Hollywood Babylon
book by Kenneth Anger
Hollywood Babylon is a book by avant-garde filmmaker Kenneth Anger, which details the purported scandals of famous Hollywood denizens from the 1900s to the 1950s. The book was banned shortly after it was first published in the U.S. in 1965, and remained unavailable until reprinted ten years later. Upon its second release in 1975, The New York Times said of it, "If a book such as this can be said to have charm, it lies in the fact that here is a book without one single redeeming merit." The Daily Beast described Anger's book as "essentially a work of fiction. There is no doubt that many—if not all—of the stories Anger shares in his slim bible have no merit." Film historian Kevin Brownlow repeatedly criticized the book, citing Anger as saying his research method was "mental telepathy, mostly".
Contents
Originally published in French in 1959 by J.J. Pauvert (Paris) as Hollywood Babylone, the first U.S. edition of Hollywood Babylon was published in 1965 by Associated Professional Services of Phoenix, Arizona. A second U.S. edition was released in 1975 by Rolling Stone's Straight Arrow Press, distributed by Simon & Schuster, following a series of copyright disputes.
The book details alleged scandals involving Hollywood stars from the silent era through the 1960s, including Mary Astor, Clara Bow, Charles Chaplin, Jeanne Eagels, Frances Farmer, Errol Flynn, Judy Garland, John Gilbert, Juanita Hansen, Jean Harlow, Barbara La Marr, Carole Landis, Marilyn Monroe, Mae Murray, Mary Nolan, Ramon Novarro, Marie Prevost, Wallace Reid, Alma Rubens, Olive Thomas, Thelma Todd, Lana Turner, Rudolph Valentino, and Lupe Vélez.
Hollywood Babylon also includes chapters on the Fatty Arbuckle–Virginia Rappe scandal, the murder of William Desmond Taylor, the Hollywood blacklist, the murder of Sharon Tate, and Confidential magazine.
Criticisms
Exploitation
The 1975 edition featured graphic images, including a photo of the car crash that killed Jayne Mansfield, a photograph of Carole Landis after her suicide, images of director Paul Bern following his suicide, a photograph of Lewis Stone dying on a sidewalk, and uncensored images of the mutilated corpse of the Black Dahlia.
Falsehoods
Many of Anger's claims have been challenged as false since the book's initial publication.
“Hollywood Babylon” enters the record as book by Kenneth Anger. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Hollywood, Babylon and book can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“Hollywood Babylon” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Hollywood, Babylon and book provides the most credible route into that argument.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3139410. VIAF identifies the subject as 9442151052054633530005. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1965, 1975 and 1959.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Hollywood Babylon” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.