likely fearful of the mass of U.S. military power that surrounded them, at a time when any sympathetic view toward Communist countries was viewed with suspicion.[27] He ended the article by stating, "If I were a Russian ... I would be alarmed, and I would petition my government to take measures at once against what would seem an almost certain blow aimed at my existence. This is how it must appear in Russia today".[27] He argued that the U.S. was a "menace" to Russia, rather than the more popular American view of Russia as the "red menace". According to author Kenneth Billingsley, Trumbo had bragged inThe Daily Worker that Communist influence in Hollywood had prevented films from being made from anti-Communist books, such asArthur Koestler'sDarkness at Noon andThe Yogi and the Commissar.[25]
William R. Wilkerson, publisher and founder ofThe Hollywood Reporter, published a July 29, 1946, "TradeView" column entitled "A Vote ForJoe Stalin". It named Trumbo and several others as Communist sympathizers, the first persons identified on what became known as "Billy's Blacklist".[28][29] In October 1947, drawing upon these names, theHouse Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) summoned Trumbo and nine others to testify for their investigation as to whether Communist agents and sympathizers had surreptitiously planted propaganda in U.S. films. The writers refused to give information about their own or any other person's involvement and were convicted forcontempt of Congress. They appealed the conviction to theSupreme Court onFirst Amendment grounds and lost. Trumbo served eleven months in thefederal penitentiary inAshland, Kentucky, in 1950. In the 1976 documentaryHollywood On Trial, Trumbo said: "As far as I was concerned, it was a completely just verdict. I had contempt for that Congress and have had contempt for it ever since. And on the basis of guilt or innocence, I could never really complain very much. That this was a crime or misdemeanor was the complaint, my complaint."[30]
TheMPAAissued a statement that Trumbo and his compatriots would not be permitted to work in the industry unless they disavowed Communism under oath. After completing his sentence, Trumbo sold his ranch and moved his family toMexico City withHugo Butler and his wifeJean Rouverol, who had also been blacklisted.[22] In Mexico, Trumbo wrote 30 scripts (under pseudonyms) forB-movie studios such asKing Brothers Productions. In the case ofGun Crazy (1950), adapted from a short story byMacKinlay Kantor, Kantor agreed to be the front for Trumbo's screenplay. Trumbo's role in the screenplay was not revealed until 1992.[31]
During this blacklist period, Trumbo also wroteThe Brave One (1956) for the King Brothers. LikeRoman Holiday, it received anAcademy Award for Best Story he could not claim. The script was credited to Robert Rich, a name borrowed from a nephew of the producers. Trumbo recalled earning an average fee of $1,750 per film for 18 screenplays written in two years and said, "None was very good".[22]
He publishedThe Devil in the Book, an analysis of the conviction of 14 CaliforniaSmith Act defendants, in 1956.[32] The statute set criminal penalties for advocating the overthrow of the U.S. government and required all non-citizen adult residents to register with the government.
Ingo Preminger, the brother of producer-directorOtto Preminger, was Dalton Trumbo's agent. Otto Preminger hired Trumbo to write a screenplay for thefilm he intended to adapt fromLeon Uris' 1958 novelExodus when the script he had commissioned from Uris was deemed unusable. The producer-director decided to give Trumbo the screen credit.[33] Shortly thereafter, actorKirk Douglas announced Trumbo had written the screenplay forStanley Kubrick's filmSpartacus (also 1960), adapted from the1951 novel byHoward Fast.[34] With these actions, Preminger and Douglas helped end the power of the blacklist.
Trumbo was reinstated into theWriters Guild of America, West and was credited on all subsequent scripts.[citation needed] The guild finally gave him full credit for the script of the 1953 filmRoman Holiday in 2011. Trumbo directed the 1971film adaptation of his novelJohnny Got His Gun, starringTimothy Bottoms,Diane Varsi,Jason Robards andDonald Sutherland. One of the last films Trumbo wrote,Executive Action (1973), was based on theJohn F. Kennedy assassination.[35] The Academy officially recognized Trumbo as the winner of the Oscar for the 1956 filmThe Brave One in 1975, presenting him with a statuette.[36]
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In 1938, Trumbo married Cleo Fincher, who was born inFresno, California, on July 17, 1916, and had moved with her divorced mother and her brother and sister to Los Angeles. The Trumbos had three children: Nikola Trumbo (1939–2018), who became a psychotherapist;Christopher Trumbo (1940–2011), a filmmaker and screenwriter who became an expert on the Hollywood blacklist; and Melissa Trumbo (1945), known as Mitzi, a photographer.[37][38] Mitzi Trumbo dated comedianSteve Martin when they were both in their early 20s, which is recounted in Martin's 2007 bookBorn Standing Up. Martin wrote of her: "Mitzi became my official photographer, and she snapped dozens of rolls of film, all to find the perfect publicity photo."[39]
Cleo Trumbo died of natural causes at the age of 93 on October 9, 2009, at the home she shared with Mitzi Trumbo inLos Altos, California.[40][41]
Trumbo died in 1976, inLos Angeles of aheart attack at the age of 70. He donated his body to scientific research.[42]
In 1993, Trumbo was posthumously awarded the Academy Award for writingRoman Holiday (1953). The screen credit and award were previously given toIan McLellan Hunter, who had been a front for Trumbo.[43] A new statue was made for this award because Hunter's son refused to hand over the one his father had received.[44]
In 2003, Christopher Trumbo mounted an Off-Broadway play based on his father's letters, calledTrumbo: Red, White and Blacklisted, in which a wide variety of actors played his father during the run, includingNathan Lane,Tim Robbins,Brian Dennehy,Ed Harris,Chris Cooper andGore Vidal. He adapted it as the documentaryTrumbo (2007),[37][45] which added archival footage and new interviews.[46]
A dramatization of Trumbo's life, also calledTrumbo, was released in November 2015.[47] It starredBryan Cranston in the title role and was directed byJay Roach.[48] For his portrayal of Trumbo, Cranston was nominated forBest Actor at the88th Academy Awards.
The moving image collection of Trumbo is held at the Academy Film Archive and consists primarily of extensive 35 mm production materials relating to the 1971 anti-war filmJohnny Got His Gun.[49] In 2016, more than a hundred years after his birth, Trumbo was honored by the installation of a statue of him in front of the Avalon Theater on Main Street in Grand Junction, Colorado, his home town. He was depicted writing a screenplay in a bathtub.[19]
Trumbo is featured in the 2024biographicalhistorical dramaReagan aboutU.S. presidentRonald Reagan. He is portrayed bySean Hankinson.[50]
Selected film works
Novels, plays and essays
Non-fiction
Media from Commons
Quotations from Wikiquote
Texts from Wikisource
