The Front (1976) on Netflix
New York, 1953. Blacklisted television writer Alfred Miller can no longer sell scripts, so his friend Howard Prince, a cashier and small-time bookie, signs his name to them for a cut.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb7.3/1010,440 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes68%
Trailer
Plot summary
New York, 1953. The House Un-American Activities Committee's investigations have left the television writer Alfred Miller unable to find work. He asks Howard Prince, a restaurant cashier who also takes bets, to put his name on Miller's scripts, and offers him a share of the earnings. Howard needs the money, so he agrees, and the scripts reach the network producer Phil Sussman, who is glad to have a writer who is not on the blacklist. One of them contains a part for Hecky Brown, one of Sussman's actors. Two more blacklisted writers then pay him to front for them too. Sussman's script editor, Florence Barrett, takes him for a principled artist, and the two begin dating.
Cast
- Marvin Lichtermanas Myer Prince
- Norman Roseas Howard's Attorney
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Front (1976)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- A scene in which Hecky, played by Mostel, is cheated out of part of his fee at a mountain resort came from Bernstein's memoirs: the manager of the Concord Hotel in the Catskills promised Mostel $500 but reduced it to $250 when he arrived, and Mostel cursed the customers during the performance, who thought it was part of the act.
SPOILER
The character Hecky Brown, and his suicide in the film, was based on real blacklisted actor Philip Loeb, a friend of Zero Mostel who was fired from his lead role on the television series The Goldbergs in 1951 after being investigated by HUAC, and who died by suicide in 1955.- Several people involved in making this film about the Hollywood blacklist had been blacklisted themselves, including screenwriter Walter Bernstein, director Martin Ritt and actors Zero Mostel, Herschel Bernardi and Lloyd Gough; the end credits list the year each was blacklisted.
