Part two of Turner Classic Movies’ (TCM) Moguls and Movie Stars: A History of Hollywood, The Birth of Hollywood (1907-1920), is as excellent as the first episode in the seven-part series (Peepshow Pioneers). Premiering at 8 pm PT/ET on Monday, November 8, part two tracks Henry Ford’s perfection of the assembly line process for Ford Motor Company, now the nation’s only private automotive manufacturer, and its profound effect on moviemaking. Marking the influence of women, immigrants, and Jews, proving that capitalism (not socialism) encourages elimination of ignorance and bigotry and advancement of human progress, this part looks at the rise of movies as an industry.
Other highlights include the controversial film made by Kentucky native D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation (1915), a box office hit regarded by many as racist that was actively supported by the radical Democratic President Woodrow Wilson, which was arguably the nation’s first commercially successful spectacle; the fascinating story of Hungarian immigrant Carl Laemmle’s creation of Universal City, an actual city invented to foster his Universal Pictures studio; the government’s early attempts at censorship; and the rise of the movie star in Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford. The Birth of Hollywood will be followed by such silent classics as George Loane Tucker’s movie about sex trafficking among immigrants, Traffic in Souls (1913), and Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. This one-hour installment will repeat later Monday night at 11 pm PT/ET and again on Wednesday, Nov. 10, accompanied by silent pictures, including The Poor Little Rich Girl (1917) with Mary Pickford and an early Cecil B. DeMille picture, The Squaw Man (1914).