THE FINAL POST

As the class comes to a close, I find myself trying to draw conclusions from everything that we have done this semester.  I have convinced myself that both Dr. Stogdill and Mr. Donnell are attempting to convey some sort of grand message about L.A. that we as a class are supposed to discern.  With every project, reading, movie, discussion, experiment, etc… that we have done, it is my belief that our teachers have guided us to some sort of greater understanding of the city that most of us have lived our whole lives in (sorry to Midge, Alex, and any other person who might have been born elsewhere).  So,  without further adieu, I present my take away from the City of Angeles Class of 2015.

The City of Los Angeles that I know and love is really centered around Pasadena.  Other than water polo tournaments and the occasional DTLA outing, I rarely venture into "the city."  "The city" for me is really only a few buildings that I pass by on the way to LAX.  The question now becomes why?  Why are cities like New York, Boston, Chicago, etc… known for their bustling urban settings filled with life, vitality, and community while L.A. is know as a sprawling, laid back oasis with beaches, babes, and Hollywood?  There obviously is not one answer, but I think that L.A. Plays Itself has started to point me in one possible direction.

In L.A. Plays Itself, we see a city that is exploited and molded to fit whatever role that it needs to play.  It does not have one true character, but thousands of ever changing roles.  From the site of alien invasions to the home of a mobster to a place of unchecked lawlessness, L.A. is whatever the next movie director wants it to be.  When it comes to the movie industry, it has no identity; it is a place that can be whatever you want it to be as long as you are willing to pay the right price.  Although we have yet to finish the movie and do not know what conclusions are going to be drawn, I think that it is important to look at what L.A. is, if anything, outside of the movie business.

Los Angeles is a place where you can have six different styles of architecture on one street.  L.A. is the place where you can spend a relaxing and warm day on the beach in January.  It is the place where an ethnic enclave like Little Bangladeshi has almost no people of the Bangladeshi ethnicity living there.            
It is a place where freeways and cars are part of the culture.  It is a place with at least ten colleges in a fifty mile vicinity.  It is a place that is so much more than Hollywood and celebrities, and it is my hope that sometime in the future L.A. will be able to break away from its movie industry reputation.  

Hollywood: Hardly Working

From the books we've read this semester, it has become clear that work in Hollywood is a different kind of work.  Maybe it has something to do with the movie industry, or the laid-back attitude that everyone associates with the West Coast, but, regardless, both Nathanael West and Budd Schulberg argue that work here is unusual at best and nonexistent at worst.

For example, In Day of the Locust, hardly anyone works at all, despite the fact that Tod and Faye both have jobs in Hollywood.  Yet Faye is happier letting Homer dote on her (that is, until she gets bored of him and runs away with Miguel) and Tod is happy obsessing over Faye and envisioning Los Angeles in flames.  The jobless Homer, unable to put his restless hands to work, becomes anxious and destructive with nothing to do but stare at lizards.  Soon the citizens of Hollywood, unable to be satisfied by poorly-paying jobs, react similarly, all their aggression bubbling to the surface and culminating in the riot at the end of the book.

Similarly, in What Makes Sammy Run?, work is hard to find.  With Glicks who gained their status through manipulation and animalistic hunger at the top, the real workers are the ones who struggle to make ends meet. Back in New York, Al is content as a writer, but in Hollywood, he discovers that working traditionally gets you nowhere.  The multitude of writers who have come to Hollywood to work find themselves time and time again tricked by the industry and left with nothing to show for their honest efforts.  It seems that in Hollywood, the only way to get work done is the Glick way, by working the crowd.  

I wonder why manipulation and fakery has become such a trademark of Hollywood. Clearly, you could find Glicks anywhere, but West and Schulberg seem to argue that Hollywood seems to have an effect on its inhabitants, making them listless and scheming, or that it attracts those with Glick-ish tendencies. Today in class, we talked about how we have learned to take every movie, even the noblest “artistic” movies with a grain of salt, because we know what their main purpose is: to turn a profit in the same way the inevitable “Fast and Furious 23” will.  We have learned to be wary of what Hollywood tells us (even though we can’t help but consume it), because we know that entertainment is a business that loves manipulating its customers, luring them in with catchy titles and explosions and romance so that it can bolster its own paycheck.  

Clearly, people really do work hard in the entertainment industry (there are some movies that aren’t just sequels), but many people have the perception that those in entertainment are slimy, always looking for the easiest way to get the biggest pay, and I wonder how that has happened.  Why do we believe that the business of Hollywood discourages normal work-ethic, or that work doesn’t exist here?

Fame and Misfortune: Representation in Hollywood Cinema

One of the many things I can deduce from this semester of class is that Hollywood is the one topic everyone loves to hate. Our ideas have held strong that the movie business and everyone involved is simply as hollow and superficial as the facades that make up their movie sets. We have yet to put Hollywood in a positive light and our discussions usually end with our fingers pointing blame at Hollywood. The least attractive characters to the reader (yet most desirable in our text), like Faye from Day of the Locust, seem to represent Hollywood. Even in the documentary, Los Angeles Plays Itself, Thom Andersen blames the abbreviation of Los Angeles to L.A. on its portrayal in cinema. I believe it is important for us to recognize just why we feel this way about Hollywood. Is the movie industry that lies within Hollywood really that despicable?

While working on the character project, I have come across the vast perpetuation of social stereotypes in Hollywood Cinema. My avatar was an Asian American female who worked in the entertainment industry during the 1980-90s. From my research, I found that there were few positions for Asian females in Hollywood, except for their racist roles as characters in film. There was very little portrayal of Asians in film, but if they were shown, they were almost always used for two reasons: the Asian American male actors were portrayed as asexual and emasculate (usually as nerds or servants) but they most always know martial arts, and the Asian American females were shown as "Dragon Ladies" or exotic temptresses whose existence was only to serve the needs of white males. Both radiate derogatory characteristics that cater to the entertainment of white America. Even during our viewing of Los Angeles Plays Itself in class today, there was a clip of an Asian actor who walked into an office and instantly started karate chopping desks and roundhouse kicking the ceiling fan. Of course, this representation was used as a comical relief to the tension of the clip, but that does not justify the stereotypes that were used. Asian Americans were also never depicted as Americans, they were always cast for the role of foreigners, thus perpetuating the idea that Asian Americans are aliens in our country and that they do not belong.

Of course, their portrayal is very different now than it was in the past and Asians were not the only ones targeted (in fact, all minorities were shown in negative stereotypical roles), but that should not be overlooked from the vast history of Hollywood films. Only in recent time has the image of the Asian American started incorporating respectable roles and even main characters.

Hollywood films have widely exaggerated stereotypes and warped the public perception of the world. Far too often, the general public will assume that what is displayed in movies can be an authentic substitute for reality. For example, the film Zero Dark Thirty interprets the location and execution of Osama Bin Laden. Many who have seen the film seem to think that the exact strategies that were carried out in the movie were the same ones that the U.S. Government organized for the real-life situation.  Of course, this is completely false because the movie is simply a dramatization of the event and we cannot judge the actions of our government from the film. Another current example is the perception of North Korea in the film The Interview. The film has recently received scrutiny for not truthfully representing the oppression of the North Korean people. We must remember that this film was a comedy that featured the likes of Seth Rogen and James Franco, and should not be seen as accurate representation.

In the same regard, we cannot judge everything that Hollywood produces as fictional and appropriate. Hollywood has had a strong influence over American culture for the past century but we need to be conscious of how easily it can skew our views of people and events.

If He Hollers Let Him Go: Another Look at Racism

In If He Hollers Let Him Go, Alice’s philosophy differs from Bob’s on how to deal with racism. Alice seems to choose responsibility over standing up for her rights as a black woman, whereas the emotions that run through Bob make him choose to stand up for himself without fearing the consequences. By pitching these two views against each other, Himes has allowed even his most recent readers into a world we can now only read about.

Reading a novel published nearly seventy years ago about race tensions is not an easy task. Many students of our generation have grown up learning about the Civil Rights Movement and race tensions in the United States, and so when reading a novel that focuses on race we might begin with a mind already made up on the problem. Knowing that racism is a horrible blemish on America’s history,  many readers might tend to assume that in a novel such as If He Hollers Let Him Go, all of the oppressed strive towards the same goal because it would be foolish of them not to. Himes opens the minds of his readers by making all of his characters have different approaches to the problem of racial inequality. He complicates our view of racial tension in the 1940’s and thereby paints a more realistic picture of the struggles that so many people went through. His novel is not merely about race, it is about human nature.

As a reader, it may be easy to think that Alice’s approach to survival is selfish or irresponsible, but what Himes shows the reader that it is not a simple task to stand up for yourself, especially when doing so might put your job on the line, or even your life. Knowing how the Civil Rights Movement transpired makes it is hard for us to imagine how Alice thought her approach would be effective, but we must keep in mind that seventy years ago there was no right way to approach the problem of racism. In short, the question of whether Alice’s philosophy was correct cannot be answered because, as Himes shows through his novel, it is more complicated than that.
Himes again illustrates how complicated racial inequality was when he makes it hard to categorize his characters. They do not tend to follow the rules of the boundaries that Himes at first created, and this is troubling to the reader. Alice can go from socializing with people like Bob to white people, and the white sailors from the novel can go from having fun with other white people to having fun with people like Bob. Himes creates boundaries for his characters to cross and in doing shows the reader that the lines are more blurry than clear. He also shows that awkwardness always seems to follow a line being crossed. Alice found she could not mix the two categories she constantly crossed between when she was treated rudely in the hotel, and similarly Bob and the two sailors soon found that the line between them, though blurry, still existed as they suffered the awkward silence that followed spotting a suffering black woman.

My Wings: Racial Inequality in Los Angeles

            On November 13, 1946, Wanda Coleman was born into a Los Angeles that was recovering from segregation but barely covering any ground towards social or racial equality. Growing up in the 1950’s and 60’s Wanda Coleman felt ostracized, due in part to her appearance. She recalled, “Boys gawked at me, and girls tittered behind my back. Black teachers shook their heads in pity, and White teachers stared in amusement or in wonder.” Beyond the torture she experienced in her childhood, she also experienced the harsh contrast in status between African-Americans and whites in society at the time. Her father was a janitor, and her mother was a seamstress and housekeeper, sometimes working for Hollywood stars such as Ronald Reagan. With this background fueling her, Wanda reflected on her surroundings through poetry, which was often described as uncompromising, “take-no-prisoners” performances that brought you into her world.

            Despite feeling oppressed by the conditions in which she grew up, Wanda expressed herself in a way that refused to submit to the white pressure around her. Instead of lashing out against the whites or falling into a meek submission, Wanda was able to maintain her integrity by choosing this other form of expression. Although one can see Wanda’s style of writing and her form of expression as being at odds with that which the grandfather believes in, I find them similar in many ways. The grandfather in Ellison’s Invisible Man appears to be promoting a method of expression that may come across as meek, but is actually a strong form of defiance by not conforming to the mold that the whites want for him. He tells the grandson to “undermine ‘em with grins [and to] agree ‘em to death and destruction.” This method is neither lashing out nor resigning to submissiveness. It is creating a unique path that maintains one’s individual integrity, just like the method that Wanda takes on in her poetry.

            There seems to be a clear argument between these two pieces: rather than submit to the dominant white force, to follow a path that promotes one’s individual integrity and allegiance to personal background or culture. This relates back to the question we brought up in class—does the means justify the ends? The grandfather in Ellison would not think so. In Kurashige’s piece, Between “White Spot” and “World City,” LAPD officer turned city councilman, Tom Bradley, was described as having a career that was built upon alliances with whites. This raises the question – does achieving success require this seemingly unfavorable means? Or were these unique scenarios, that are now outdated?

            While both of these pieces are a commentary on the racial inequality present in Los Angeles, I question what they ask of the audience. Wanda writes in such a way that bluntly brings attention to the inequality inherent our society. However, rather than the poem coming across as a complaint, she seems to end her poem on a note of empowerment with the final line being, “my wings.” This echoes the first line that seems to state that such wings are necessary to rise above the oppression inherent in society. Is this piece a simple commentary on her personal life, or does she expect people of color in Los Angeles at large to find their wings, as well?

Two Roads, One Destination: Hollywood

Budd Schulberg was born in 1914 in New York City to B.P. Schulberg, a Hollywood mogul in the era before Hollywood moguls.  After moving his family to Hollywood after Budd’s birth, B.P. founded a production studio in 1919 backed by the “American Beauty” (but average actress) Katherine Macdonald.  Once this studio folded in 1925, the elder Schulberg waited an entire three days before signing on with Paramount Pictures, and the rest was history.

In an age when the rest of the nation was enamored with all that Hollywood had to offer, the younger Schulberg had an inside view to its dark side.  He quickly learned that for every success story, there were twice as many failures, failures that were probably unjust.  Because of what his father displayed, an un-ending desire to climb for no apparent reason, Budd became wanted to chronicle Hollywood, and unpack this foreign characteristic.  As we talked about in class, Al’s main drive throughout the novel is to find what drives Sammy, yet we can’t really analyze Sammy.  He exhibits no human emotions, and despite Al’s most faithful attempts to reach him through flattery, nostalgia, religion, kindness, humor, fatherly criticism, insult, psychology, patronization, silence, and ridicule, Sammy does not reveal his humanity.  Still, as Al takes on these very human qualities, he lags behind Sammy in Hollywood success, as apparently is necessary to succeed.  In just the first seven chapters, Sammy has all but bamboozled his way to the very top, while Al has been laid off.

Sammy’s character arc is B.P. Schulberg’s life on steroids.  The hyper-success Sammy achieves comes even quicker than it did to B.P. in his career, as Sammy only experiences meteoric, un-sustainable growth.  He cannot continue to grow at his current pace, and this is an aspect a young Budd Schulberg did not overlook in his father.  Despite the glory and money that come with Hollywood fame, it has a dirty secret: everyone falls.  Budd, even with his upbringing, knew the possible success to be had in Hollywood first hand, and wanted to pursue it full time, albeit without the necessary exuberance that his father had.  He wrote two screenplays, which were generally unsuccessful, before venturing into writing fiction, where he could step away from the limelight and unearth Hollywood, and his father for how they really were: emotionless.  The younger Schulberg tried to make a human out of his father, just as Al tries to with Sammy. He wants to project the good he seems to possess so abundantly onto those who aren’t so blessed.  At the same time, the hyper-driven characters like Sammy sympathize with the weaker ones such as Al, who cannot start to be successful in the real world.

 There is a clear schism between these two methods of thought, one better suited to success, and one better suited to rising and falling in the middle of the pack.  In Hollywood, the driven person rises to unseen success, but at what cost?  Eventually, even B.P. Schulberg was spat out by Hollywood, and his son completely financially supported him for the final five years of his life.  Even though Bud eventually returned to Hollywood for a short stint, his experiences with his father let him avoid an inevitable crash, and he stopped writing screenplays very quickly.   The bright lights of Hollywood allure even the most humble people again and again, but are very equal in choosing who to bring down: everybody.  Even so, B.P. has a star at 1500 Vine Street and Budd does not, which is how both would want it.

Cherchez La Femme: Roman Polanski's Chinatown

            Chinatown’s director Roman Polanski has a complicated relationship with Los Angeles. His wife, Sharon Tate, and his unborn daughter were both brutally murdered by devotees of Charles Manson in 1969. According to the coroner’s office, Tate had been stabbed sixteen times, and of those stabbings five “were in and of themselves fatal." Her neck was tied with a long rope to that of her hair stylist, also murdered. Police arrived on the scene to find the word “pig” (ostensibly a reference to the Beatles’ Little Piggies) smeared in her blood on the front door of the house. So, when producer Robert Evans came to Polanksi in London four years later to pitch Chinatown, one would understand his apprehension to return.

            Still, Polanski could not resist an opportunity to cut his teeth on what he called in his autobiography “a potentially first-rate thriller showing how the history and boundaries of L.A. had been fashioned by human greed.” Indeed, this description quite accurately fits Chinatown, but it seems that much of the trademark cynicism that pervades Polanksi’s take on noir is focused on the women of Los Angeles rather than its development. Evelyn Mulwray, for example, could so easily have been the menacing femme fatale Gittes initially suspects of killing her husband (screenwriter Robert Towne preferred Jane Fonda for the character because her looks fit the bill); instead, Polanski insisted on Faye Dunaway and reportedly cultivated her look to resemble memories of his mother. Dunaway’s Evelyn was soft, sophisticated, and left a resounding impression of selflessness unique among Chinatown’s cast of characters. Her angelic looks suggest a shame and victimization due to her incestuous relationship with her father that might have been absent had Towne had his way and casted Jane Fonda. Comparing her with Faye Dunaway almost evokes the leopard from Double Indemnity–not that Fonda’s Evelyn would be predatory but rather a product of her circumstances, someone whose humanity had been partially taken from her by the world she was born into.

Jane Fonda in 1963

            

Faye Dunaway in Chinatown

            After months of squabbling over their artistic differences, Robert Towne and Roman Polanski finally parted ways after a dispute over Chinatown’s final scene. Towne pleaded for a brighter ending without the death of Evelyn. Eager to eschew a melodramatic “adventure story for the kids” and perhaps more eager to express some of the darkness he felt in LA, Polanski instead forced him to redraft the scene:

"…Towne and I couldn't agree on an ending. Towne wanted the evil tycoon to die and his daughter, Evelyn, to live. He wanted a happy ending; all would turn out okay for her after a short spell in jail. I knew that if Chinatown was to be special, not just another thriller where the good guys triumph in the final reel, Evelyn had to die."

Ultimately, it seems Polanski was right. The tragic end is haunting and infuriating, driving home the theme of futility that cements Towne’s Chinatown as a microcosm of Los Angeles. Maybe there is some bias to account for since the film was so universally well received, but there must be more emotion evoked by “Forget it, Jake, it’s Chinatown” than “We did it, Jake, it’s Chinatown!” Perhaps his director’s eye saw this, or perhaps Roman Polanski was troubled at the thought that his return to Los Angeles four years after the death of his wife would have a happy ending. Robert Towne is of the second persuasion; he sums up Polanski’s last scene like this: “That's life. Beautiful blondes die in Los Angeles. Sharon had.”