Cold War Entertainment: The Spy Drama "I Led 3 Lives"

          Television programming took full advantage of the Cold War fears of the viewing public. News and discussion programs continually covered the Cold War as their primary platform, but “such nonfiction shows were limited in how they could present the Cold War. Tied to fact and the presentation of actual events, news programs could not ef­fectively illustrate emotional ramifications, such as the nature of the enemy or the consequences of defeat.”   Entertainment, however, had much more leeway in presenting the anti-Communist rhetoric.  Entertainment programs, especially the genre which has since been known as “spy television,” continually “presented an interpretation of life in which a good ‘us’ was forever defeating, in 30 or 60 minutes, an evil ‘them.’”  Throughout the 1950s, television programming inundated the viewing public with a “bath of Cold War clichés and fear—a flood of propagandistic messages that urged the public to support unquestioningly the policies of the U.S. government.” These shows subtlety conditioned Americans to believe that the U.S. government was the brave and unconquerable soldier in the fight against Communism everywhere.

          A prime example of the “spy television” program I Led 3 Lives which aired from 1953 to 1956 and was promoted as “a crusade against communist subversion.”  It was an instant hit. The audience was riveted by the character, promoted as a patriot, who led three lives in the service to his country:  a citizen, a Communist, and a counter-spy for the FBI.  The advertisements constantly reminded viewers that the story was based on true events, that of Herbert A. Philbrick who wrote a memoir documenting his years as an FBI informant working within Communists cells.  If this wasn’t enough to keep viewers routing for Philbrick’s character, each week actor Richard Carlson recapped for viewers that this was for real:

This is the story, the fantastically true story, of Herbert A. Philbrick, who for nine frightening years did lead three lives—average citizen, high-level member of the Communist Party, and counterspy for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. For obvious reasons the names, dates, and places have been changed. But the story is based on fact.

With the constant recaps that the story was “true,” the entertainment became fact in the eyes of the viewers and further prompted fears of Communist infiltration within everyday America.

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Sources:

 J. Fred McDonald, Television and the Red Menace: The Video Road to Vietnam, http://jfredmacdonald.com/trm/index.htm

Thomas Doherty, Cold War, Cool Medium.

 Richard Carlson, I Led Three Lives quoted in McDonald.