Kenneth Anger’s Explosive ‘Hollywood Babylon’ Means More Than You Think

Yet despite all the misinformation and outright nonsense, this searing piece of juicy scandal continued for decades, and Wrath even updated the book for its 1975 reprint. The success of the book prompted Anger to publish another volume of hot stories, Hollywood Babylon 2, in 1984. Anger, too, once promised a third volume, but with his recent death, the tripartite debauchery of the celebrity world never materialized. So how did a book based on so many outrageous anecdotes and myths manage to maintain such a prominent place in pop culture? The answer is simple: as much as moviegoers love their stars, they love it even more when those stars fall, and Hollywood Babylon it’s the missile that shoots them all down.

Kenneth Anger: From Queer Film Visionary to Gossip Spreader

To understand how Hollywood Babylon appeared, and in order to understand its enduring popularity, it is important to know more about its author. Kenneth Anger, who died on May 11 at the age of 96, was a pioneer in the world of avant-garde queer cinema. Born in Santa Monica, California in 1927, Anger began telling stories at a young age. He claimed to be a child actor who appeared in the 1935 film version. A dream in a summer night With Mickey Rooney, but Anger’s name is not in the film’s credits, nor is there any hint of his presence in the film itself. However, Anger began experimenting with filmmaking at the age of nine, and by the time he was 20, he had written, directed and starred in the cult masterpiece. Fireworks. Filmed at his parents’ home when they were away for the weekend, the 1947 short is a surreal fever dream far ahead of its time, filled with haunting homoerotic imagery and scenes of shocking violence and gore. Sex researcher Alfred Kinsey saw the film and was so moved by its stunning imagery and disturbing themes that he bought the first print of the film.

WITH Fireworks placing him firmly at the forefront of experimental underground film culture, Unger wrote and directed dozens of short films over the next six decades that explored queer themes, homophobia, the occult, and sadomasochism. It reached its apogee in 1963. Rising Scorpio, a 28-minute film inspired by the homoerotic iconography of the leather motorcycle gangs of the 1950s and 60s. The film is a cacophony of celluloid sexuality, including scenes from a 1953s film. Wild With Marlon Brando next to clips from Cecil B. DeMillesilent classic about the life of Christ, King of Kings. The film was initially banned on charges of obscenity, but received enough critical acclaim to eventually make the list. 1001 movies to watch before you die. Rising Scorpio it is both a celebration and an indictment of the Hollywood version of masculinity and masculinity, and it is in this short story that Anger’s disdain for the mainstream film industry is most visible. Looking at this film, it’s not hard to see what motivated Anger to write a book that aimed to destroy the glamorous, glamorous façade of show business.

“Hollywood Babylon” brought down the stars from the sky

Maybe Anger was upset that he was never accepted into the mainstream, or maybe he never wanted to be a part of it and was more comfortable making fun of it. As it were, Hollywood Babylon was his way of presenting himself to an industry that he knew only on the fringes, and this was reflected in the feelings shared by thousands who also could only look from the sidelines. Anger actually started writing gossip for French magazines to help fund his film production. efforts, some of which he picked up from social circles, some of which he simply offset for profit. In the days when the studio system was firmly established, PR professionals worked overtime to control the images of contract stars, going to great lengths to ensure that only the most scrubbed, family stories about their clients ever reached the public. .

Facts or not, stories in Hollywood Babylon blew off the gloss, and movie fans around the world devoured the tales like a delicious dessert after a hearty meal. For the first time, people no longer looked at their favorite celebrities as sublime beings hovering above them. Anger’s book brought the stars down from the sky and made them “real” to the masses. In some cases, Unger’s stories were so sloppy that readers felt superiors to their once revered idols, and it was so powerful that it forever changed the way audiences perceived the personalities they saw on the silver screen. The era of the golden age of the untouchable “movie star” was beginning to crumble, and Anger was all too ready to continue carrying the wrecking ball.

Anger used shocking photos to perpetuate myths

IN Hollywood Babylon, Anger often supplemented his anecdotes with photographs to increase their credibility. When an actress Jane Mansfield died in a car accident in 1967, Anger created a false story that she had been decapitated by posting a photo of a mop of blond hair lying on the road at the scene of the accident. It turns out the hair was actually one of Mansfield’s wigs that was thrown out of her car during the impact. However, the myth of the headless Mansfield continued to exist even 56 years after her death.

Trying to paint a picture of a 1940s music star Carmen Miranda as a hypersexual minx who enjoyed sleeping with her male co-stars, Anger included an unfortunate candid shot of the actress being lifted into the air by her stage partner. Cesar Romero while rehearsing for his 1942 film, Spring in the Rocky Mountains. Miranda, unfortunately, was not wearing panties under her skirt at the time the photo was taken, so readers are easily fooled into believing Anger’s tales of Miranda’s slutty ways. Anger was especially fond of finding photos of celebrities looking at their worst, and then using those pictures to confirm the often false sensationalism about their rampant drug or alcohol use, or to report that they were suffering from some kind of terminal illness that made them living out their sad last days. . Elizabeth Taylor was one of Wrath’s favorite targets when Wrath featured a brightly colored image of Taylor at her heaviest weight on the cover of the second edition of his book.

‘Hollywood Babylon’ spawned enduring urban legends

Even without photographs to back up his wild stories, some of Unger’s false stories from Hollywood Babylon urban legends still exist, such as rumors of a 1920s movie goddess and “It Girl”. Clara Bow once had sex with the entire USC football team. By the way, Bow served as an inspiration for Margot Robbie2022 movie character Babylon, the film itself is inspired by themes from Unger’s book. Anger also took the sisters Lillian And Dorothy Gish were lovers; What Rudolph Valentino died not after an appendectomy, but after poisoning by a secret lover; this tragic actress Lupe Velez drowned her head in the toilet while trying to commit suicide; and this silent screen star Ramon Navarromurdered in his home in 1968, was found with a sex toy supposedly modeled after Valentino’s anatomy and given to Navarro by the actor himself, stuffed into his mouth.

The more outlandish the story, the more readers liked it, and the longer the myth remained in the public mind. People can’t help but be mesmerized by a story full of dirty, dirty details, and there is little more satisfaction than having those details attributed to a cherished icon. The same types of ridiculous myths that Wrath perpetuated in Hollywood Babylon continue today. There is a false story that the singer Cass Elliot like choking on a ham sandwich, and, of course, the infamous Richard Gere and gerbil. Stories like these, while funny, continue to take root in pop culture. As psychotherapist Britt Frank writes in his book: The science of getting stuck“Celebrity gossip is a safe way to snack on schadenfreude… It is far less shameful to admit that we enjoy watching celebrities get miserable than it is to admit that we enjoy watching family and friends get miserable.”

From “Hollywood Babylon” to “TMZ”

It would be fair to say that Anger Hollywood Babylon helped advance the era of tabloid journalism by picking up the momentum of infamous 1950s gossip magazines such as Confidential (famously mentioned in the 1997s Los Angeles Confidential) began. While the rags are like Confidentially thrived on the promotion of scandalous materials about celebrity sex, infidelity and other promiscuity, Hollywood Babylon turned the heat even higher and immortalized depravity in hardcover, giving a lasting gift to moviegoers who harbor love-hate relationships with the stars they see on the big screen.

Loyal followers of the entertainment industry want their favorite personalities to succeed so that they reach the highest rung on the ladder of fame. But once that happens, there’s nothing left to do but wait for the descent, and Wrath was an expert at packing that downfall, with truth secondary to hyperbole. His influence is still being felt today, from celebrity news magazines like People and In Touch Weekly to celebrity websites like TMZ and Radar Online. Anger may not have realized the impact his collection of lewd stories would have on the current state of celebrity tabloid journalism, but there is no argument about the significance of his contributions, for better or worse.