Episode 42: On the Waterfront (1954) (Guest: Warren Scharf)

Episode 42: On the Waterfront (1954) (Guest: Warren Scharf)

Jonathan Hafetz

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Description

This episode looks at On the Waterfront, the celebrated 1954 American film directed by Elia Kazan and written by Budd Schulberg. The film stars Marlon Brando as the ex-prize fighter turned New Jersey longshoreman Terry Malloy. Malloy struggles to stand up to mob-affiliated union boss Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb) after Malloy is lured into setting up a fellow dockworker whom Friendly has murdered to prevent him from testifying before the Waterfront Crime Commission about violence and corruption at the docks. The pressure on Malloy rises as he falls in love with Edie Doyle (Eva Marie Saint), the murdered dockworker’s sister, and as Edie, along with local priest Father Pete Barry (Karl Malden), urge Malloy to do the right thing. Malloy ultimately testifies against Friendly and challenges Friendly’s leadership at great personal risk. While the film is about a courageous fight against a corrupt power structure and injustice, it is also influenced by director Elia Kazan’s own controversial decision to act as an informant against fellow directors, writers, and actors during the McCarthy-era Red Scare.

Guest: Warren Scharf

Warren Scharf has been the Executive Director of Lenox Hill Neighborhood House since 2003. Warren served previously as the Attorney-in-Charge of The Brooklyn Neighborhood Office of The Legal Aid Society, the Attorney-in-Charge of The Brooklyn Office for the Aging of The Legal Aid Society and the Vice President of The Partnership for the Homeless. He is the recipient of the Legal Services Award from the Association of the Bar of the City of New York and is a graduate of Columbia College and Columbia Law School.

Timestamps:

0:00 Introduction
2:20 Corruption on the docks
9:18 Boxing: I could have been a contender
17:07 The priest on the waterfront
23:44 Testifying before waterfront crime commission
32:10 Informants
34:48 Elia Kazan and the House Un-American Activities Committee
47:04 The film’s relevance today
48:39 Some people who stood up to HUAC
50:40 Separating the art and the artist

Further Reading:

Demeri, Michelle J., “The ‘Watchdog’ Agency: Fighting Organized Crime on the Waterfront in New York and New Jersey,” 38 New Eng. J. on Crim. & Civ. Confinement 257 (2012)

Murphy, Sean, “An Underworld Syndicate': Malcolm Johnson's ' On the Waterfront' Articles,” The Pulitzer Prizes Archive (1948)

Navasky, Victor S., Naming Names (Viking Press 1980)

Rebello, Stephen, A City Full of Hawks: On the Waterfront Seventy Years Later—Still the Great American Contender (Rowman & Littlefield 2024)

Pjevach, Julia, Note, “A Comparative Look at the Response to Organized Crime in the Ports of New York-New Jersey and Vancouver,” 6 Cardozo Int'l & Comp. L. Rev. 283 (2022)

Smith, Wendy, “The Director Who Named Names,” The American Scholar (Dec. 10, 2014)

Publication Date

4-29-2025

Disciplines

Law

Episode 42: On the Waterfront (1954) (Guest: Warren Scharf)

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