Interview (Video): Dalton Trumbo

Here’s a treat: Some interviews with screenwriter Dalton Trumbo. We will be hearing more about this significant figure in American movie history over the next few months as the biopic Trumbo is slated to be released on November 6. Here is some background from Wikipedia on Trumbo:

James Dalton Trumbo (December 9, 1905 — September 10, 1976) was an American screenwriter and novelist. As one of the Hollywood Ten, he refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1947 during the committee’s investigation of Communist influences in the motion picture industry. Trumbo won two Academy Awards while blacklisted; one was originally given to a front writer, and one was awarded to “Robert Rich”, Trumbo’s pseudonym.

Blacklisting effectively ended in 1960 when it lost credibility. Trumbo was publicly given credit for two blockbuster films: Otto Preminger made public that Trumbo wrote the screenplay for the smash hit, Exodus, and Kirk Douglas publicly announced that Trumbo was the screenwriter of Spartacus. Further, President John F. Kennedy crossed American Legion picket lines to see the film.

On December 19, 2011, the Writers Guild of America announced that Trumbo was given full credit for his work on the screenplay of the 1953 romantic comedy Roman Holiday, almost sixty years after the fact.

Here is a January 1959 interview with Trumbo which any fan of Hollywood history absolutely has to watch. When asked by the interviewer Bill Stout if he can prove he wrote the screenplay for the 1956 movie The Brave One, Trumbo produces an actual script for “The Bull and the Boy,” the original title for the project, and says this:

There’s no problem proving all this shit, the problem with Hollywood has been to admit all this shit.

Classic Trumbo. Check out this rare video:

More Trumbo: A late 1960s appearance on a TV show on KHJ (Channel 9) I used to watch as a teenager, hosted by Stan Bohrman:

Here is an audio clip of a 50 minute speech given by Trumbo at UCLA on May 17, 1972:

Here is the website for the movie Trumbo.

Finally, to watch the PBS “American Masters” episode on Dalton Trumbo, featuring more rare footage and focusing on the Blacklist, go here.