Communist infiltration of Hollywood motion-picture industry : hearing before the Committee on Un-American activities, House of Representatives, Eighty-second Congress, first session (1951)

COMMUNISM IN HOLLYWOOD MOTION-PICTURE INDUSTRY 3527 going to be damaged because I thought that when I testified, that career I had worked hard at for a long time would be over. I was also in the third month of a pregnancy. I was emotionally not too stable, and I just couldn't get myself to do it. Mr. Wood. What made you believe that? Do you know of any per- son who had been called to testify before an authorized body of people or a committee of Congress with reference to party affiliation in the Communist movement, who has done so, freely, honestly, who has been penalized on account of it, with reference to their position? Miss Lennart. No, I do not, since that time. But Congressman, may I say that this was before the hearings. There was an awful lot of talk in town. Nobody knew what was going to happen, you know, and that feeling would be that if one spoke honestly and openly you would not be an outcast. But my meeting with Mr. Wheeler was before I knew this and I was in quite a turmoil about it. I must con- fess that after my meeting with Mr. Wheeler I relaxed a little about the whole matter. I live in comparative isolation from the political zone in Hollywood and from the social zone. We live quite a bit out of town, and between working and bringing up my children and run- ning my house, I have another child besides the new one, I don't get around much. I have lost touch with what was going on. I felt that the past was over for me. I had told Mr. Wheeler I had been in the party, I was out of the party, he seemed to believe me, and so on. In the last months, however, since the birth of my second child, who was ill after she was born and that kept me busy for a while, I started working at the studio again. In this past year I worked at the studio very little and people didn't talk to me much about what was going on, probably because I hadn't been mentioned. I heard rumors that I heard for the first time that were very shocking to me and horrifying to me. This one I didn't hear directly, but I was told that it was commonly supposed that the reason I was still able to work even though I had been mentioned at the last hearings last year was that I had made a deal with someone, and this was pretty revolting for me and for this committee, too, I felt. The other rumor, this oppos- ing rumor was that I was the last active, powerful Communist in Hollywood, that for some reason I was such a powerful Communist I couldn't be touched. This rumor was appalling to me, too. Mr. Wood. I think it appropriate at this point to let the record be perfectly clear that there has never been any deal entered into by this committee or any member of the committee, so far as I know, or, any member of its staff. Miss Lennart. I don't consider the committee's consideration for a woman who is busy having a child a deal. I call it something I am grateful for. But it is pretty horrifying to hear that I alone was work- ing because I possibly had paid out a great deal of money, and you can imagine this was a very upsetting thing to hear. Besides that, I find now something else I didn't know: that I am a source of embarrassment to many of our friends who are not and have never been Communists, and it has become a very brave thing to be a friend of mine now, with the rumors going on. Besides that, I have three children. I have two of my own and I have a stepson I have raised who is going to college this fall. I don't think it is fair that they grow up under a cloud which is none of their doing and which