There Is No Unified, Evil ‘Hollywood’

There you go again, Howard! Not just Jaclyn Smith this time, but all of us (“Is the GOP Getting the Last Laugh?,” by Howard Rosenberg, Calendar, Sept. 2). “Mean-spirited political punch lines” at the Emmys? Is the pot calling the kettle black?

Many might agree the Emmys were too long and the award structure needs revision, but endorsing the outrageous and unwarranted Bush-Quayle political attack on the creative community is willful misuse of a television critic’s word processor.

“Hollywood is a liberal--code for extremist --monolith,” Rosenberg writes. Shades of Joe McCarthy! Are you going to name names, Howard? How many liberals have you uncovered this week at Universal?

“This monolith is biased against the Republicans. . . .” Paranoid! But maybe understandable in a year that nothing’s working for the Republicans.

”. . . and, parenthetically, biased against the so-called traditional values that many Americans supposedly espouse. . . .”

What is this evil “Hollywood”? Is it a place on the map? I doubt it. Warner Bros. is in Burbank--surely there must be liberals there too. And what about liberals in New York or San Francisco? Ted Turner and Jane are in Atlanta--surely we can’t count them out. No, it can’t be a location.

Is it the entertainment industry? Maybe. But who does that include? Is it only writers, producers and directors? No, Candice Bergen is an actor--it has to include her. But so is Arnold Schwarzenegger . . . and Charlton Heston . . . and Bruce Willis and . . . well, let’s just say all actors are not liberal.

What is a monolith anyway? Sounds scary.

monolith, n. something made of a single block of stone. something like a monolith in size, unity of structure or purpose.

That’s it, isn’t it, Howard. According to Bush-Quayle-Rosenberg, “Hollywood”--the American entertainment industry--is a single block of people with unity of purpose, and that purpose is to destroy traditional American values.

Nonsense! Rubbish!

There is no unified “Hollywood.” Diane English doesn’t check with me before writing a show (I’ve never even met her). Candice Bergen doesn’t call up Kirstie Alley to make sure they’re united behind “the purpose.”

Television’s creative people are a complex, diverse amalgam of free-thinking individuals in competition with each other for limited hours of network time or the few choice roles available to thousands of actors. Our political views run the gamut like any other cross-section in the country.

What does unite us is an outrageous attack on creative freedom and pontification of a “right” way to life. If liberal means tolerance of diversity, whether that be races, religions or lifestyles, then being liberal is American to the core in the tradition of those who founded our country based on tolerance of differences.

If so many took a shot at Dan Quayle on the Emmys, it was Quayle who brought it on. He has stood before television cameras day in and day out since last May blasting “Hollywood” and the “cultural elite” and deriding Murphy Brown for having a child outside of marriage. The Emmys were the first opportunity to respond, and respond they did. (I hear the trial lawyers are thinking of organizing their own awards show.)

Quayle talks to Murphy Brown as if she’s a real person. She’s a character, Dan. Candice Bergen is the real person. She may not be anything like Murphy.

If the vice president is so concerned with the influence of fictional characters maybe he’d better take a look at friend Arnold’s “Terminator,” who mows down dozens of cops at a time! Talk about law and order. Get real, Dan!

Finally, Howard, when you suggest that a few hundred thousand voters might carry negative Emmy memories with them into their polling places in November and make the difference in a close election, you grossly underestimate the American people.

The country is stagnated by years of economic neglect. Millions are unemployed. Everyone else fears they may be next. And you think people will vote because they didn’t like a joke on the Emmys?

You’re attacking the wrong people and the wrong issues, Howard. The American voter won’t make the same mistake.