Table of Contents

1. Video Rising 2. The Gestalt of the Blacklist 3. Controversial Personalities 4. Hypersensitivity: The Codes of Television Censorship 5. Forums of the Air 6. Roman Circuses and Spanish Inquisitions 7. Country and God 8. Edward R. Murrow Slays The Dragon of Joseph McCarthy 9. "The Speaktacular": the Army-McCarthy Hearings, April 22-June 17, 1954 10. Pixies: Homosexuality, Anti-Communism, and Television 11. The End of the Blacklist 12. Exhuming McCarthyism: the Paranoid Style in American Television

Promotional Information

Though conventional wisdom claims that television is a co-conspirator in the repressions of Cold War America, Doherty argues that during the Cold War, through television, America actually became a more tolerant place. He examines television programming and contemporary commentary of the late 1940s to the mid-1950s-everything from See It Now to I Love Lucy, from Red Channels to the writings of Walter Winchell and Hedda Hopper. By rerunning the programs, freezing the frames, and reading between the lines, Doherty paints a picture of Cold War America that belies many black and white cliches.

About the Author

Thomas Doherty is professor in the American studies department and chair of the film studies program at Brandeis University. He is the author of Projections of War: Hollywood, American Culture, and World War II and Pre-Code Hollywood: Sex, Immorality, and Insurrection in American Cinema, 1930-1934; and is associate editor of the film journal Cineaste. He lives in Salem, Massachusetts.

Reviews

"Invigorating and wide-ranging scholarship... The heart of Cold War, Cool Medium is a lively and compelling retelling of the effect of McCarthyism on television." -- Cineaste "[A] seriously intelligent history." -- Library Journal "fresh and important insights...an accurate and engrossing account for the nonspecialist, and its methodology provides a revealing context for the specialist as well" -- Brenda Murphy, The Journal of American History "thoughtful and nuanced" -- Michael C. C. Adams, Film & History "Thomas Doherty's groundbreaking new volume, Cold War, Cool Medium, [is] a sweeping examination of the collision of television and McCarthyism, and one of the most searching looks at the intersection of popular and political culture in years." -- Boston Globe "A witty, often riveting account of the simultaneous rise of television and McCarthy." -- Film Comment "A wide-ranging, impressionistic portrait of the era... Mr. Doherty, a professor of American studies at Brandeis University and a noted film historian, deftly recaps this familiar story." -- New York Observer "Doherty succeeds in illuminating both the history of television in the US in the 1950s and television's relationship to the era's anticommunist crusade... this volume carefully examines the often-overlooked political side of 1950s television. Essential." -- Choice " Cold War, Cool Medium is an excellent overview of television and American culture at a pivotal moment in United States history. It is also wittily written, with Doherty's sense of humour and irony coming through on nearly every page." -- Jennifer Frost, University of Auckland, Australasian Journal of American Studies "It is not only readable, enlightening and amusing, it does what all good books on the televisual Cold War should do: it can distinguish between hype and substance." -- Adam Piette, Journal of American Studies " "Doherty delivers an enlightening and critical reassessment of television, culture, and politics in the early 1950's." -- Michael Curtin, American Historical Review " Cold War, Cool Medium is an engaging and complex account of US commercial television during the 1950's." -- Megan Mullen, Technology and Culture "[A] superbly written analysis of the link between the rise of American television and the fall of Senator McCarthy." -- Vincent Brook, American Studies " Cold War, Cool Medium is engagingly written, offering prose that is brimming with wit and insight." -- Christine Becker, Film Quarterly

"Invigorating and wide-ranging scholarship... The heart of Cold War, Cool Medium is a lively and compelling retelling of the effect of McCarthyism on television." -- Cineaste "[A] seriously intelligent history." -- Library Journal "fresh and important insights...an accurate and engrossing account for the nonspecialist, and its methodology provides a revealing context for the specialist as well" -- Brenda Murphy, The Journal of American History "thoughtful and nuanced" -- Michael C. C. Adams, Film & History "Thomas Doherty's groundbreaking new volume, Cold War, Cool Medium, [is] a sweeping examination of the collision of television and McCarthyism, and one of the most searching looks at the intersection of popular and political culture in years." -- Boston Globe "A witty, often riveting account of the simultaneous rise of television and McCarthy." -- Film Comment "A wide-ranging, impressionistic portrait of the era... Mr. Doherty, a professor of American studies at Brandeis University and a noted film historian, deftly recaps this familiar story." -- New York Observer "Doherty succeeds in illuminating both the history of television in the US in the 1950s and television's relationship to the era's anticommunist crusade... this volume carefully examines the often-overlooked political side of 1950s television. Essential." -- Choice " Cold War, Cool Medium is an excellent overview of television and American culture at a pivotal moment in United States history. It is also wittily written, with Doherty's sense of humour and irony coming through on nearly every page." -- Jennifer Frost, University of Auckland, Australasian Journal of American Studies "It is not only readable, enlightening and amusing, it does what all good books on the televisual Cold War should do: it can distinguish between hype and substance." -- Adam Piette, Journal of American Studies " "Doherty delivers an enlightening and critical reassessment of television, culture, and politics in the early 1950's." -- Michael Curtin, American Historical Review " Cold War, Cool Medium is an engaging and complex account of US commercial television during the 1950's." -- Megan Mullen, Technology and Culture "[A] superbly written analysis of the link between the rise of American television and the fall of Senator McCarthy." -- Vincent Brook, American Studies " Cold War, Cool Medium is engagingly written, offering prose that is brimming with wit and insight." -- Christine Becker, Film Quarterly

Doherty (American & film studies, Brandeis Univ.) makes his third contribution to the publisher's new but already voluminous series, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of TV's first great reality show-the Army-McCarthy hearings. To frame his vivid reconstruction of that genuine drama, he provides a compressed but seriously intelligent history of how TV grew out of, but departed from, Depression-era radio; the legacy of the Popular Front; the difficulties inherent in working from the scant kinescopic documentation of broadcastings infancy; and the rise of the Un-American Activities Committee, the Hollywood blacklist, and J. Edgar Hoover's somewhat unpredictable role in seemingly all of American life for half of the last century. Along the way, he concludes that Edward R. Murrow was a morally impressive (but manipulative) character indeed. This is not the definitive book on the Cold War, proto-TV, or Joe McCarthy, and Doherty never makes that claim; but thoseinterested in these matters will do well to either begin or end their background reading here. Recommended for academic and public libraries alike; note that while Doherty's prose is generally straightforward, he does write out of the cultural studies tradition.-Scott H. Silverman, Bryn Mawr Coll., PA Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.