Alvah Bessie came from a wealthy family with an authoritarian father. His father used the family's wealth to control his children, dictating what they would study in college and where they would study it. Upon his father's death, Alvah chose to leave his practical studies behind and focus on the arts, originally becoming an actor. Unable to break out, he moved to France to live with other American expatriates in the artist section of town. Originally translating French novels into English, he quickly began writing his own novels. The world took notice and he earned plaudits from the likes of Ernest Hemingway.
Upon his return to the United States, Bessie became ensconced at Warner Brothers, writing and punching up scripts. At the time, the studio system would keep a staff writers on the payroll who would be called upon to fix existing scripts, adapt novels into scripts and anything else the studio might assign. (These days, most writers outside of television are not actual studio employees.)
Alvah soon grew concerned with the rise of fascism around the world, but particularly in Europe. Seeing no movement willing to fight back against this, he joined the American Communist party. While the United States would eventually start fighting fascism on the side of the Allied Powers during WWII, Bessie was considered to be "pre-maturely anti-fascist", which brought scrutiny upon him. At the conclusion of the war, looking for a new nemesis, Congress chose communism and began heaping scorn upon anyone deemed "anti-American". Alvah found himself on the outs with the mainstream.
Mr. Bessie soon found himself summoned before HUAC to participate in the kangaroo court that didn't seek to arrest anyone; as a matter of fact it was not illegal to be a communist or communist sympathizer. The hearings were mainly setup to stir up the populace against communism and provide a showcase for their grandstanding. Alvah chose to defy the order and spent ten months in jail. Since it wasn't illegal to be a communist, the only way to punish anyone was to blacklist them from work, which sadly happened to Bessie.
While Bessie never worked in Hollywood again, he did continue writing novels, eventually telling his side of the story in the fictionalized The Un-Americans. While Mr. Bessie's life eventually recovered, his career never did.
