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Biography

17 Hollywood Artists Who Were Blacklisted During the Red Scare

The Hollywood blacklist derailed the careers of Charlie Chaplin, Orson Welles, Lena Horne, and others over fears of their ties to the Communist Party.

By Catherine Caruso and Eudie Pak Updated: Mar 17, 2025 2:18 PM EDT

“Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?” was the $64,000 question asked by the notorious House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Between the late 1940s and 1950s, the Second Red Scare was an era marked by great fear that Communism was on the rise in the United States. Led by Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy, government officials accused hundreds of Americans of being members of the Communist Party or being sympathetic to the cause. Most of the people accused of treason and/or subversion were union workers, government employees, prominent intellectuals, and Hollywood artists.

Among those in the last category, actors, musicians, and writers accused of Communism had their careers derailed and, in some cases, even ruined after being named in the anti-Communist, right-wing publication Red Channels. From there, the Hollywood blacklist was born.

Although the blacklist wasn’t an official document, Hollywood studios informally agreed not to hire artists who refused to cooperate with HUAC’s investigations, essentially banning them from working in radio, film, and television. Here are some of the famous faces that were blacklisted in Hollywood and spied on during the Cold War era of McCarthyism.

Charlie Chaplin

The FBI referred to British actor and filmmaker Charlie Chaplin as a “parlour Bolshevik,” believing him to be a Communist sympathizer and a possible security risk to the country. Although Chaplin denied being a Communist, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover was determined to have the actor deported and worked with immigration services to prevent him from reentering the United States after he flew to London to promote one of his films. Hoover even had MI5 spy on Chaplin; in the end, the foreign agency concluded he was no security risk and, instead, believed he was merely a left-leaning progressive.

Still, Chaplin was banned from the United States. Instead of fighting to return to America, where he had lived for 40 years, Chaplin decided to make his home in Switzerland and released a statement about his experience:

“Since the end of the last world war, I have been the object of lies and propaganda by powerful reactionary groups who, by their influence and by the aid of America’s yellow press, have created an unhealthy atmosphere in which liberal-minded individuals can be singled out and persecuted. Under these conditions I find it virtually impossible to continue my motion-picture work, and I have therefore given up my residence in the United States.”

Orson Welles

Director, actor, and writer Orson Welles was at the peak of his professional career when the federal government began investigating him as a possible closeted Communist. His 1941 film Citizen Kane, whose main character starts out as an idealistic social servant and grows into a power-hungry manipulative capitalist, was considered evidence by the FBI that the movie was nothing but a smear campaign orchestrated by the Community Party. He was considered such a threat that the government had him on a list of people who should be apprehended in case of a national emergency.

Knowing he was being targeted by the FBI, Welles left the United States in 1948 and moved to Europe, where he lived for the next eight years. A decade later, he found his way of expressing his distaste for the Red Scare through the film noir Touch of Evil, which depicted crooked law enforcement who chose to abuse their power by pursuing witch hunts instead of protecting their fellow citizens.

Leonard Bernstein

“I am not now or at any time have ever been a member of the Communist Party,” so swore famed composer-conductor Leonard Bernstein on an affidavit. Still, the FBI was convinced he was a dangerous political subversive and spied on him for the next three decades, even getting him blacklisted at CBS and denying his request to renew his passport.

Having supported protestors of the Vietnam War and the activities of the Black Panthers, Bernstein was under the watchful eye of Hoover, who was determined to ruin his reputation, especially for supporting the Panthers. Like many other prominent figures in the entertainment industry, Bernstein was mentioned in the anti-Communist publication the Red Channels.

Lena Horne

Despite her talent, beauty, and fame in Hollywood, singer and actor Lena Horne was no stranger to racism and discrimination as a biracial woman. Her experience inspired her to become politically active, and many of the organizations she attended happened to include members who were radical leftists and Communists.

The FBI took notice and had her blacklisted from Hollywood, forcing her to spend a number of years touring as a nightclub singer to make a living. Determined to get her life and career back on track, Horne publicly denied she was affiliated with the Communist Party and wrote a series of letters to important individuals in Hollywood denouncing its ideology. Eventually, she was able to return to film and television and also produced hit records.

Still, her taste for politics wasn’t so easily intimidated. When the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s emerged, Horne was a prominent supporter of the cause.

Dalton Trumbo

Screenwriter Dalton Trumbo wrote the Academy Award–winning films Gun Crazy (1950), Roman Holiday (1953), and The Brave One (1956), yet he was unable to receive credit because of his blacklisted status. Instead, he had to sell his scripts under various pseudonyms.

Unlike many of his Hollywood colleagues, Trumbo was once a card-carrying member of the Communist Party. Still, when questioned by HUAC for his political ties, he defiantly refused to answer their questions and was subsequently held in contempt, thrown into federal prison for a year, and banned from the industry.

His excommunication didn’t turn out to be a life sentence, though. He returned to Hollywood’s good graces thanks to colleagues like actor Kirk Douglas and director Otto Preminger who were adamant Trumbo receive credit for his work in the 1960 movies Spartacus and Exodus.

Dorothy Parker

One of the wittiest writers of her time, critic and screenwriter Dorothy Parker got a real taste of activism when she was arrested at a 1927 political rally in support of Italian anarchists Bartolomeo Vanzetti and Nicola Sacco, who were tried and convicted of murder on dubious evidence.

Parker’s arrest inspired her to continue fighting for a number of political and activist causes, including the Screenwriters Guild and the Anti-Nazi League, which were considered “Communist fronts” by the FBI. Although Parker was never a member of the Communist Party, she was known to be sympathetic to its ideology and had no qualms associating with local organizations.

When McCarthyism was in full force, Parker was at the apex of her writing career. With her name on the blacklist, she was still able to get work but sensed her services weren’t in high demand. When FBI agents came to her house and questioned whether she was undermining the government, she promptly replied, “Listen, I can’t even get my dog to stay down. Do I look to you like someone who could overthrow the government?”

The writer was in her 60s when the FBI finally decided she wasn’t a potential national security threat.

Langston Hughes

Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes was known for his support of Communist groups in the United States and even traveled to the Soviet Union at one point to make a film. But he always denied being a member of the party, himself. Along with his affinity for Marxist ideas, Hughes’ leftist views were reflected in some of his poetry, which Communist newspapers in America often published. It was for all these reasons, Congress prompted him to testify.

When asked why he never became a member of the Community Party, Hughes wrote, “it was based on strict discipline and the acceptance of directives that I, as a writer, did not wish to accept.” In 1953, during his public testimony before McCarthy and the HUAC committee, he also added, “I never read the theoretical books of socialism or communism or the Democratic or Republican parties for that matter, and so my interest in whatever may be considered political has been non-theoretical, non-sectarian, and largely emotional and born out of my own need to find some way of thinking about this whole problem of myself.”

After testifying before Congress, Hughes pulled away from his associations with Communism and also became less political in his poetry.

Pete Seeger

A talented musician who helped define American folk music, Pete Seeger was blacklisted from performing on radio and television in the 1950s and ’60s because of his leftist political views.

Monitored by the FBI for years, Seeger was first flagged by the agency after he wrote a letter to the American Legion while serving in the Army in 1942. In the letter, he objected to the deportation and internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. Seeger joined the Communist Party later that year. In 1950, the singer was named in the Red Channels and subsequently dropped from his record label.

Five years later, Seeger was called to testify before the HUAC Committee, where he refused to plead the Fifth or answer any questions. As a result, he was indicted for contempt of Congress. In 1961, the singer was found guilty and sentenced to a year in prison, but his case was later dismissed on appeal.

Seeger remained blacklisted until 1967 when he performed on the variety show The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.

Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller was a prominent playwright known for such works as All My Sons and Death of a Salesman when he was accused of being a Communist sympathizer. The HUAC Committee took an interest in Miller following the 1953 opening of his celebrated play The Crucible, based on the Salem witch trials. The following year, the U.S. State Department denied him a passport to see the premiere of The Crucible in Brussels.

In 1956, the same year he married Marilyn Monroe, Miller was subpoenaed by the HUAC Committee but refused to provide names of suspected Communist writers he knew. “When I say this I want you to understand that I am not protecting the Communists or the Communist Party. I am trying to and I will protect my sense of myself,” he said during his testimony. “I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him.”

Miller was found in contempt of court and was later sentenced to a $500 fine and 30 days in jail. However, his conviction was overturned by a federal appeals court in 1958. While the writer was blacklisted from Hollywood for several years, his plays still appeared on Broadway.

Lee Grant

Rising star Lee Grant had just made her film debut in Detective Story when she gave a eulogy that would upend her career. Grant, who earned an Oscar nod for her performance, spoke out about the Red Scare at her c0-star J. Edward Bromberg’s funeral in 1951.

Bromberg suffered a fatal heart attack shortly after he was accused of being a Communist, and Grant claimed the investigation into his political ties contributed to his death. Her then-husband, screenwriter Arnold Manhoff, was also under investigation at the time for being a suspected member of the Communist Party.

Two days after she delivered her impassioned eulogy, the actor’s name was added to the Red Channels. Grant refused to testify against Manhoff in exchange for the removal of her own name and was blacklisted from Hollywood for 12 years. During this time, she worked as an acting teacher and took on a few live TV roles.

In 1964, Grant’s agent did a favor for the head of the HUAC Committee, which ultimately lifted Grant’s industry ban. The following year, she landed a recurring role in the popular series Peyton Place, which later won her an Emmy.

Lillian Hellman

Playwright and screenwriter Lillian Hellman was an outspoken leftist whose dramas often tackled themes of discrimination, greed, and injustice. Following the revival of her play The Children’s Hour, about societal paranoia around homosexuality, Hellman was subpoenaed in 1952 to testify about her ties to the Communist Party. While she wasn’t a formal member, she attended several meetings in the mid-1930s.

In a letter to the HUAC’s chairman, the writer insisted that she would only answers questions about herself. “To hurt innocent people whom I knew many years ago in order to save myself is, to me, inhuman and indecent and dishonorable,” she wrote. “I cannot and will not cut my conscience to fit this year’s fashions.”

During her public testimony, Hellman invoked her Fifth Amendment rights in response to several questions before being dismissed. She was blacklisted from the film industry soon after, and for the next decade, she exclusively stuck with theater. Hellman didn’t return to Hollywood until 1966 when she wrote her final screenplay for The Chase.

John Garfield

Known for his portrayal of rebels, actor John Garfield appeared in nearly 30 movies until his successful career was cut short in 1950. A self-described New Deal Democrat, Garfield protested the Red Scare early on. In 1947, he joined the Committee for the First Amendment, whose members included Lucille Ball and Humphrey Bogart, and performed in the two-part “Hollywood Fights Back” radio program.

After the Garfield’s name appeared in the Red Channels, however, he could no longer find work in Hollywood. He defended his reputation before Congress in 1951 but ended up perjuring himself when he claimed to not know any Communists. His old theater group had ties to the Communist Party, and his wife, Robbe Seidman, was a former member.

A few months after his testimony, Garfield’s final film, He Ran All the Way, was sneakily distributed in theaters by Charlie Chaplin’s United Artists. The following year, Garfield died of a heart attack at age 39.

Burl Ives

Folk singer and actor Burl Ives was blacklisted from radio and film after he was accused of having Communist ties in 1950. Unlike many of his contemporaries, however, he cooperated fully with the HUAC Committee’s investigation. Appearing as a so-called “friendly” witness, Ives insisted that he no longer had ties to Communism.

“The only affiliation that I have had with Communism was back in the spring of 1944; I went to some open meetings, discussion meetings of an organization called the Communist Political Association,” he said in 1952. Ives’ testimony effectively ended his blacklisting but it alienated him from the rest of the folk music community, who saw his willingness to testify as a betrayal.

Judy Holliday

Judy Holliday had just won an Oscar for Born Yesterday when she was investigated for having Communist sympathies. Having grown up in a Jewish family with socialist political beliefs, Holliday was no stranger to Communism.

Interrogated by the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee for her progressive views in 1952, Holliday, who was known for her intellect, embodied her Oscar-winning role of Billie Dawn and played dumb to avoid persecution. Narrowly sidestepping questions, she feigned innocence regarding pictures of her with suspected Communists and rebuked herself for not being the wiser. “I have been awakened to a realization that I have been irresponsible and slightly—more than slightly—stupid,” Holliday said in her testimony. While the actor was blacklisted from radio and television for three years, she continued to work in the film industry uninterrupted.

Gypsy Rose Lee

Burlesque dancer and actor Gypsy Rose Lee became politically active after living through the hardships of the Great Depression. Known as an “intellectual stripper,” Lee attended Communist United Front meetings and supported the left-leaning Spanish loyalists during the Spanish Civil War.

Because of her views, she was investigated by the HUAC Committee and blacklisted from radio and television. While she continued to perform burlesque, she didn’t make a comeback in Hollywood until the late 1950s.

Dashiell Hammett

The longtime partner of Lillian Hellman, author Dashiell Hammet also got caught up in the Red Scare. Hammett, who wrote screenplays and acclaimed detective novels such as The Maltese Falcon, was active in various leftist organizations, including the Communist Party.

He was also the chairman of the Civil Rights Congress, which was labeled a “Communist front” by the FBI. In 1951, he was arrested for refusing to provide the names of people who had contributed to the group’s bail bond fund. Hammett was found guilty of contempt of court and served six months in prison.

The writer was investigated again in 1953, this time for his personal ties to Communism. Hammett testified before the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations but didn’t name names. He was subsequently labeled “subversive” and blacklisted from Hollywood.

Uta Hagen 

German-American actor Uta Hagen was surveilled by the FBI for six years, starting in 1950. Hagen, who started her career in theater, was targeted largely because of her relationship with her Othello co-star Paul Robeson, a suspected Communist sympathizer. After being named in the Red Channels, her film and television opportunities dried up for several years. Hagen eventually made it to the big screen, but by then, her career had lost momentum.

Recalling her experience with McCarthyism in her 1991 book A Challenge For The Actor, she wrote: “It was the only time in my life when I was made fearful or felt that I had lost control over my own destiny. And for that, I have the right to remain outraged!”

Catherine Caruso

Associate Profiles Editor

Catherine Caruso joined the Biography.com staff in August 2024, having previously worked as a freelance journalist for several years. She is a graduate of Syracuse University, where she studied English literature. When she’s not working on a new story, you can find her reading, hitting the gym, or watching too much TV.

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