Ryan Murphy Imagines a 1940s ‘Hollywood’ Where Everything That Could Have Been Great Actually Happens

Alci Rengifo

Simply watching “Hollywood” has the sensation of walking around an expensive candy shop where everything looks sumptuous, draped in colors that seem to explode. Of course the problem with sweets is that they give little in terms of valuable nutrition. Such is the case with this technicolor opus of a series assembled for Netflix by maverick producer Ryan Murphy. Set in 1948 Los Angeles it’s not about the Golden Age Hollywood that was, but about an alternate fantasy where nothing goes wrong. Convoluted, yet always looking great, the show loses punch because it wants to deliver a blow that simply never happened.

Into the sunny city of dreams arrive a group of good-looking types who want (what else?) to be in movies. First there’s Jack Castello (David Corenswet) who fought in WWII and wants to get into a film without any training. He’s moved here with his young wife without a dime. He’s lured by a suave gas station owner, Ernie (Dylan McDermott) to make money not actually pumping gas, but by servicing rich ladies and men who pull up in search of discreet comfort. Jack recruits into the underground business an aspiring black screenwriter, Archie Coleman (Jeremy Pope), who has written a passion project about a woman who jumped off the Hollywood sign. Their introduction into the L.A. underground soon gets them in touch with an assortment of characters who will bring them closer to their dreams. There’s Raymond (Darren Criss), a half-Filipino with a black actress girlfriend, Camille (Laura Harrier), who wants to direct movies about those who don’t have a voice in film. But this is the era of the big studios and their bosses. The biggest operation in town is Ace pictures, run by old timers like Ace Amberg (Rob Reiner), who firmly likes movies to be about white people and especially without gays. Yet there’s a lot of gay partying going on about town and Jack and Archie soon also cross paths with a nice but simple-minded actor calling himself Rock Hudson (Jake Picking) and his snaky agent Henry Willson (Jim Parsons). 

This is all merely the beginning of a wider saga with a whole parade of characters, some real and most fiction, who serve at the behest of Murphy’s fantasy. “Hollywood” is not about the actual history of the 1940s film world, but plays around for seven episodes with a “what if” scenario where outsiders truly challenged and changed the industry. It’s the flip side of a series like HBO’s “The Plot Against America,” where a pro-Hitler Charles Lindbergh becomes president. In “Hollywood” instead of history taking a darker turn, everything works the way it should’ve. While Murphy’s main aim is to promote the idea of minorities and the unrepresented getting a say in film, a lot of the writing feels no different from the average fantasy of every hopeful dreamer who lands in this town. “Hollywood” in essence becomes seven episodes about what everyone wishes would happen when they try to get into the business. Everyone meets precisely the right person at the right time and no one’s script is rejected. Archie blindly submits his script to Ace pictures and soon has a contract. Jack sleeps with Avis (Patti LuPone), wife of studio boss Ace Amberg, so getting him a screen test is no problem. Every hero or heroine in our group has the spark even when they lack training, and happen to sleep with just the right person to get them just where they need to be. Bad luck doesn’t exist in the universe of this show. Actors are generally expected to be attractive, but there is never a single flaw in any of these faces. 

Where “Hollywood” had more promise was in its exploration of the hidden corners of la la land in a more conservative era. The best thing about the series is its aesthetic, as Murphy and his team of directors craft vivid, sensuous images with rich colors evoking film greats like Douglas Sirk (All That Heaven Allows, Written in the Wind). The glossy canvas is then subverted with edgier moments as when Henry Willson demands sex from Rock Hudson to get him into the studio, going on to work him like a puppet, including getting him new teeth. Jack, Archie and Rock are also made to attend late night pool parties in Beverly Hills where the movie elite indulge in chiseled naked specimens culled from the UCLA football team. It’s one of the few moments in the season where the show dares to go for a more uncomfortable angle, as someone like Jack is cornered by Willson to either give in physically out in a tennis court or risk losing his big chance. When Rock is offered by Willson at the same party as a gift to studio chief Dick (Joe Mantello), it develops into a rather strong scene where the more powerful man steps back and realizes he’s not the kind of person to take advantage of a young, clueless person in this way. In the post-#MeToo era it could have developed into an even more powerful commentary on sex as a power tool in Hollywood.

But alas, “Hollywood” prefers to be all dream and no reality. After the half-way point the season is nothing more than a string of victories for everyone. Ace goes to the hospital after a tryst with an actress which conveniently leaves Avis in charge of the studio. Taking a stand for women’s power, and after advice from Eleanor Roosevelt who visits the studio, Avis greenlights Archie’s script, “Meg,” with Raymond directing. Not only that, but Raymond strikes a blow for equality by casting Camille and Anna May Wong (Michelle Krusiec). Like Rock Hudson, Wong really did exist and was one of the first truly recognized Chinese-American actresses. “Hollywood” dramatizes her famous clash with MGM when they refused to cast her in the lead for the film “The Good Earth,” preferring to go with the very white Luis Rainer. But in Murphy world Wong does get her big break afterwards with Raymond and the gang. “Meg” even becomes the first movie in history to go “into wide release,” breaking records, promoting racial harmony and going all the way to the Oscars. Nothing will dash anyone’s dreams. When evil studio lawyers try to burn the film prints, a good-hearted editor just happened to have a copy saved. If Raymond needs an extra $25,000 for a set piece his friends will go service a few clients and easily get the cash. And at the Oscars red carpet Archie and Rock stun the world by declaring their love before the cameras. Does “Meg” win Best Picture? Do you have to ask?

One of the great curiosities in “Hollywood” is that the imagined movie made by its heroes, “Meg,” looks like a more enticing story. It’s about a black woman who tries to become an actress but fails and decides to end it all one night at the Hollywood sign as her lover races to save her. Ironically enough it feels truer to the actual experience of trying to make it in a tough industry than the show’s feel-good fantasies. Alternate histories work best when they imagine another version of events that can feel eerily possible. The best way to honor those who did struggle in a more racist, less inclusive Hollywood would be to actually tell their stories, not daydream about chances they were never given or easy doors that were never opened. Anna May Wong never won her Oscar, Rock Hudson was never able to be open about his sexuality, and only now is cinema truly becoming diverse. “Hollywood” lacks tension because it’s a clutter of characters all getting what they want, in a terrain where that rarely happens.

In terms of production values Murphy has delivered a visually stunning show. “Hollywood” is gorgeous and pristine, beautiful to gaze at endlessly from episode to episode. But like all fantasies, that’s all it is, a dream and nothing more.

“Hollywood” season one begins streaming May 1 on Netflix.