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Balakian Discusses ‘Hollywood and the Armenian Genocide’ in NY
NEW YORK—More than 100 people attended Prof. Peter Balakian's talk, titled "Hollywood and the Armenian Genocide," at the Diocesan Center in New York on April 8. The event was hosted by the Development Department of the Eastern Diocese of the Armenian Church of America.
Central to his talk was the screening of the first part of renowned director Elia Kazan's 1
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I always wondered why the film did not achieve more popularity.I found that growing up in an Armenian family in Watertown helped in understanding so many of the scenes,which may not have resonated with non-Armenians.The description of the Greek family trapped within the confines of Turkish rule fit in well with the stories I heard from my grandmother about life in Anatolia. Could it also be that Kazan named names at HUAC? He was a disaffected Communist who loved America and felt compelled to speak out about Communists in Hollywood but in so doing probably alienated the Hollywood elite. I read somewhere that the Mafia in “On the Waterfront” that ran the docks represented for Kazan the Communist control of Hollywood. Hollywood having felt betrayed by Kazan, may have limited the distribution of the film. I think we forget that our Armenian immigrant experience which seems so universal is in many ways sui generis and may not translate well into contemporary American life.Congratulations to Mr Balakian on his Pulitzer!
Wonderful article and congratulations to Peter Balakian for raising this question in this incredible week of his honoring by the Pulitzer Prize. I remember taking a bus from Lewiston, Maine to Manhattan to see America, America in the early 1960s when the movie was released. All these years later, I still remember and use to express frustration the closing words if the young protagonist, “people waiting, people waiting”