HOLLYWOOD’S DICTATOR

Greymouth Evening Star, 26 April 1938, Page 10

HOLLYWOOD’S DICTATOR

■ SUPREME FILM CENSOR. No single man in the world has mere power in determining what goes into your cinema than a husky, twofisted Irishman named Joe BreenJoseph Ignatius Breen, as Catholic and as Irish as they make ’em, is America’s supreme film censor and tlte right-hand man of Will Haye (says Film Weekly). One of the toughest, eggs in Hollywood. it has been claimed for him that, he has never yet lost a single light to a finish, verbal or otherwise, and that he “can ou-tshout the pick ci Hollywood hog-callers-’’ Breen is the one man in the film business who has tried out-arguing the Schenck brothers, Sam Goldwyn, the Warners, Adolph Zukor, Harry Colin and Darryl Zanuck —and come out on top. Charged by Lens of millions of Catholics, Protestants, and Jews to keep pictures clean. Breen has put on a magnificent one-man performance in Hollywood, frequently arguing a comparatively small point for hours on endWill Hays watched Breen handle a strikers' protest meeting-—and at t ime offered him a job. It happened rm a sweltering evening in New York- in July. 1934. The Hays organition was at its wit’s end to know how to reconcile Hie mutually exclusive demands of one public avid of sensation and tiitilation and another righteously determined to exclude certain basic, emotions and their expression from Ameiica’s 14,000 screens. H was estimated that, the militant ‘‘Legion of Decency’’ in its campaign to boycott the films its inspirers rej garded as indecent and unchristian were bringing pressure on more than sixty-five million people. The producers were in a panic; weekly attendances at America’s j cinemas hud fallen, within a very short time, by over fifteen millions. Joseph Breen just talked to them, and he talked eloquently and savagely. He told them that reforms and small mud ill cations wouldn't, be enough., and that, the press, pulpit, amt public were it) a really dangeious mood. They alp out of his band, because they knew that what he said was t rue. Shortly alter this, they .themselves ] got. together 1.0 organise joint action j to purity pictures, and elected Joseph - Ignatius Breen to be their “Lord High l-au ilier”—Hollywood's all-powerful “Decency Dictator.”

Himself a very religious man, Breen tries to preserve a reasonable and' moderate cum sc. So many protests conic hi from cranks find extremists of every kind IhSt? one' day, in despfcr?tioii. lie .said: “Pretty soon the movies will have to eliminate’ all villains and have'entire casts 'of heroes.” A continued believer in the Catholic view of life, he has no hesitation •in encouraging propaganda in pictures, propaganda for religion generally and for Catholicis specifically. You remember the athletic priest; who knocks out .Gable in one of those ’‘friendly .set-to’s” in San Francisco?! Spencer Tracy didn’t want to play that role, anti, 'believe it or not, Nat Pendleton, determined to put himself over as a serious actor, was very much in the running for if.

TOLSTOY VICTORY. But. Joe Breen knew the risk of having a priest laughed at on .the screen; we occasionally laugh with

Spencer Tracey, never at him. Spencer Tracy played' tfie part- ;. > Another of Breen’s diplomatic victories was the white-washing of Tol--1 stoy's “Resurrection,” in the Gold--1 wyn-Sten version which made -the screens under 1-1 ie name We* Live. I Again. Breen himself‘-was -inclined to be broadminded about it; but the censors in many American States wanted to slash it to bits. After hectic talks with Sam Gpldwyn, who was a bit sore and said that he’s made the picture strictly-accord-' ing Lo J tie's.nations of decency, Breen went East and after some immense battles won a complete victory, and got the picture shown almost exactly as it left ihe cutting-room-A bespectacled, twp-fi(sted giant, , Joe Breen has become one of the most . powerful men behind the scenes in the United States. He himself is an . amiable, extremely conscientious, and- 1 quiet burgher. i • To understand him, stand by the - door of the Church of The Good Shep- i herd in Beverly Hills any Sunday morning. Rain, sleet, fog or shine, ii

Joe Breen, Mary Breen, and the six little Breens—Helene, Natalie, Joseph Junior, Frances, James, and Thomas —troop in religiously. They never miss. That's the sort of man Joe Breen