In the new movie, "J. Edgar," Clint Eastwood resuscitates one of the stalest of urban legends; namely, that the late director and founder of the Federal Bureau of Investigation was a cross-dresser, and publicly appeared in drag. One doesn't have to be a fan of Mr. Hoover, or the F.B.I., to come to the defense of a reputation he is unable to defend.
Mr. Hoover was many things, some bad and some good, but there is no evidence that he was a cross-dresser. I don't know what Hoover did in the privacy of his bedroom (and for that, I'm most thankful), but his public life appeared to be free of scandal. A recent article in the New York Times's "Styles" section, reveals that "J.Edgar," written by Dustin Black, includes a "Bates Motel" scene, in which Hoover is shown trying on the dress and pearls of his late mother. While the rumors of Hoover's cross-dressing at parties supposedly attended by (surprise, surprise) Roy Cohn and Sen. Joseph McCarthy and accompanied by a retinue of blond boy playthings, took on a life of their own, regardless of their absence of veracity. Forget that the source of the rumors, Susan Rosenstiel (ex-wife of Schenley founder, Lewis Rosenstiel), had her own axe to grind, blaming Hoover for his imagined role in her divorce trial. Mrs. Rosenstiel, who later did time for perjury, was hardly a person of impeccable credibility. And yet, the lurid details of these imagined hotel scenes became as real as if the incidents were filmed by "You are There." There is no suggestion that the Mafia (hardly fans of Hoover or his Bureau) or anybody else, had any such "evidence." If they did, they would not have hesitated to surface it.
Even if Hoover was a repressed homosexual, he was clearly a product of his time, and no self-respecting public figure (especially one of Hoover's make-up--no pun intended) would have ever risked parading himself in public, at parties in the Waldorf-Astoria no less, without fear of exposure. When Mrs. Rosenstiel badgered U.S. Attorney (and later N.Y. County District Attorney) Robert Morganthau to investigate claims (about Hoover) he dismissed them as "baseless." These "charges" were similarly dismissed by the Justice Department. Anyone old enough to remember the 50's and 60's would know that not even J. Edgar Hoover could have survived such a scandal.
I know that no film biography can ever be done without some degree of "poetic license." I remember when my oldest son, then in college, saw Oliver Stone's movie, "J.F.K.," he was amazed that such strong (cinematic) evidence of a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy could have been ignored. While I agreed that it was a good movie, it was just a movie, and bore little resemblance to the historical truth. I was living in Biloxi, Mississippi at the time, and New Orleans was our nearest "big city." New Orleans District Attorney "Big Jim" Garrison, portrayed by Kevin Costner as the epitome of rectitude and the very picture of the crusading D.A., was widely considered to be a buffoon and a demagougue, trampling upon both reputations and the truth. At the risk of picking on Oliver Stone, remember the film, "W?" Presumably, former President George W. Bush (like virtually every human being) spends some portion of his or her life sitting on a toilet seat, but did we really need Stone to include such a scene in the movie? Even Mr. Black's earlier biographical film, "Milk," necessarily had to contain some fictional dialogue in order to provide for dramatic exposition, and no one can blame him for doing so in "J. Edgar." Most recently, the ill-fated docu-drama, "The Kennedy's" was (after family and other pressures were brought to bear) was rejected by the History Channel, and had to cast about before finally finding a home on the barely-known "Reelz" channel? As with any historical cinematic recreation, the screenwriter has to be given some scope, and I don't begrudge either Mr. Black or Mr. Eastwood theirs. What I do take issue with is their feeling the need to circulate what they both believe to be, if not a falsehood, a rumor totally lacking in supporting evidence. I know I sound like a spoilsport, but even Mr. Black (the gay activist screenwriter of "Milk"), grants that there was no evidence to support Mr. Hoover's cross-dressing. For this reason, there was no way they would include the "party dress" scenes at the Waldorf. But still, it must have been irresistible to avoid including some scene of Hoover in a dress--something most everyone was hoping to see, even if it never happened. So what did Mr. Black cleverly create? Mourning the loss of his just deceased mother, a distraught Hoover tries on both her pearls and her dress. He then tears off the pearls and sinks to the floor in tears. Now, of course, no one was present in these moments of his private mourning, so all we can do is imagine his reaction to the passing of the woman whose "tough love," both captivated and controlled him. Wouldn't it have been enough for him to take the dress and press it to his lips? Perhaps, but that wouldn't have sold the popcorn. It's easy to say "What the hell, the guy's dead, lots of people hated him, and what fun to see the old red-baiter in a dress." Dramatic license aside, I'm surprised at Mr. Eastwood for taking such a cheap shot (this time, Harry Callahan, the pun is intended).
The Time's "Styles" article is accompanied by a caricature of Eastwood (in cowboy garb) lassoing Hoover attired in a strapless evening gown. Okay, class, let's see a show of hands. How many of you think such a drawing would have appeared in the Times, The Washington Post, or any-damn-where when Hoover was still running the Bureau? If, as would doubtless be asserted, it would have been unethical to portray a public figure in a manner bearing no relation to fact, why do so now? The paper(s) that had the courage to publish the Pentagon Papers, are not only silent in the face of the lies being spread about Hoover, but have made this troubled (and troubling) man the subject of ridicule. There's a dirty little secret I'd like to let some of our younger readers (and perhaps a few of our older ones as well) in on. J.Edgar Hoover was not simply kept in office for over fifty years by Democrats and Republicans alike because of fear. Hoover was considered a necessary evil. He did a lot of good in professionalizing law enforcement and virtually invented forensics. In the course of doing so, he carefully built up a personal image as managed as as any a Madison Avenue campaign.
Along with going after many of the well-publicized "bad guys," he was late to take on organized crime, and reluctant to enforce and investigate civil rights violations. His secret files ruined a lot of people's careers, and kept a lot of potential critics quiet. He may have been wrong to trail and bug Martin Luther King, but was he wrong to confront Dr. King about his extra-marital affairs, or to warn Robert F. Kennedy about the dangers of his brother continuing an affair with former Mafia mol Judith Exner? I think not. After all, both men had vital public images to maintain and were just as vulnerable to being blackmailed for their real activities as Hoover would have been for his imagined cross-dressing. Perhaps President Lyndon Johnson (a pragmatic man if ever there was one) got it right. When once asked why he kept Hoover in office, LBJ was said to respond, "I'd rather have him on the inside pissing out than on the outside pissing in."
For every person who criticized the excesses of "Cointelpro," there were many others who were glad that someone was keeping an eye on the reality of Communist espionage in the United States, the Black Panthers and other groups who were perceived as threats to the public order. (Wouldn't the more recent activities of FBI turncoat and communist spy Robert Hanssen have been enough to make Hoover turn over in--and perhaps arise from--his grave?) Yes, Mr. Hoover was heavy-handed in how he pursued his enemies (both real and imagined), posed a threat to civil liberties, and was obsessive about his fears, but let's not forget that he was doing our bidding.
I propose neither sanctification nor excommunication for the soul of J. Edgar Hoover, just a simple reminder of Marc Antony's eulogy of Caesar: "The evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones." So let it be with Caesar, but let Hoover rest in peace.
Mr. Hoover was many things, some bad and some good, but there is no evidence that he was a cross-dresser. I don't know what Hoover did in the privacy of his bedroom (and for that, I'm most thankful), but his public life appeared to be free of scandal. A recent article in the New York Times's "Styles" section, reveals that "J.Edgar," written by Dustin Black, includes a "Bates Motel" scene, in which Hoover is shown trying on the dress and pearls of his late mother. While the rumors of Hoover's cross-dressing at parties supposedly attended by (surprise, surprise) Roy Cohn and Sen. Joseph McCarthy and accompanied by a retinue of blond boy playthings, took on a life of their own, regardless of their absence of veracity. Forget that the source of the rumors, Susan Rosenstiel (ex-wife of Schenley founder, Lewis Rosenstiel), had her own axe to grind, blaming Hoover for his imagined role in her divorce trial. Mrs. Rosenstiel, who later did time for perjury, was hardly a person of impeccable credibility. And yet, the lurid details of these imagined hotel scenes became as real as if the incidents were filmed by "You are There." There is no suggestion that the Mafia (hardly fans of Hoover or his Bureau) or anybody else, had any such "evidence." If they did, they would not have hesitated to surface it.
Even if Hoover was a repressed homosexual, he was clearly a product of his time, and no self-respecting public figure (especially one of Hoover's make-up--no pun intended) would have ever risked parading himself in public, at parties in the Waldorf-Astoria no less, without fear of exposure. When Mrs. Rosenstiel badgered U.S. Attorney (and later N.Y. County District Attorney) Robert Morganthau to investigate claims (about Hoover) he dismissed them as "baseless." These "charges" were similarly dismissed by the Justice Department. Anyone old enough to remember the 50's and 60's would know that not even J. Edgar Hoover could have survived such a scandal.
I know that no film biography can ever be done without some degree of "poetic license." I remember when my oldest son, then in college, saw Oliver Stone's movie, "J.F.K.," he was amazed that such strong (cinematic) evidence of a conspiracy to assassinate President Kennedy could have been ignored. While I agreed that it was a good movie, it was just a movie, and bore little resemblance to the historical truth. I was living in Biloxi, Mississippi at the time, and New Orleans was our nearest "big city." New Orleans District Attorney "Big Jim" Garrison, portrayed by Kevin Costner as the epitome of rectitude and the very picture of the crusading D.A., was widely considered to be a buffoon and a demagougue, trampling upon both reputations and the truth. At the risk of picking on Oliver Stone, remember the film, "W?" Presumably, former President George W. Bush (like virtually every human being) spends some portion of his or her life sitting on a toilet seat, but did we really need Stone to include such a scene in the movie? Even Mr. Black's earlier biographical film, "Milk," necessarily had to contain some fictional dialogue in order to provide for dramatic exposition, and no one can blame him for doing so in "J. Edgar." Most recently, the ill-fated docu-drama, "The Kennedy's" was (after family and other pressures were brought to bear) was rejected by the History Channel, and had to cast about before finally finding a home on the barely-known "Reelz" channel? As with any historical cinematic recreation, the screenwriter has to be given some scope, and I don't begrudge either Mr. Black or Mr. Eastwood theirs. What I do take issue with is their feeling the need to circulate what they both believe to be, if not a falsehood, a rumor totally lacking in supporting evidence. I know I sound like a spoilsport, but even Mr. Black (the gay activist screenwriter of "Milk"), grants that there was no evidence to support Mr. Hoover's cross-dressing. For this reason, there was no way they would include the "party dress" scenes at the Waldorf. But still, it must have been irresistible to avoid including some scene of Hoover in a dress--something most everyone was hoping to see, even if it never happened. So what did Mr. Black cleverly create? Mourning the loss of his just deceased mother, a distraught Hoover tries on both her pearls and her dress. He then tears off the pearls and sinks to the floor in tears. Now, of course, no one was present in these moments of his private mourning, so all we can do is imagine his reaction to the passing of the woman whose "tough love," both captivated and controlled him. Wouldn't it have been enough for him to take the dress and press it to his lips? Perhaps, but that wouldn't have sold the popcorn. It's easy to say "What the hell, the guy's dead, lots of people hated him, and what fun to see the old red-baiter in a dress." Dramatic license aside, I'm surprised at Mr. Eastwood for taking such a cheap shot (this time, Harry Callahan, the pun is intended).
The Time's "Styles" article is accompanied by a caricature of Eastwood (in cowboy garb) lassoing Hoover attired in a strapless evening gown. Okay, class, let's see a show of hands. How many of you think such a drawing would have appeared in the Times, The Washington Post, or any-damn-where when Hoover was still running the Bureau? If, as would doubtless be asserted, it would have been unethical to portray a public figure in a manner bearing no relation to fact, why do so now? The paper(s) that had the courage to publish the Pentagon Papers, are not only silent in the face of the lies being spread about Hoover, but have made this troubled (and troubling) man the subject of ridicule. There's a dirty little secret I'd like to let some of our younger readers (and perhaps a few of our older ones as well) in on. J.Edgar Hoover was not simply kept in office for over fifty years by Democrats and Republicans alike because of fear. Hoover was considered a necessary evil. He did a lot of good in professionalizing law enforcement and virtually invented forensics. In the course of doing so, he carefully built up a personal image as managed as as any a Madison Avenue campaign.
Along with going after many of the well-publicized "bad guys," he was late to take on organized crime, and reluctant to enforce and investigate civil rights violations. His secret files ruined a lot of people's careers, and kept a lot of potential critics quiet. He may have been wrong to trail and bug Martin Luther King, but was he wrong to confront Dr. King about his extra-marital affairs, or to warn Robert F. Kennedy about the dangers of his brother continuing an affair with former Mafia mol Judith Exner? I think not. After all, both men had vital public images to maintain and were just as vulnerable to being blackmailed for their real activities as Hoover would have been for his imagined cross-dressing. Perhaps President Lyndon Johnson (a pragmatic man if ever there was one) got it right. When once asked why he kept Hoover in office, LBJ was said to respond, "I'd rather have him on the inside pissing out than on the outside pissing in."
For every person who criticized the excesses of "Cointelpro," there were many others who were glad that someone was keeping an eye on the reality of Communist espionage in the United States, the Black Panthers and other groups who were perceived as threats to the public order. (Wouldn't the more recent activities of FBI turncoat and communist spy Robert Hanssen have been enough to make Hoover turn over in--and perhaps arise from--his grave?) Yes, Mr. Hoover was heavy-handed in how he pursued his enemies (both real and imagined), posed a threat to civil liberties, and was obsessive about his fears, but let's not forget that he was doing our bidding.
I propose neither sanctification nor excommunication for the soul of J. Edgar Hoover, just a simple reminder of Marc Antony's eulogy of Caesar: "The evil that men do lives after them. The good is oft interred with their bones." So let it be with Caesar, but let Hoover rest in peace.
