An exploration of the struggles between art and business in modern Hollywood. Matthew Specktor grew up in the film industry: the son of CAA superagent Fred Specktor, his childhood was one where Beau Bridges came over for dinner, Martin Sheen's daughter was his close friend, and Marlon Brando left long messages on the family answering machine. He would eventually work in Hollywood himself, first as a studio executive and later as a screenwriter. Now, Specktor blends memoir, cultural criticism, and narrative history to tell the story of the modern motion picture industry-illuminating the conflict between art and business over the last seventy-five years in Hollywood. Interweaving his own story with that of his father, mother (a talented screenwriter whose career was cut short), and figures ranging from Jack Nicholson to CAA's Michael Ovitz, Specktor reveals how Hollywood became a laboratory for the eternal struggle between art, labor, and capital. Beginning with the rise of Music Corporation of America in the 1950s, The Golden Hour lays out a series of clashes between fathers and sons, talent agents and studio heads, artists, activists, unions, and corporations. With vivid prose and immersive scenes, Specktor shows how Hollywood grew from the epicenter of American cultural life to a full-fledged multinational concern--and what this shift has meant for the nation's place in the world. At once a book about the movie business and an intimate family drama, The Golden Hour is a sweeping portrait of the American Century.