Upon being blacklisted, the Hollywood Ten, not to mention other blacklistees, were out of work and with few prospects. Although some, like Ring Lardner, Jr., initially tried to ride out the blacklist with the help of prior savings and careful planning, the majority lacked such resources and needed work fast.
C. Robert Jennings, "The Hollywood 10, Plus Twenty," Los Angeles Times WEST Magazine, September 3, 1967, p. 12-14.	In general, such work came in three different forms: non-film-related employment, overseas work, and work under a pseudonym and/or a front. Upon realizing the blacklist was no fleeting fad, some blacklistees temporarily gave up on Hollywood and the film industry altogether and found less glamourous jobs -- running clubs, selling auto parts, working in toy stores. For example, as C. Robert Jennings notes in his essay "The Hollywood 10, Plus Twenty," Lester Cole "spent five years in his native New York, working variously as a short-order cook, a waiter, and pushing slabs of marble around a Brooklyn warehouse." Similarly, Alvah Bessie spent five years working as an assistant editor for a San Francisco newsheet; Herbert Biberman worked several years as a land procurer, packaging small plots of the Hollywood Hills to prospective buyers.
Jennings, p. 12-14. For a brief discussion of Trumbo's stay in Mexico City, see Bruce Cook's "The Black Years of Dalton Trumbo," American Film, October 1975, p. 35-36.	The second option was exile. Countless blacklistees left the States in search of film- and television-related work in England, France, and Mexico. For some, this exile was immediate. Edward Dmytryk, for example, left for England immediately following his blacklisting and spent nearly eighteen months there before returning to serve his prison sentence. Others left only after exhausting all American leads and opportunities. As Jennings notes, while Albert Maltz and Dalton Trumbo relocated to Mexico, Scott and Lester Cole found work in England. Other blacklistees, such as Ben Barzman and Paul Jarrico spent several years working in France.

Dalton Trumbo, "Blacklist=Black Market," The Nation, May 4, 1957, p. 385.	The third option for blacklistees was to assume a pseudonym. Of course, this was not an option for actors and producers. Although actors could -- and did -- use pseudonyms, it was practically a lost cause. Likewise with producers, who were required to meet face-to-face with studio heads, financial backers, etc. Yet writers, who were seldom asked to appear on the set, were better suited for a life of anonymity. As Dalton Trumbo noted, "[a] writer is more fortunate. Give him nothing more than paper, a pencil and a nice clean cell, and he's in business" (1) Thus, with the help of a sympathetic middleperson, or front, blacklisted writers were able to continue writing and selling (albeit at a dramatically lower price) scripts for both film and television.
	The following essay explores this subject in three parts. First, it provides a brief overview of the process of assuming a pseudonym and using a front. Next, it examines Adrian Scott's use of a number of pseudonyms and a single, quite interesting front. Finally, it discusses Dalton Trumbo's (in)famous use of "Robert Rich" to help destroy the blacklist.
	I. Pseudonyms and Fronts

Larry Ceplair and Steven Englund, The Inquisition in Hollywood: Politics in the Film Community 1930-1960 (New York: Anchor Press, 1980): 403-404.	As Larry Ceplair and Steven Englund note in The Inquisition in Hollywood: Politics in the Film Community 1930-1960, the most immediate by-product of the blacklisting was a black market. Following the HUAC hearings in 1947, members of the Hollywood Ten were not only out of jobs, they were unable to sell their work under their own names. The solution, of course, was pseudonyms. Many of the blacklisted used pseudonyms to sell their work. For example, Lester Cole wrote under the name Gerald L. C. Copley, Ring Lardner used Oliver Skene, and, as we shall see later, Adrian Scott used a number, including Guy Ritchie, John Ridgely, and J. P. Taylor.
	Yet by 1951, the conditions altered dramatically. Feeling political pressure, all of the major film studios and most of the independents were unwilling to traffic black market scripts. One result for blacklistees was the shift from film to television work. Another was what developed into a sophisticated use of pseudonyms and fronts.
	In theory, the use of pseudonyms and fronts was quite simple. Unable to sell under their own names, blacklisted writers would take on another. If suspicions arose, writers would use a front, who, like Woody Allen's character in the film The Front, would present the work as his (and in some cases, her) own, represent it in developmental meetings, discuss alterations, etc.
Jennings, 14.	In practice, however, the use of pseudonyms and fronts was quite complex. In response to a (quite correct) suspicion that blacklisted writers were writing under pseudonyms, HUAC established a number of watchdog agencies which sent out spies to monitor closely the transactions between studios and writers. To be safe, many writers took on multiple pseudonyms. As Jennings notes, Trumbo wrote under nine pseudonyms.
	The nuts and bolts of using pseudonyms is described in detail in a 1961 article in The Saturday Evening Post. The writer was none other than Ring Lardner, Jr., one of the Hollywood Ten. Because of its relevance, I quote from it at length:
Ring Lardner, "My Life on the Blacklist," The Saturday Evening Post, October 14, 1961, p. 42.	The people for whom I was directly working knew who I was, but the men who signed the checks in some instances did not. In others they did, but their records were subject to inspection at a higher echelon. To meet this situation my blacklisted collaborator and I had to use pseudonyms not only on the air but in our financial transactions. It would have been preferable to keep on using the same name, so that it would become familar to potential purchasers of our material. We learned, however, that if a writer appeared to be doing more than a few scripts in the same series, there would be a demand for personal contact with him from investors, sponsor representatives and network executives who wished to communicate their views on how to improve the program. A variety of pseudonyms became necessary in order to avoid undue attention.
Ceplair and Englund, 404. Cook, 32. Jennings, 14.	In addition to the practical headaches of using pseudonyms and fronts, there were other, larger problems. First, as mentioned earlier, blacklisted writers sold their scripts at a considerably lower rate than they were used to. As Ceplair and Englund note, the "black market was a buyers' paradise; some of the finest screenwriting talent in the world became available at bargain rates to small, independent producers who turned out grade 'C' films on shoestring budgets." Trumbo, for example, commanded $75,000 per film while under contract with MGM. According to Cook, Trumbo received $3,750 a film writing under a pseudonym. As Jennings notes, this is the same fee he once commanded for a single week's work. Moreover, writers split -- often fifty-fifty -- their fees with their fronts.
	Second, for a generation of writers responsible for politically- and socially-loaded films -- think Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo, Cornered, Crossfire, and Home of the Brave -- the black market fare was far from fulfilling. Indeed, it was difficult (yet not impossible and certainly attempted) to pack much social consciousness into episodes of Lassie, The Adventures of Sir Lancelot, and Daphne, Girl Detective.
	The third and perhaps most overlooked problem with using a pseudonym and front concerns the psyche. For those used to seeing their names on the silver screen, it was quite demoralizing to witness someone else receiving credit for their work. Accompanying the loss of credit was a loss of identity, meaning, and community. As the blacklisted writer Guy Endore notes:
Guy Endore, "Life on the Black List," The Nation, December 20, 1952, p. 568.	You are lost. You have no country, no civil rights, no means of livelihood. And you have heard so much about guilt by association that you hesitate to go to see anyone. When you meet an aquiantance you wait to be recognized, not wishing to spread the infection. You feel that like the lepers of the Middle Ages you ought to tinkle a bell and cry out the old warning, "Unclean!" "Unclean!"
	II. Pseudonyms, Fronts, & Adrian Scott

	In some ways, Adrian Scott is the perfect subject through which to trace the setbacks, creative adjustments, and experiences of the Hollywood Ten. Unlike other members of the Hollywood Ten who responded to the blacklist by either changing careers, assuming a pseudonym, or leaving the States, Scott did all three in an attempt to salvage and rebuild his career. As we shall see, his efforts produced modest yet steady returns.
	The blacklisting of Scott was one of the swiftest among the Hollywood Ten. On October 29, 1947, Scott appeared before HUAC to offer his testimony, or lack thereof, regarding his personal politics. Four weeks later, on November 26, Scott was fired by RKO Radio Pictures. RKO Radio Picture's President, N. P. Rathvon, did not mince words on why he was firing Scott:
"Letter from N. P. Rathvon, President of RKO Radio Pictures, November 26, 1947." Adrian and Joan Scott Papers, 1940-1972, Accession Number 3238, Box 2, Folder 23, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming.	You have recently refused to answer certain questions propounded to you by a committee of the House of Representatives. By your conduct in that regard and by your actions, attitude, associations, public statements and general conduct before, at and since that time you have brought yourself into disrepute with a large section of the public, have offended the community, have prejudiced this corporation as your employer and the motion picture industry in general, have lessened your capacity fully to comply with your employment agreement, and have otherwise violated the provisions of Article 16 of your employment agreement with us... The effects of your conduct in this regard are still, and increasingly, continuing. Accordingly, we hereby notify you that we have elected and do hereby elect, pursuant to the rights conferred upon us by said employment agreement, to terminate your employment by us, effective immediately.
	For Scott, the blacklist was complete. Fired from RKO Radio Pictures, the idea of film-related work in Hollywood was out of the question. As a "threat to the security of the United States," Scott's ability (not to mention ease with which) to travel was sharply curtailed. Further, projects that Scott had developed and set forth previous to the trial, including the screenplay and book Mr. Lincoln's Whiskers, were immediately severed.
"Letter to C. Robert Jennings, June 27, 1967." Adrian and Joan Scott Papers, 1940-1972, Accession Number 3238, Box 5, Folder 4, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming.	From 1947 to 1952, my earning capacity diminished to almost nil. Some years: zero. Some years: roughly 10% of my salary of 1947. I was unable to get work in any of the fields allied with motion pictures, -- magazines, radio, TV, etc. and did one brief stint as an office manager where I displayed an extroadinary inefficeincy [sic]. All seasons during this period were dominated by the question: How to eat? How to live?
"Letter from J. Harold Myers, January 8, 1948." Adrian and Joan Scott Papers, 1940-1972, Accession Number 3238, Box 5, Folder 4, American Heritage Center, University of Wyoming. Adrian Scott, "Blacklist: The Liberal's Straightjacket and It's Effect on Content," [sic] in Hollywood Review 2:2 (Sept-Oct, 1955).	Interestingly, Scott did work during the first year of his blacklisting. However, instead of writing or producing films, he wrote about films and the film industry. For example, he contributed regularly to Cine-Technician, a London-based, bi-monthly journal published by the Association of Cine-Technicians. Further, in 1955, Scott published a long essay entitled "Blacklist: The Liberal's Straightjacket and It's Effect on Content" [sic] in Hollywood Review. Like fellow Hollywood Tenner John Howard Lawson, who in 1953 published the polemical Film in the Battle of Ideas, Scott went from film producer/screenwriter to film critic and conducted a content analysis of films produced before and after the blacklist. To no one's surprise, Scott concluded that film production after 1947 lacked the humanistic, democratic, and anti-fascist content found in such pre-1947 films as Crossfire, 30 Seconds Over Tokyo, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.
Bruce Cook, Dalton Trumbo (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1977): 282-3.	By the mid-fifties, however, Scott returned to screenwriting -- albeit for television -- with the help of a number of pseudonyms and an interesting front. When asked by Bruce Cook what he had been doing during the time, Scott answered: "During the fifties, you mean? What saved me was TV. It was a matter of feeding the monster. I worked under the table on television from 1954 to 1961 -- totally as a writer. To be a producer, of course, there has to be a body to appear at conferences and so on. And my body just wasn't acceptable."
	By examining the contracts from the time, we begin to understand what and how it happened. On June 11, 1957, a series of contracts were signed for scripts for The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Adventures of Sir Lancelot. Although the two series were produced by different production companies -- Dilipa Corporation and Sapphire Films, respectively -- they were produced by the same man, Albert G. Ruben. Conversely, although the two separate scripts for Robin Hood and Sir Lancelot were written by the same man, Adrian Scott, they were attributed to two separate entities, or pseudonyms: Guy Ritchie and John Ridgely.
	And yet, there's more. The same year Albert Ruben from Sapphire Films signed an additional series of contracts for scripts for The Adventures of Sir Lancelot. This time, however, the signee is one Joanne Court. To complicate matters further, four years later in June of 1961, Joanne Court sent a letter to Carl Stucke of Warner Brothers Pictures requesting the writing credits for new scripts for Daphne, Girl Detective be changed from Joanne Court to J. P. Taylor. Likewise, on June 1, 1961, Joanne Court sent a letter to Miss Jane Lynch of the Writers Guild of America, West, Inc., to "notify you that I intend using the pseudonym, J. P. Taylor, on a Warner Brothers T.V. production. The show is entitled, "Daphne, Girl Detective," and is part of their Surfside 6 series."
	What's going on? If Guy Ritchie and John Ridgely are pseudonyms for Adrian Scott, who is Joanne Court? And if Joanne Court is a front for Scott, who is J. P. Taylor?
Cook, 283.	The answers to these questions are, in order: a lot; a front, a pseudonym, and a wife; and a pseudonym for a pseudonymed front. We begin with an explanation from Bruce Cook. Cook writes that in the early fifties, Adrian Scott made contact with a young lady named Joan LaCour who wanted to write for television. She had no experience, but she did have ideas, energy, and a name to offer. They formed a partnership, these two. In the beginning, she merely fronted for him, proposing his ideas, delivering material he had written, and sitting in on rewrite conferences with story editors and producers. The credits and 50 percent of the money they earned went to her. But as time went on, she began to take a more active part in the enterprise, and it became something more in the nature of a true collaboration -- ideas tossed back and forth, lines written and rewritten between them. The split of the take remained the same, though, for the two eventually married.
Bernard F. Dick, Radical Innocence: A Critical Study of the Hollywood Ten (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1989): 133.	This story is confirmed by Bernard Dick, who in his book Radical Innocence: A Critical Study of the Hollywood Ten notes that following the turbulent trial and prison sentence, Scott's "luck began to change when he met aspiring television writer Joan La Cour, who first fronted for him on television scripts, then collaborated with him, and eventually became his wife."
	So who is who? Let us review: Joanne Court: pseudonym of Joan La Cour who is both a co-writer with and front for Adrian Scott. Joan La Cour (or Joan LaCour): television writer, front for, and wife of Adrian Scott. John Ridgely: pseudonym for Adrian Scott. Guy Ritchie: pseudonym for Adrian Scott. Adrian Scott: producer, writer, blacklistee. J. P. Taylor: a pseudonym for Joanne Court, a pseudonym for the collaborations between Joan La Cour and Adrian Scott.
	III. Robert Rich and the Blacklist's End

Cook, 282.	In an interview with Bruce Cook, Adrian Scott attributed the end of the blacklist to Dalton Trumbo: "That it ended at all was due to the work of Dalton Trumbo. You have to give him credit -- the Robert Rich episode followed by his credits for Exodus and Spartacus, well, it was just too much for them. The blacklist had been broken by one man. That showed it could be broken by all."
	However simplistic, Scott's assessment of the end of the blacklisting or, to be more specific, the one who made the end possible, is right on target. For it was Trumbo, along with his pseudonymed side-kick Robert Rich, who unraveled the blacklist.
	In 1956, The Brave One won an Academy Award for "Best Motion Picture Story." The credited screenwriter was Robert Rich, one of Dalton Trumbo's nine pseudonyms. When Robert Rich failed to appear to claim his prize, widespread speculation as to the identity of Rich spread. Although many believed Rich to be Trumbo, the writer was saying neither yeah nor nay.
Ceplair and Englund, 419.	Trumbo spent the next two years playing with Robert Rich, the industry, and the public. As Ceplair and Englund note, Trumbo "began deliberately to augment and manipulate the industry's considerable interest in 'Robert Rich,' making it appear as if there were a thriving black market all over Hollywood responsible for virtually every important film of the last five years." Thus, while the industry insiders cringed, Trumbo laughed and "bided his time as he calculated the effects of the systematic campaign of gossip, innuendo, and whispers he was organizing." In a December 8, 1957 letter to Aubrey Finn, his lawyer, As Trumbo himself noted:
Additional Dialogue: Letters of Dalton Trumbo, 1942-1962, edited by Helen Manfull (New York: M. Evans and Company, Inc., 1970): 407-408.	The Robert Rich incident is well known throughout Italy, France, England, and the United States. It is one of the truly comic names in recent motion picture history. The incident is remembered, particularly in entertainment circles and in the international press as a whole, as an entirely delightful one. I believe the reappearance of Robert Rich on a second King Brothers picture will be worth just about a million dollars worth of publicity. I think the King Brothers are too shrewd not to see that fact when it is properly presented to them. The first Robert Rich incident caught them unprepared. This one will find them loaded to the guns in advance, and waiting for it. I will devote a good deal of energy to press releases which we will have prepared in advance, to interviews with the various King Brothers, and to other aspects which can be exploited by good copy: jokes, gags, and so forth... We will drag the gag out as long as we can, with TV and radio interviews and all the press exploitation we can get. I think that I can persuade them to feature the author in their ads as the mysterious winner of last year's Academy Award. I think I can get them to have Saul Bass draw up a sketch of the Oscar itself covering its eyes with its two hands.
Ceplair and Englund, 418-421.	By 1960, Trumbo's laughs transformed into a full-fledged assault. Bolstered by fellow blacklistee Nedrick Young's announcement that "Nathan E. Douglas," the writer of the Academy Award-winning The Defiant Ones, was none other than Nedrick Young, Trumbo revealed to the world on January 16, 1959 that he indeed was Robert Rich. A year later, Otto Preminger announced that Trumbo had written Exodus and that he would include the writer's proper name on screen. This action prompted Kirk Douglas to give Trumbo proper screen credit for Spartacus.
	Although the courage of Preminger and Douglas certainly helped Trumbo -- not to mention the plight of all other blacklistees -- the financial returns of Exodus and Spartacus certainly did not hurt. In a January 3, 1961 letter to fellow Hollywood Tenner, Alvah Bessie, Trumbo notes:
Manfull, 540.	I enclose weekly Variety's most recent "National Boxoffice Survey" (Wednesday, December 28, 1960) -- which shows that in terms of cash revenue Exodus is number one nationally and Spartacus is number two. The two films will shift back and forth between those two positions for many many weeks in the future. This proves to the banks, the distributors, the studios, and the organizations and press of the right that, ordinarily, good films cannot be financially damaged by political attack, threatened boycott, and actual picketing. Not in today's climate, at least. This has to be, in one degree or another, a victory for every blacklisted person, since it knocks the props out from under the principal economic reason for blacklisting him. It cannot hurt him, therefore; it can only make easier his personal struggle to break through.
Cook, 282-3.	It is no coincidence that in 1961, the same year that Trumbo was receiving un-pseudonymed screen credits, Adrian Scott began working again in less-than hostile waters. That year, he and his wife, writing partner, and front Joan moved to England. Although still employing pseudonyms, he and Joan enjoyed much more of an open life and kept busy writing scripts for television. Two years later, in 1963, MGM, England hired Adrian Scott as a production executive, thus officially ending over sixteen years of blacklisting.