FBI File: Hollywood and J. Edgar Hoover: Communists in the Motion Picture Industry
J. Edgar Hoover (1895-1972), the first director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, held longstanding interest in the Hollywood film industry as well as deep distrust of anyone on the political left. In August 1942 he ordered the bureau’s Los Angeles office to report on “Communist Infiltration of the Motion Picture Industry.” Various FBI reports chronicled the working of major film studios such as MGM, Paramount, RKO, and Warner Brothers, including studio management and labor union power struggles. The FBI's investigation of Hollywood resulted in many thousands of pages and show a growing operation organized in the early 1940s that continued throughout the Cold War. Subjects include: American Federation of Labor; Communist International; front organizations; Council of Hollywood Guilds and Unions; Screen Directors Guild; Screen Office Employees Guild; Screen Cartoonists Guild; Screen Writers Guild; Joint Anti-Fascist Refugee Committee; Hollywood Ten; FBI support of anticommunist organizations; Humphrey Bogart; Charles Chaplin; Cecil B. DeMille; Katharine Hepburn; Gary Cooper; Frank Sinatra; among other topics.