Go West, Young Women!: The Rise of Early Hollywood

In the early part of the twentieth century, migrants made their way from rural homes to cities in record numbers and many traveled west. Los Angeles became a destination. Women flocked to the growing town to join the film industry as workers and spectators, creating a "New Woman." Their efforts transformed filmmaking from a marginal business to a cosmopolitan, glamorous, and bohemian one. By 1920, Los Angeles had become the only western city where women outnumbered men. In Go West, Young Women, Hilary A. Hallett explores these relatively unknown new western women and their role in the development of Los Angeles and the nascent film industry. From Mary Pickford's rise to become perhaps the most powerful woman of her age, to the racist moral panics of the post-World War I years that culminated in Hollywood's first sex scandal, Hallett describes how the path through early Hollywood presaged the struggles over modern gender roles that animated the century to come.

Author: Hilary Hallett
Publisher: University of California Press
Published: 01/15/2013
Pages: 326
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.90lbs
Size: 8.90h x 5.90w x 0.70d
ISBN13: 9780520274099
ISBN10: 0520274091
BISAC Categories:
- Performing Arts | Film | General
- History | United States | General

About the Author
Hilary Hallett is Assistant Professor of History at Columbia University.