Ben Urwand

Ben Urwand

My Book

When I was doing my PhD at UC Berkeley, I made a surprising discovery at the Bundesarchiv in Berlin: every night before going to bed, Adolf Hitler watched a movie — and his opinions were always recorded. In the image below, you can see his verdict on Tarzan, the tenth film on the list: “Bad [schlecht].”

Scanned document from 1939 showing Adolf Hitler’s verdict on the film Tarzan as “bad [schlecht]”

As I sifted through these files, I found something even more shocking: a letter from the head of Twentieth Century Fox in Germany addressed to one of Hitler’s adjutants. He asked whether Hitler would share his views on the role of American films in Germany. The letter was signed, “Heil Hitler!”

Letter from 20th Century Fox’s Berlin office in 1938 addressed to Adolf Hitler’s adjutant, signed “Heil Hitler!”
Hollywood Reporter magazine cover showing a swastika painted on the Warner Bros. water tower, illustrating coverage of Ben Urwand’s research on Hollywood and Nazi Germany

That moment set off years of archival research across Germany and the United States. I watched more than 500 feature films and uncovered a dense web of connections between Hollywood and Nazi Germany. I found that the major studios routinely cut scenes — or canceled entire productions — in response to objections from the German consul in Los Angeles.

In 2013, while a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows, I published The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler (Harvard University Press). The book made international headlines and was featured as the cover story of The Hollywood Reporter, introducing a new interpretation of Hollywood’s “golden age” into public discourse.

Book cover of The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler by Ben Urwand, featuring a black-and-white photo of Nazi officials, including Hitler, watching a film

The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler

To continue doing business in Germany after Hitler’s ascent to power, Hollywood studios agreed not to make films that attacked the Nazis or condemned Germany’s persecution of Jews. Ben Urwand reveals this bargain for the first time—a “collaboration” (Zusammenarbeit) that drew in a cast of characters ranging from notorious German political leaders such as Goebbels to Hollywood icons such as Louis B. Mayer. Painstakingly marshaling previously unexamined archival evidence, The Collaboration raises the curtain on a hidden episode in Hollywood—and American—history.

Buy The Collaboration

The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler

To continue doing business in Germany after Hitler’s ascent to power, Hollywood studios agreed not to make films that attacked the Nazis or condemned Germany’s persecution of Jews. Ben Urwand reveals this bargain for the first time—a “collaboration” (Zusammenarbeit) that drew in a cast of characters ranging from notorious German political leaders such as Goebbels to Hollywood icons such as Louis B. Mayer. Painstakingly marshaling previously unexamined archival evidence, The Collaboration raises the curtain on a hidden episode in Hollywood—and American—history.

Buy The Collaboration
Book cover of The Collaboration: Hollywood’s Pact with Hitler by Ben Urwand, featuring a black-and-white photo of Nazi officials, including Hitler, watching a film

TV Interviews

Ben Urwand appearing on Lou Dobbs Tonight on Fox Business, discussing his book The Collaboration and Hollywood’s concessions to Nazi Germany in the 1930s
Ben Urwand appearing on WSJ Live’s News Hub to discuss his book The Collaboration and Hollywood’s dealings with Nazi Germany
Ben Urwand appearing on CBS This Morning with Anthony Mason and Gayle King to discuss his book The Collaboration and Hollywood’s relationship with Nazi Germany

Radio / Podcasts

WNYC - On the Media

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ABC - Late Night Live

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KCRW

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Crime & Justice with Dan Schorr

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WBEZ - Worldview

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BBC Radio 4

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Public Appearances

2015

  • July 2, German Historical Museum, Berlin

2014

  • January 23, JCCSF, with Greil Marcus, San Francisco, CA
  • January 26, Temple Isaiah / UC Riverside, Palm Springs, CA
  • February 19, Pforzheimer House, Harvard University, MA
  • December 9, Westchester Reform Temple, NY

2013

  • October 2, Cape Ann Community Cinema, Gloucester, MA
  • October 10, Jewish Literary Festival, Washington, D.C.
  • October 15, Free Library, Philadelphia, PA
  • October 16, Holocaust & Human Rights Education Center, NY
  • October 17, Museum of Tolerance, New York, NY
  • October 25, Harvard Bookstore, Cambridge, MA
  • October 28, Open Visions Forum, Fairfield, CT
  • November 4, The Wiener Library, London, United Kingdom
  • November 5, Waterstone’s Gower Street, London, United Kingdom
  • November 13, Book Festival of the MJCCA, Atlanta, GA
  • November 16, Monte Cristo Bookshop, New London, CT
  • November 19, Film & Visual Studies Colloquium, Harvard University
  • November 22, Harvard Club of New York City, NY
  • December 11, National Archives, Washington, D.C.
  • December 12, Columbia University, NY
  • December 18, Sydney Jewish Museum, Sydney, Australia

Praise for The Collaboration

“That's really f*ckin' interesting.”
- Quentin Tarantino
“Full of startling and surprising revelations, presented in exemplary fashion, without any moralizing or sensationalism.”
- Sir Richard Evans
“A tremendous piece of work, fully sustained, building momentum charged by thrillingly detailed storytelling, increasing suspense, and a consistent movement from outrages to atrocities, with a stunning conclusion of heroism and tragedy – and it is as well a devastating RIP to what we’ve been told, all down these years, about ‘the genius of the system."
- Greil Marcus
“Urwand draws on a wealth of previously uncited documents to argue that Hollywood studios, in an effort to protect the German market for their movies, not only acquiesced to Nazi censorship but also actively and enthusiastically cooperated with that regime's global propaganda effort.”
- Jennifer Schuessler, New York Times
“Urwand keeps the jaw-dropping revelations coming in this damning indictment of the complicity of the major Hollywood studios--and their mostly Jewish heads--in the Nazis' campaign to exterminate Europe's Jews...Urwand deserves immense credit for this groundbreaking--and truly unique--take on the WWII era.”
- Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Offers a keen, unsettling look at the unholy alliance Hollywood made with the Nazis, which allowed both to keep packing movie theaters in Germany up until the outbreak of war... The result of this complicated and slippery relationship, as Urwand depicts with subtlety, was the absolute disappearance from film of Nazis and Jews until the end of the decade.”
- Kirkus Reviews
“Urwand is tearing down the popular impression that the 1930s Hollywood community stood united in efforts to combat the Nazi regime. Quite the contrary, says Urwand, whose research reveals a shocking level of collaboration (or Zusammenarbeit, i.e. 'working together') between the German government and Tinseltown's studios... not only to film versions created for the German market, but for the U.S. and countries around the world.”
- Lesley M. M. Blume, Vanity Fair
“The Collaboration unfolds a story that rather knocks the shine off the golden age of cinema... Urwand has done some energetic digging in the archives, quoting letters, memos and newspaper reports to uncover a shameful policy of compromise and kowtowing on the part of the studio bosses.”
- Anthony Quinn, The Guardian
“Unearthing multiple archives on two continents, Urwand chronicles the birth and growth of the major film studios’ craven accommodation toward Nazi Germany throughout the 1930s.”
- Melvin Jules Bukiet, Washington Post
“These and other revelations in Ben Urwand’s controversial exposé, ‘The Collaboration,’ are nothing short of astonishing, going well beyond what was known about Hollywood’s timidity during that era. With damning archival evidence, Urwand argues that the studios, motivated by profits, were reluctant to abandon the German market, where American films were popular and Hitler himself was a fan.”
- Julia M. Klein, Boston Globe
“Urwand...presents explosive new evidence about the shocking extent of the partnership between the Nazis and major Hollywood producers...[A] riveting book...As you turn its pages you realize with dismay that collaboration is the only fitting word for the relationship between Hitler and Hollywood in the 1930s.”
- David Mikics, Tablet Magazine
“Urwand is also to be commended for retaining a sense of the bigger picture, especially in detailing the sustained and callous disregard for the plight of Jewish citizens across Europe, even when the system of collaboration started to fall apart from 1939. This is a book that challenges every rose-tinted view of Hollywood's Golden Age. It sheds a piercing light on dark deeds and is an invaluable work of political history that has all the page-turning urgency of a thriller.”
- Allan Hunter, Herald Scotland

As Seen In

The New York Times logo – featured Ben Urwand’s work
The Wall Street Journal logo – featured Ben Urwand’s work
Vanity Fair logo – featured Ben Urwand’s work
CBS logo – featured Ben Urwand’s work

Ben Urwand

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