The studio system that produced Hollywood movies from the 1930s through the 1950s was tightly controlled by those in charge to ensure that the American people only saw the stars they wanted them to see, how they wanted them to see them. In The Star Machine, noted film historian Jeanine Basinger examines how studios worked to create movie stars, first by finding them and then putting them through a rigorous process referred to as the star machine.


Basinger was very wise in choosing actors that have a following but have not been widely written about in recent years. Fans will find it fascinating to read about dancer Eleanor Powell, who in the 1930s and ’40s was a leading star, Deanna Durbin, Irene Dunne Norma Shearer and more. These are all people who went through the “star machine” but are now largely consigned to reruns of their films on Turner Classic Movies.
One of the most fascinating chapters in the book is titled “Malfunctions.” Studios did everything they could to make sure that their ‘finds’ would become stars. They changed their names, capped teeth and put them in every cheesecake photo imaginable. Sometimes alas, it just didn’t work out. Why didn’t Jack Beutel become a star after the release of Howard Hughes’ The Outlaw? While it may have had something to do with the size of co-star Jane Russell’s bosom, the author does offer additional theories. Sometimes it was a case of wanting to break a singer into films. Why didn’t Rosemary Clooney become a movie star but Doris Day did?
Jeanine Basinger is an experienced writer who has written The Star Machine in a breezy, yet informative manner that will please both film scholars and fans alike. The numerous cheesecake photos of actors are a bonus. Her footnotes, present on almost every page offer fun, occasionally tongue in cheek facts to an already informative book. If there is anything to quibble with Basinger about, it is her belief that the “star machine” is long dead. It operates in a different way today, but as we see the careful crafting of Disney’s High School Musical franchise, I can’t help but feel there is in fact a “star machine” at work.