Some are under the mistaken impression that Hollywood’s rallying behind behind Polanski because he’s a a fellow artist. That has nothing to do with it. Polanski made a few classic films but his resume pales in comparison to the great Elia Kazan — a man who, until his death in 2003, remained something of a pariah in Hollywood even though sixty years had passed since he named names before the House Un-American Activities Committee.
In Hollywood there’s something worse than being a communist (or a child rapist) and that’s being an anti-communist. Kazan, a former member of the Communist Party of America, died a die-hard liberal but once he came to understand the crimes against humanity committed under Stalin he left the communist party and eventually went before HUAC where he named Stalinists, not innocent liberals. He also never apologized:
“I’d had every good reason to believe the party should be driven out of its many hiding places and into the light of scrutiny, but I’d never said anything because it would be called ‘red-baiting.’ [. . .] The `horrible, immoral thing’ that I did I did out of my own true self.”
In 1999, the director of more classic films than I can list was awarded a long overdue honorary Oscar, and this was how the Hollywood elite greeted this fellow artist:
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In 2003 Roman Polanski, a then 25-year fugitive for the crime of raping a 13 year-old girl won the Oscar for Best Director. Here’s how the Hollywood elite greeted that fellow artist:
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“Artist” has got nothing to do with it.