Film 🎥 & Media Studies: Vintage Hollywood Constructions Of Teen Male Idols: Part 1

Anyone reading my posts about film or music knows that I enjoyed my time engaged with these subjects at ASU, and was always eager to expand my knowledge through a wide array of courses related to them. While digging through more of my past coursework earlier today I decided to share another paper that I wrote for a class way back in November of 2012. This course was called FMS 394: Adolescent Film and the topic was “Hollywood Constructions Of Teen Male Idols In The 1950s”.

This is what I wrote for that assignment:

Films produced and marketed specifically to adolescent audiences and sensibilities were a largely untapped market by the Hollywood establishment until well after World War Two. The chief reason for the dearth of teen centered narratives was mainly because American culture at large did not really recognize adolescence as an important, distinct phase of life between childhood and adult majority. However, this situation would change rapidly by the 1950s during an unprecedented period of national prosperity as adolescents would begin their ascent into the national consciousness, from a large but vaguely understood portion of the population to a clearly defined group that American business – with Hollywood filmmakers prime among them could cater to and profit from.

This study will examine this new sub genre of teen oriented film depictions and specifically the primary Hollywood constructions of the adolescent male and the allure they would have on young movie goers by analyzing three vital screen depictions of the post war era: Blackboard Jungle (1955), Rebel Without A Cause (1955), and Jailhouse Rock (1957). First, it will be necessary to provide some brief background regarding the development of the adolescent entertainment market. From the early studio era of the World War One period right up through the close of of the Second World War in the mid-1940s, the Hollywood filmmaking establishment rarely brought much focus to teenage sensibilities or created matinee idols (Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland being among the rare exceptions in the 1940s – and they were primarily song and dance stars who were popular with all audiences).

Prior to the 1940s teen performers were rarely depicted in their own right, usually as just foils (“The Dead End Kids”, “Bowery Boys”) for the major adult stars, mainly opposite James Cagney in gangland epics such as Angels With Dirty Faces (1938), or subordinate to Humphrey Bogart in juvenile delinquent subplots like Dead End (1937) at Warner Brothers or United Artists studios, or in low-budget “B” serials at poverty row studios like Monogram. None of them stood out as true teen idols that had stories and films tailored and showcased for them – and intended specifically for teen audiences.

However, the deprivations of the 1930s Depression years and the material austerity caused by World War Two in much of the 1940s finally faded away and American business (entertainment related businesses most prominently) set about to create a separate youth culture. This new state of affairs was succinctly described by social historians Douglas T. Miller and Marion Nowak in their detailed, well-written account of American life at mid-century, The Fifties: The Way We Really Were. The authors proclaimed in chapter 10 “Growing Up”: “Youth occupied a unique place in fifties America. Teens were perceived as different from other human beings and so were more set apart by a generation gap. The value of being young kept rising.” (Pg. 270) Miller and Nowak noted numerous other cultural and social trends coalescing at mid-century America to create a new, unique adolescent class.

While unprecedented affluence and its relationship to luxury markets were vital to this change, the authors of The Fifties also add that progressive educational changes along with Freudian psychology also: “…stressed the importance and uniqueness of childhood.” (Pg. 270) Miller & Nowak also noted such changes as the scientific and industrial revolutions which along with the rise of urbanization in the United States hastened the breakdown of small community control over youth and helped to spread the nuclear family apart and this “…removed a major social control over the young.” (Pg. 270) Nonetheless, the most important point that The Fifties makes regarding the emergence of adolescent youth culture stresses the schemes of corporate America to bring this concept to the forefront of American life: “Fifties mass culture was, after all, dominated by big business and big businesses generally expected people to indulge themselves with conspicuous consumption. Teens were no exception. (Pg. 271)

Besides the conscientious creation of a youth culture fueled along largely by corporate interests and social trends, another noteworthy post-war development towards forging a distinctive youth culture was the looming crisis (at least as the news media would have it) of rampant juvenile delinquency across the nation. Marlon Brando would be the first young actor of the 1950s to try and articulate the youth defiance of the age in such attention grabbing performances – as a motor cycle gang leader shaking up life in a small California town in The Wild One (1953). Nevertheless, the growing attention to this social problem and the anxiety it caused was presented to lasting effect in Rebel Without A Cause (1955). This film was the quintessential narrative of the era dealing with alienated, troubled youth, and family strife.

The role of disaffected teen Jim Stark was immortalized by the charismatic James Dean in a timeless study of youth rebellion and coming of age forged in the midst of tragedy. Rebel Without A Cause was the first and most vital construction of a teen male character to resonate so powerfully with adolescent filmgoers. The plot mirrored Dean’s life to some extent as he was estranged from his own father and Rebel director Elia Kazan used that to good advantage in the contentious onscreen relationship Jim Stark has with his own weak, ineffectual, henpecked father (Jim Backus). Dean’s portrayal of the rebellious, troubled teen struggling to find a sense of place and belonging stands out as remarkable – not only because of the special, intuitive young man who played the part Jim Stark, but also because there was not really any previous film portrayals that favorably compared to Rebel Without A Cause.

It is also worthy to note that Warner Brothers had originally planned the film as a low budget black & white ‘B’ picture – but on the strength of box office returns from Dean’s first starring role in East Of Eden, the studio quickly upgraded the production to a full color ‘A’ picture with the attendant big publicity buildup. Although Dean also played a turmoil-ridden young man with serious authority and parental issues in East Of Eden, that story was set during the World War One period of almost forty years previously, while Rebel Without A Cause was fully contemporary and compatible with the frustrated and rebellious mid-century suburban youth of 1955…who were not exactly sure what they were so bothered about, as the film’s title strongly suggests. In Rebel Dean’s confused alter ego Jim Stark is in the precarious, untenable position of coping with the broken relationship to his own father while acting as a comforting father figure to his even more troubled teen friend Plato (Sal Mineo), who has no involved parents to speak of and is cared for by the family maid.

Tragically, Plato ends up dying at the close of the story in a shootout with Los Angeles police. To top things off, our troubled male teen characters there is Buzz (Corey Allen) the leading bully and gangster at the high school all three young men attend. Buzz goads Jim into a knife fight and a deadly car race known as a “chickie run” in which Buzz gets killed. Both young men were also vying for the affections of popular girl Judy (Natalie Wood) which adds more tension to the narrative while diminishing male strength and stability. Though Dean has the lead role, we still have three important adolescent male portrayals – who for one reason or another engage in delinquent, socially unacceptable behaviors, yet this is never fully justified or explained to satisfaction. The overwhelming, yet vague alienation of all three teen male constructions would have been unprecedented for the time.

Then again, the turbulent emotions and growing pains of the adolescent years are difficult to fully articulate and the cast of Rebel Without A Cause (Dean especially) embodied that angst superbly. The storyline of Rebel Without A Cause was a rather radical departure from everything else that Hollywood churned out before. In the aforementioned Halberstam tome The Fifties, prominent television writers such as Rod Serling (who would later create the acclaimed tv series Twilight Zone) believed that the movie industry was sorely outdated and had gotten away for too long with it’s unrealistic, misleading one dimensional treatments of teens as fresh, wide-eyed innocent bobby-soxers or goody-goody variety clad sports heroes.

It’s also remarkable that the 24 year-old Dean was blessed with an abundance of youthful good looks and convincingly passed for a 17 year-old teen, adding to his allure. Another outstanding aspect of Rebel Without A Cause that really distinguished it from more typical, bland teen fare of the era (and there was not much that catered chiefly to teens at this time) was the provocative promotional material – chiefly full size posters showing Dean wearing the film’s iconic bright red windbreaker (highly suggestive of racing teen hormones and angry, juvenile rebellion) along with tight jeans he dons, and the sullen, intimidating poses directly into the camera. These left an indelible imprint on the collective adolescent psyche of the times.

Dean’s tragic death in a car crash on September 30, 1955 – only five weeks before the release of Rebel Without A Cause cemented his global fan following and iconic status – strong to this day – – that no studio character development or image building apparatus could accomplish. In any event, 1955 would prove to be a major turning point in Hollywood’s recognition of the burgeoning adolescent culture, and from then forward would actively cater to it’s desires and speak to teen sensibilities – if only for boosting it’s profit margins.

Still, it’s important to note that while Dean was the single biggest teen idol of the decade there were other actors such as Nick Adams, Paul Newman, Dennis Hopper, and Warren Beatty who tried to emulate the James Dean mystique to one degree or another throughout the remainder of the 1950s and into the 1960s. Yet, they only succeeded in proving that Dean was an authentic phenomenon who captivated adolescent audiences in a way that no successors or imitators could match.

Since this post has been rather lengthy, the conclusion will be next week. The last part of my paper delves into the immense and lasting impact which the advent of Rock & Roll started having on youth culture.