Red Carpet by Erich Schwartzel
Wall Street Journal reporter Erich Schwartzel documents Communist China’s growing influence over Hollywood but can’t avoid commenting on the context. As he makes clear in Red Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy, many American industries beyond motion pictures have fallen silent or done a tricky dance to please the Chinese regime. When Houston Rockets’ GM Daryl Money tweeted support for Hong Kong protestors, the NBA apologized and fell in obeisance. Pro basketball made clear that it wished no offense to their “friends” in Beijing.
Hollywood may have been a test case for mainland China venturing onto the world stage in the ‘90s after decades of Maoist isolation. Pandering to a market of 1.4 billion was a temptation too strong to resist. Disney and Sony CEOs apologized profusely for Kundun (1997) and Seven Years in Tibet (1997). It wasn’t just the prospect of the Chinese regime banning those two films—or even the entire Disney and Sony film roster—that spooked the executives. Disney wanted to launch its channel or open a theme park in China and Sony had million dollar deals in electronic devices at stake.
The desire to please China eventually encompassed even the smallest detail. In the original Top Gun (1986), Tom Cruise’s flight jacket bore the flags of America’s Pacific allies, Japan and Taiwan. Allies be damned nowadays. In the upcoming sequel, Top Gun: Maverick, those flags have reportedly disappeared.
Red Carpet includes many other examples of Beijing’s growing hegemony. The irony is that mainland China is no longer a prime market for Hollywood blockbusters. According to Schwartzel, China’s film industry is producing its own thrillers, sci-fi and fantasy epics based on the Hollywood precedents and those 1.4 billion viewers are flocking to see their own movies instead.
Red Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy is published by Penguin Press.
