Every now and then, a book can change the way we think about the past. Independent Stardom: Freelance Women in the Hollywood Studio System (published by University of Texas Press) tells a story that can shift perspectives on how Golden Age Hollywood operated. With Independent Stardom, Chapman University film professor Emily Carman explores an aspect of the old studio system hidden in plain sight—the free agent status enjoyed during the 1930s by some female stars, including Carol Lombard and Barbara Stanwyck. Free agency allowed them to negotiate salaries and choose directors and screenplays with any interested studio at a time when most movie actors (as well as the people behind the cameras) were employees of the major studios.
Of course, only a handful of top stars were able to leverage their popularity to achieve such autonomy. Before the end of World War II, actresses were uniquely able to work as independent contractors because of the studios’ perception of their box office draw with the female audiences that comprised the largest share of regular moviegoers. Diligently sifting through the archives to show how free agency worked, Carman also establishes a continuity of quasi-independence stretching from the formation of United Artists in 1919 by Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin and other stars and the situation of directors and actors in today’s Hollywood who negotiate deals with the studios while remaining outside their employ.
