Pro-communist writers, actors, and filmmakers on the “Hollywood blacklist” of the 1940s and 1950s have in recent years gotten positive press. The blacklist itself is now often viewed as an example of government censorship, a product of the heavy-handed tactics of the now-defunct House Un-American Activities Committee, which aimed to ban and suppress communist movements in the United States.
But the situation is more complicated than these current views admit. History shows many on the blacklist may have been placed there for good reason, since many were revealed to have worked as Soviet agents, and shaped pro-communist narratives through film.
