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The Hollywood Reporter's part in this was founder Billy Wilkerson, then 47, doing the discovering. In early 1937, Judy Turner (director Mervyn LeRoy later encouraged the change to "Lana") skipped typing class to have a Coke with friends at the nearby Top Hat Malt Shop. Wilkerson had walked from his THR office for the same reason. He saw Turner, a stunningly beautiful and by all accounts self-possessed 16-year-old,...

Gloria O’Connor, an actress and the widow of legendary MGM song-and-dance man Donald O’Connor, died Tuesday of natural causes at her home in Thousand Oaks, Calif., their daughter Alicia told The Hollywood Reporter. She was 84. O’Connor was the younger sister of Tichi Wilkerson Kassel, the publisher of THR from 1962 (when her husband Billy Wilkerson died) until the publication’s sale to Affiliated Publications in 1988 for $26.7 million. Wilkerson Kassel died in 2004. As Gloria Noble, O’Connor was a promising starlet at MGM who appeared in such films as Skirts Ahoy!, Small Town Girl, Latin Lovers

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The Hollywood Reporter’s examination of its behavior during the Blacklist era (“The Most Sinful Period in Hollywood History,” Nov. 30), published days before the 65th anniversary of the list’s inception, was widely featured, from NBC’s Nightly News With Brian Williams to NPR. The story investigated this publication’s anti-communist crusade, focusing on how and why its founding editor and owner Billy Wilkerson led the charge. Yet it was the comments made by Wilkerson’s son, Willie, which provoked some of the most passionate responses from those people closest to the Blacklist. Story: Blacklist Profiles: 7 Writers and Actors Who Defied

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What my followers on Facebook, Twitter, and Google+ saw yesterday: • I had no idea the Hollywood blacklist scandal of the 1950s was fomented by The Hollywood Reporter. Journalmalism! An Apology: The Son of THR Founder Billy Wilkerson on the Publication's Dark Past • Star Wars snowflakes to cut out yourself. You're welcome. Star Wars Snowflakes 2012 • Two Doctor Who/Winnie the Pooh crossover designs at ShirtPunch! today. B-i double-g ER On The Inside / Doctor Pooh • Male film critic is affected by misogyny, so now it's news. Reactionary men who fear and hate strong women • The Times (of London) refused to publish an essay critical of James Bond, so dude's wife posted it on her recipe blog. (I loved Skyfall, but it's hard to refute Coren's scathing critique.) Bond, villain (hat-tips for today’s links: @jan_gilbert, @emmafgreen)...

After issuing an apology this week for his father’s role in the creation of Hollywood’s blacklist, the son of The Hollywood Reporter founder Billy Wilkerson spoke with one of the infamous list’s victims on public radio Wednesday. W.R. Wilkerson III and Marsha Hunt, a former star who was unable to find industry work after being branded a communist sympathizer, spoke by phone during a segment on Kcrw's Which Way L.A.? Photos: Blacklisted: Portraits of 7 Writers and Actors Who Defied Hollywood “I can’t tell you how heartwarming that is. I do salute Wilkerson’s son,” Hunt said of the

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The Hollywood Reporter has published an article by Willie Wilkerson (son of THR founder Billy Wilkerson) apologizing for his father and the trade paper's involvement in the Hollywood Blacklist. First published in 1947 and spurred on by Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee, the Blacklist destroyed the careers and lives of hundreds of directors, writers and actors who were believed to have Communist affiliation. In his apology, Wilkerson writes that he hopes that his father would have eventually seen the error of his ways had he lived longer. "On behalf of my family, and particularly my late father, I wish to convey my sincerest apologies and deepest regrets to those who were victimized by this unfortunate incident." Wilkerson refers to the Blacklist as a "Hollywood Holocaust," and writes that his father played a role in the fear-mongering in order to exact revenge on the studio bigwigs he felt rejected him when he too.

Magazine founder's son admits father was motivated by spite to accuse film industry workers of being communist sympathisers

Us film industry magazine the Hollywood Reporter has apologised for its role in kickstarting the infamous 1947 blacklist that destroyed the careers of writers, actors and directors accused of being communist sympathisers.

In its latest issue, the magazine features a column by Willie Wilkerson, son of founder Billy Wilkerson, admitting his father was motivated by spite to publish lists of left-leaning film industry workers that influenced Us politicians during the postwar McCarthy era. The elder Wilkerson was annoyed at having been shut out by an exclusive "club" of Hollywood bosses when he tried to open his own studio in the 20s, his son revealed. By way of revenge, the magazine's proprietor decided to destroy his enemies' most valuable commodities by labelling them communists.

"No one has ever apologised to the victims of this holocaust,...

Los Angeles (AP) — The son of The Hollywood Reporter founder Billy Wilkerson is apologizing for his father's and the trade paper's role in the 1947 Hollywood Blacklist that destroyed the careers of writers, actors and directors accused of having communist ties.

In an article published Monday by The Hollywood Reporter, Willie Wilkerson, 61, calls the Blacklist era "Hollywood's Holocaust" and says, "On the eve of this dark 65th anniversary, I feel an apology is necessary."

He says his father supported the Blacklist to exact revenge against the Hollywood titans he felt denied him entry to their club when he wanted to establish a movie studio in the late 1920s. Billy Wilkerson founded The Hollywood Reporter in 1930, and after World War II, used the paper as a vehicle for a series of editorials attacking communist sympathizers and their influence in Hollywood.

"In his maniacal quest to annihilate the studio owners, he realized that...

The Hollywood Reporter addressed on Monday its role in setting off a Red Scare in the industry 65 years ago, when its then-editor penned a column naming near a dozen alleged communists. In a lengthy feature story published on the Reporter's site, the trade magazine analyzed its longtime publisher and editor Billy Wilkerson's campaign to expose suspected communists in Hollywood in July 1946. And Wilkerson's son, W.R. Wilkerson III, apologized in a separate op-ed for what he called Hollywood's "Holocaust." In his piece, Wilkerson's son said his father, who before founding THR was a producer,...

This story first appeared in the November 30 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Billy Wilkerson was nervous. It was July 1946, and The Hollywood Reporter owner, editor and publisher was preparing to embark on a landmark campaign that would expose communists working in Hollywood. He would name the alleged Reds in his "Tradeviews" column and expose this lurking menace. Wilkerson already had begun his crusade a year or so earlier, penning fiery editorials that railed against communism and targeted the Screen Writers Guild, the WGA precursor that he believed was the seat of what he termed the "Red Beachhead.

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This coming Sunday marks the 65th anniversary of the inception of the infamous, career-destroying Hollywood Blacklist that targeted supposed communists within the entertainment industry. The Nov. 30 issue of the The Hollywood Reporter addresses the magazine's role in the communist witch hunt, which was launched in 1946 by THR's legendary owner, editor and publisher Billy Wilkerson, who would name the alleged Reds in his "Tradeviews" column. His son, W.R. Wilkerson III, has written a formal apology for what he calls "Hollywood's Holocaust." Story: Blacklist Profiles: 7 Writers and Actors Who Defied Hollywood THR profiled six people whose

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Jean Harlow in her mother's living room (top); Harlow in Hollywood authors Mark Vieira and Darrell Rooney (middle); Cafe Trocadero 1935: Edith Gwynne Wilkerson (wife of Trocadero owner Billy Wilkerson), Jean Harlow, William Powell, William Haines' lover Jimmy Shields (standing), Anderson Lawler, unidentified man (standing), Haines, Edith's sister Marge (bottom) Jean Harlow in Hollywood – Introduction to Interview with Author Mark Vieira How did the Jean Harlow book project come about? Darrell Rooney, besides being a respected director of animated movies, has a huge collection of Jean Harlow memorabilia. Eight years ago I suggested that he and I collaborate on a book like the one I had done on Greta Garbo. We wanted to build on the research that David Stenn had done for Bombshell, his 1993 Harlow bio, but we wanted to tell Harlow’s story with photographs and newly uncovered correspondence. We also wanted to document how she became...

Barry Levinson and Warren Beatty's portrayal of the life of a mobster cleans off the blood and concentrates on the cakes

Bugsy (1991)

Director: Barry Levinson

Entertainment grade: B+

History grade: D+

Benjamin Siegel – nicknamed, to his anguish, Bugsy – was an American

mobster. He is often remembered for his role in the development of Las

Vegas.

Crime

The film opens with a portrait of Bugsy Siegel (Warren Beatty)'s everyday life. He says goodbye to his family. He does speech exercises. He has sex with a random woman in a hotel. He shoots a wiseguy dead at point-blank range in view of an entire office full of people. It's a fine cinematic start. But Bugsy suffers from a problem that afflicts many gangster movies. We're supposed to like the hero, but he's a violent sociopath. So there is a little light editing. Sure, Siegel does the odd bit of murder and cheats on his wife,...