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Stars Answered the Call to Duty in World War II

Many entertainers signed up to serve

Sunday, April 6, 2003
By Lynn Smith
Los Angeles Times Staff

HOLLYWOOD, Cal.
The most thrilling part of the 1943 Academy Awards ceremony, wrote columnist Louella Parsons, had nothing to do with the Oscars. Rather, it was the sight of two dreamboats -- Tyrone Power and Alan Ladd -- in their private’s uniforms, marching onto the stage after the national anthem.

The movie stars presented the flag, along with a list of 27,677 names -- all members of the motion picture industry who also had signed up for the armed forces.

Today, it’s hard to imagine stars such as Ben Affleck or Josh Hartnett signing up for a tour of duty in Iraq.

But in world War II -- a vastly different and larger conflict -- everyone in Hollywood was expected to pitch in and support the war effort.

By the war’s end, some people estimated that as many as 40,000 industry members had served the military in jobs ranging from boatswain’s mate (Cesar Romero) to air combat intelligence officer (Henry Fonda).

Directors, including John Ford, John Huston and William Wyler, flew in combat to make documentaries. Glamorous stars sold war bonds, or entertained the troops. And some of the most dashing heartthrobs, such as James Stewart and Clark Gable, saw action in Europe and the Pacific.

People who appeared to resist joining up risked damaging their careers. Lew Ayres, a pacifist since he starred in the war film All quiet on the Western Front, prompted some theaters to ban his films when he declared himself a conscientious observer in 1942.

“After Pearl Harbor, everyone rushed to their local military recruitment officer to go enlist and fight in the war,” says Robert Thompson, former president of the Popular Culture Association. “After 9/11, the patriotic thing to do was see a play, buy shoes, get back to business as usual. That sense that everybody become a citizen soldier when the time was needed went away after World War II.”

The war years were golden ones for Hollywood, with film production and movie attendance at all-time highs.

Military authorities analyzed every profession to see how best people in all walks of life could serve.

“The conclusion was that people love their movie stars. The U.S. Military actually had a policy in which they did not want movie stars to enlist and fight,” says Paul Livinson, communications professor at Fordham University in New York.

They thought it was far more valuable to the military to have stars act in movies, or entertain the troops.”

Hollywood didn’t hesitate to turn movie marquees into recruiting tools. When perhaps the nation’s most popular actor, Stewart, was inducted into the Army Air Force as a private in 1941, he had starred in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), and won an Oscar for The Philadelphia Story (1940).

With his boy-next-door personality, he drew thousands of new recruits through recruiting films, such as Winning Your Wings.

Stewart, descended from a long line of soldiers and already a trained pilot, became a B-17 bomber pilot who flew 20 combat missions and commanded his own squadron. He won the Distinguished Flying Cross for a raid on a German aircraft factory, the Croix de Guerre and seven battle stars. And after the war he remained in the Air Force Reserves, retiring in 1968 as a brigadier general, the highest ranking actor in military history.

Gable ventured into the line of fire as well. In 1942, as vice chairman of the Hollywood Victory Committee, he had arranged for his wife, Carole Lombard, to go on a bond tour. When her plane crashed and she was killed, Gable, 41, was devastated.

He enlisted in the Army Air Force, where he flew five missions to help produce an aerial-gunner recruitment film. Each of Gable’s planes was hit. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air Medal.

Many of Hollywood’s best directors also jumped into the action to film what have become legendary documentaries.

As an officer in the U.S. Navy, Hollywood’s most honored director, John Ford (1940's The Grapes of Wrath) filmed several, including one that traced the key naval battle of the Pacific, 1942's The Battle of Midway.

John Huston (1941's The Maltese Falcon) flew in combat in the northern Pacific, and his documentary San Pietro showed a battle in which more than 1,100 Allied soldiers were killed. He was awarded the Legion of Merit.

William Wyler (1959's Ben Hür), a major in the U.S. Army Air Corps, directed The Memphis Belle, about the 25th and last bombing mission of a B-17.

And Frank Capra produced the seven-part Why We Fight propaganda series (1943) that was used as an Army training film before its theatrical release. Capra (1946's It’s a Wonderful Life) received the Distinguished Service Medal, the highest award given for nonmilitary action.

Many prominent stars who continued to act in war-era movies took exemptions from active military duty because of age, heart ailments, or poor eyesight.

John Wayne, renowned as a star of gung-ho war movies, such as 1944's The Fighting Seabees, was exempt for having an impaired shoulder and four children. Humphrey Bogart, born in 1899, was too old; he already had served in World War I.

After the war, Hollywood stars came home to a changed world.

Stewart returned in 1945 and continued acting, but with a more somber persona. Even his best-loved role in It’s a Wonderful Life added darker shadings to his pre-war screen image.

Gable returned to Hollywood a very old-looking 44. He produced his recruitment film , although the military told him it no longer was needed. Depressed, he began drinking and taking long motorcycle rides. He made films until his death in 1960, but never regained the box-office standing he had before the war.

Director George Stevens, who had photographed the liberation of the Dachau concentration camp, turned from comedies (1943's The More the Merrier) to more serious films, such as Giant and The Diary of Anne Frank.

Power, who had flown in supplies and carried out casualties for the Marines in Iwo Jima and Okinawa, remained in the reserves the rest of his life and reached the rank of major in 1957. He began taking more serious roles, starring in The Razor’s Edge in 1946 to mixed reviews, and Nightmare Alley in 1947 to good reviews, but a dismal box office.

He died of a heart attack at 44, at the end of a sword fight sequence while filming Solomon and Sheba (1956). He was buried with full military honors.

War movies gradually became less sanitized and more realistic, starting with films about the war’s real heroes, such as Audie Murphy, the nation’s most decorated soldier. (Murphy subsequently took up acting and appeared in 40 movies).

The public’s fascination with World War II has persisted to the present. One reason, says Peter Bardazzi, a specialist in war movies at New York University, is that, in those movies, the United States is always undefeatable.

In those movies, he says, “You could think of a war that was all good. The good guys did a good job with their backs to the wall, and the actors were all in it together.”

Regardless of their sincerity, it’s different for celebrities now to approach the commitment of the World War II stars using words alone, Bardazzi says.

“James Stewart did something meaningful. That’s a powerful thing. When he got into a fighter plane, he didn’t have to say anything.”
(Source: The Columbus Dispatch)

No cut-n-paste this time,
Dan
--ps--
And leave us not forget a personal favorite of mine.