BOOKS

By Richard Stengel

THE POWER AND THE GLITTER by Ronald Brownstein

Pantheon; 437 pages; $24.95

Katharine Hepburn once remarked that the secret to Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers' success was that he gave her class while she gave him sex appeal. Hepburn's equation helps explain the long and awkward tango between Hollywood and Washington. To Washington, Hollywood offered glamour; to Hollywood, Washington provided substance, or at least the illusion of it.

The two cities are the source of much American mythology. Washington promulgated the fable that any boy -- or girl -- could grow up to be President; Hollywood invented the fantasy that the same boy or girl could become a movie star. Both cities must appeal to hearts and minds; both require a mass audience; both thrive on applause.

Ronald Brownstein's The Power and the Glitter is a history of the relationship between Hollywood and Washington. But Brownstein does not really mine the mythological and sociological bond between the two cities. Instead, he recounts the times that Hollywood and Washington have intersected on affairs of state and of the heart. His research suggests that while Washington occasionally flirts with Hollywood, Hollywood has long been an unrequited suitor in the corridors of power. In the end Brownstein's book is less a history of the connection between Washington politics and Hollywood dazzle than a diligent and readable survey of politics in Hollywood.

Brownstein walks us through some of the early history: moguls sycophantically pursuing Presidents; Bogie and Bacall barnstorming for Adlai Stevenson; the Hollywood Ten and the House Committee on Un-American Activities; the unholy Jack Pack of Frank Sinatra and J.F.K. (Gary Hart and Warren Beatty being the more cerebral, 1980s version). Much of the book's second half deals with the travails of a coterie of wealthy Hollywood liberals -- from Norman Lear to Rob Lowe -- who are desperate to be taken seriously.

In truth Washington is interested in Hollywood just at election times, and even then the interest is primarily cash. Only in the past few years has Hollywood demanded a little respect for its money. Liberal organizations such as the Hollywood Women's Political Committee and People for the American Way seek to influence policy, not just pose for snapshots with the candidate.

Such ideological activism poses a Democratic dilemma. Groups like the H.W.P.C. are liberal on social and foreign policy issues but moderate on economic ones. Mainstream Democrats are precisely the opposite: they care far more about economic equity than about a nuclear freeze.

No one disputes that the distance between politics and show business is narrowing, yet Hollywood is no closer to power. Ronald Reagan did not represent the apotheosis of Hollywood in Washington, but the reverse: he was spurned by the film community and accepted by voters precisely because he seemed so un-Hollywood. Washington has yet to harness Hollywood for its ability to create modern myths and tap into the national zeitgeist. When that happens, the connection between the two cities will be more real than celluloid.