Class Notes - February 10, 1999
Class notes features
Blacklisted screenwriter Ring Lardner,
Jr. '36
A reissue of the book he researched in prison commemorates the 50th
anniversary of the blacklist
With its book-crammed shelves and family photographs, the New York study
of Ring Lardner Jr. '36 looks like any writer's home, until you notice the
two gold statuettes standing unobtrusively on a glass shelf. They are the
Oscars -- for the Katharine Hepburn-Spencer Tracy classic Woman of the
Year, in 1942, and the dark Korean War comedy M*A*S*H, in 1970
-- that bracket a distinguished screenwriting career with an 18-year hole
in its heart.
In 1947, Lardner became one of the first victims of the Hollywood blacklist, which forced left-leaning screenwriters -- some, like Lardner, members of the Communist Party -- to hide behind false names, if they worked at all. A year ago, to mark the blacklist's 50th anniversary, Prometheus Books republished Lardner's comic novel, The Ecstasy of Owen Muir, which he researched while serving 10 months in federal prison. His crime was contempt of Congress -- like his fellow members of the "Hollywood Ten," Lardner refused to tell the House Committee on Un-American Activities whether he was a Communist. "I could answer the question the way you want, Mr. Chairman," Lardner told his questioner, "but I'd hate myself in the morning."
The HUAC hearings braked an accelerating career. Within nine years of dropping out of Princeton -- he had spent his two years there playing cards and getting Cs -- Lardner had shared the Oscar for Woman of the Year, and the $100,000 writers' fee Hepburn had negotiated. When the HUAC subpoena arrived, Lardner had recently signed a $2,000-a-week studio contract.
In 1950, the Hollywood Ten exhausted their appeals, and Lardner began his relatively painless prison term. "Most of the prisoners, who didn't quite understand what we had done, knew it had something to do with not talking to the cops, and they approved of that," Lardner says.
In the years between his testimony and his imprisonment, Lardner had kept writing, under aliases, for producers who disapproved of the blacklist -- or who knew that because of it they could get top writers for bargain prices. "When we came back to Hollywood in 1951, it was an entirely different situation," says Lardner, who by then had drifted away from the Communist Party. "Nobody would touch us. McCarthy had come on the scene, and the hysteria was at its worst."
Over the next few years, Lardner and his family lived in Mexico and then Connecticut, as he worked on Owen Muir. The novel, a black comedy about the marriage between a less-than-observant Catholic-born woman and a zealous convert, was rejected by American publishers -- one told Lardner parochial schools might boycott that publisher's textbooks if it bought his book. Although an English company finally published it in 1954, "it all convinced me that I was not going to make a living, or the kind of living I needed to make, by writing novels," Lardner says. He turned to television, writing under aliases until the late 1950s, when the Hollywood blacklist softened enough for him to return -- anonymously -- to screenwriting.
Not until The Cincinnati Kid, in 1965, did Lardner get another screen credit, and not until M*A*S*H did he enjoy the success he had tasted after Woman of the Year. Even then, many of his scripts never made it to the screen: His last film appeared in 1977.
"I was allowed to choose my own projects, and I tended to choose the ones which were least commercial but covered material that I thought movies should be written about," Lardner says. "In the end, the studios didn't agree." Lardner was working on one of those never-to-be-produced scripts when he was asked to write a pilot for the M*A*S*H television series. He declined; Larry Gelbart was chosen. "He did a very good job, and he's much richer than I am," Lardner says.
Since then, Lardner has published another novel and a family memoir, and he is finishing a new book combining autobiography with meditations on everything from politics to old age. He does not feel cheated by the blacklist, he says: Without it, he might never have tried other kinds of writing. Still, getting the Oscar for M*A*S*H was a sweet moment. "It was very gratifying when I went up to receive it," Lardner says, "because there was more applause than there usually is for a writer's award."
-- Deborah Yaffe
At some point during my P-i-A internship, I learned to stop worrying and love Malaysia. I think it might have been during the Thaipusam Festival.
A Hindu festival, Thaipusam is a national holiday in Malaysia, and many Malaysians point to it as an example of their country's cultural diversity. Officially, Malaysia is a Muslim country, but the breadth of its racial and religious diversity is truly astounding. Muslim Malays make up about 55 percent of the population of West Malaysia, followed by a sizable population of ethnic Chinese and a smaller, but equally visible, population of ethnic Indians. At the university, students and teachers alike spout the view that Malaysia is a true multiracial, multiethnic utopia.
While the "utopia" part is far from true, the often uneasy mingling of the races and religions results in a fascinating mix. Even in a country on the verge of full development, strong ethnic minorities and the official majority preserve and morph old traditions, creating a volatile Malaysian character.
Thaipusam originated in India to honor Lord Subramaniam, the principal Hindu diety, and takes place in January or February, depending on the Hindu calendar. Malaysia's biggest celebration is in Kuala Lumpur, but that in Penang runs a close second. Spectators, including many tourists, flock outside of Georgetown to watch the participants make the arduous trek from the Sri Mariamman Temple in town, down Waterfall Road, then up the many stairs to the Nattukotai Temple, which sits high on a hill.
Following the advice of my colleagues at the university in Penang, we arrived in town before five in the morning. A few blocks from the Nattukotai Temple, the traffic was at a standstill, so we got off the bus and began to walk. The main road was closed for the procession, and the side streets were clogged with booths, food stalls, and makeshift plywood altars lit with carnival lights. Tamil music, with its hypnotic beat and neverending wail, blared from speakers, and the steady rhythm of drums provided a backbeat to the day. As the devout passed by, spectators smashed coconuts on the ground as a kind of cleansing ritual. We made our way down the greasy street, the sweet smell of rotting husks mingling with the jasmine incense that burned from every altar. It was a hazy morning to begin with, and the clouds of incense stayed closed to the ground, making the heat more suffocating and the lights more dazzling.
The devout perform acts of masochism during the procession to the temple as a kind of penance to show appreciation for answered prayers during the previous year. For some, this means carrying a large paalkadam, a pot filled with milk. For others, the definition of masochism is a little more extreme. We'd been told to get to the temple so early because this was when devotees would gather to pierce themselves with metal hooks and kavadis, elaborate lattices of metal rods that pierce the skin of the back and chest.
When the participants are prepared for the piercing, they're surrounded by fellow believers who chant, "Vel! Vel! Vel!" in an everincreasing orgy of sound that climaxes as the spear pierces the skin. The devout go into a kind of semilucid trance. As long as they maintain the trance, they appear to feel no pain, and the wounds do not bleed. One youth had a footlong rod piercing his face. After the piercing, he calmly stood, unable to close his mouth because the rod stuck horizontally out of each cheek, almost like cruel bit on a horse. He slowly tipped his head back and poured water from a plastic bottle down his throat, then turned his attention to the procession. Another man had hooks inserted in the skin on his back. The hooks were attached to ropes, and as he walked toward the temple, a friend walked behind him, pulling the ropes and stretching the other's skin like a sheet of rubber.
The Nattukotai, or Waterfall Temple, in Penang is situated on a hill, so spectators and participants alike have to work their way up hundreds of stairs to get to the entrance. Muslim mosques are known for their clean and simple lines, but Hindu temples are so artfully cluttered they are almost alive. They are crowded with layers of figures representing the gods and goddesses in the brightest blues, pinks, and yellows. When the participants got to the entrance, they were cheered by the crowds as drums continued to pound. Once inside, friends or family members helped remove their piercings. Their penance was fulfilled for that year, and they deposited their kavadi or kadaam at the foot of Lord Subramaniam's image. By this point, many were coming out of their trances, and screams of pain punctuated the air.
Banned in India
Participating in Thaipusam is certainly not a requirement for Hindus. It's been banned in India, and most of the people I met in Malaysia will never participate. Still, Malaysia's celebration is among the largest in the world, and it has become less a strictly Hindu affair and more a distinctly Malaysian one, celebrated by Hindus and non-Hindus alike. This is the thing to appreciate about Thaipusam after the shock of the spectacle has eased. An extreme Hindu ritual, no longer practiced in the homeland of Hinduism, lives on as a national holiday in Malaysia, a country dominated by the austerity of Islam. Malaysia may have many rules, but it has just as many exceptions. It took me a while to understand and still longer to embrace, but the exceptions explain Malaysia better than the rules ever could.
-- Kerrie Mitchell '97
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