Anna May Wong
Encyclopedia
Anna May Wong (January 3, 1905 – February 3, 1961) was an American actress, the first Chinese American
movie star, and the first Asian American
to become an international star. Her long and varied career spanned both silent and sound film, television, stage, and radio.
Born near the Chinatown neighborhood of Los Angeles
to second-generation Chinese-American parents, Wong became infatuated with the movies and began acting in films at an early age. During the silent film
era, she acted in The Toll of the Sea
(1922), one of the first movies made in color and Douglas Fairbanks
' The Thief of Bagdad
(1924). Wong became a fashion icon, and by 1924 had achieved international stardom.
Frustrated by the stereotypical supporting roles she reluctantly played in Hollywood
, she left for Europe in the late 1920s, where she starred in several notable plays and films, among them Piccadilly
(1929).
She spent the first half of the 1930s traveling between the United States and Europe for film and stage work. Wong was featured in films of the early sound era, such as Daughter of the Dragon
(1931) and Daughter of Shanghai
(1937), and with Marlene Dietrich
in Josef von Sternberg
's Shanghai Express
(1932).
In 1935 Wong was dealt the most severe disappointment of her career, when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
refused to consider her for the leading role in its film version of Pearl S. Buck
's The Good Earth
, choosing instead the German actress Luise Rainer
to play the leading role. Wong spent the next year touring China, visiting her family's ancestral village and studying Chinese culture. In the late 1930s, she starred in several B movie
s for Paramount Pictures
, portraying Chinese-Americans in a positive light. She paid less attention to her film career during World War II, when she devoted her time and money to helping the Chinese cause against Japan
. Wong returned to the public eye in the 1950s in several television appearances as well as her own series in 1951, The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
, the first U.S. television show starring an Asian-American. She had been planning to return to film in Flower Drum Song
when she died in 1961, at the age of 56.
For decades after her death, Wong was remembered principally for the stereotypical "Dragon Lady
" and demure "Butterfly" roles that she was often given. Her life and career were re-evaluated in the years around the centennial of her birth, in three major literary works and film retrospectives. Interest in her life story continues and another biography, Shining Star: The Anna May Wong Story, was published in 2009.
, one block north of Chinatown, in an integrated community of Chinese, Irish, German, and Japanese residents. She was the second of seven children born to Wong Sam Sing, owner of the Sam Kee Laundry in Los Angeles, and his second wife Lee Gon Toy.
Anna May Wong's parents were second-generation Chinese-Americans; her maternal and paternal grandparents had resided in the U.S. since at least 1855. Her paternal grandfather, A Wong Wong, was a merchant who owned two stores in Michigan Hills, a gold-mining area in Placer County
. He had come from Chang On, a village near Taishan
, Guangdong Province, China in 1853. Anna May's father spent his youth traveling between the U.S. and China, where he married his first wife and fathered a son in 1890. He returned to the U.S. in the late 1890s, and in 1901, while continuing to support his family in China, he married a second wife, Anna May's mother. Anna May's older sister Lew Ying (Lulu) was born in late 1902, and Anna May was born in 1905, followed by five more children.
In 1910, the family moved to a neighborhood on Figueroa Street
where they were the only Chinese on their block, living alongside mostly Mexican and Eastern European families. The two hills separating their new home from Chinatown helped Wong to assimilate into American culture. At first she attended public school with her older sister, but when the girls were the target of racist taunts from other students, their parents moved them to a Presbyterian Chinese school. Classes were taught in English, but Wong attended a Chinese language school
afternoons and on Saturdays.
About that same time, U.S. motion picture production began to relocate from the east coast to the Los Angeles area. Movies were shot constantly in and around Wong's neighborhood. She began going to Nickelodeon movie theaters and quickly became obsessed with the "flickers
", missing school and using lunch money to attend the cinema. Her father was not happy with her interest in films, feeling that it interfered with her studies, but Wong decided to pursue a career in film regardless. At nine years of age, she begged filmmakers for parts, earning herself the nickname "C.C.C." or "Curious Chinese Child". By the age of 11, Wong had come up with her stage name
of Anna May Wong, formed by joining both her English and family names.
Wong was working at Hollywood's Ville de Paris department store when Metro Pictures
needed 300 girl extras
to appear in Alla Nazimova
's film The Red Lantern
(1919). Without her father's knowledge, a friend of his with movie connections helped Anna May land an uncredited role as an extra carrying a lantern.
She worked steadily for the next two years as an extra in various movies, including Priscilla Dean
and Colleen Moore
pictures. While still a student, Wong came down with an illness identified as St. Vitus's Dance
which caused her to miss months of school. She was on the verge of emotional collapse when her father took her to a practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine
. The treatments proved successful, though Wong later claimed this had more to do with her dislike of the methods. Other Chinese thought such as Confucianism
and particularly Taoism
and the teachings of Laozi
had a strong influence on Wong's personal philosophy throughout her life. The family's religious life also included Christian
thought, in the form of Presbyterianism
, and as an adult she was a Christian Scientist
for some time.
Finding it difficult to keep up with both her schoolwork and her passion, she dropped out of Los Angeles High School
in 1921 to pursue a full-time acting career. Reflecting on her decision, Wong told Motion Picture Magazine in 1931: "I was so young when I began that I knew I still had youth if I failed, so I determined to give myself 10 years to succeed as an actress."
In 1921, Wong received her first screen credit for Bits of Life
, the first anthology film
, in which she played the wife of Lon Chaney
's character, Toy Ling, in a segment entitled "Hop". She later recalled it fondly as the only time she played the role of a mother; her appearance earned her a cover photo in the British magazine Picture Show.
At the age of 17 she played her first leading role, in the early Metro two-strip Technicolor
movie The Toll of the Sea
. Written by Frances Marion
, the story was based loosely on Madama Butterfly
. Variety magazine
singled Wong out for praise, noting her "extraordinarily fine" acting. The New York Times
commented, "Miss Wong stirs in the spectator all the sympathy her part calls for, and she never repels one by an excess of theatrical 'feeling'. She has a difficult role, a role that is botched nine times out of ten, but hers is the tenth performance. Completely unconscious of the camera, with a fine sense of proportion and remarkable pantomimic accuracy ... She should be seen again and often on the screen."
Despite such reviews, Hollywood proved reluctant to create starring roles for Wong; her ethnicity prevented U.S. filmmakers from seeing her as a leading lady. David Schwartz, the chief curator of the Museum of the Moving Image, notes, "She built up a level of stardom in Hollywood, but Hollywood didn’t know what to do with her." She spent the next few years in supporting roles providing "exotic atmosphere", for instance playing a concubine in Tod Browning
's Drifting
(1923). Film producers capitalized on Wong's growing fame by using her brief appearances in these supporting roles to promote their films. Still optimistic about a film career, in 1923 Wong said: "Pictures are fine, and I'm getting along all right, but it's not so bad to have the laundry back of you, so you can wait and take good parts and be independent when you're climbing."
picture The Thief of Bagdad
(1924). Playing a stereotypical "Dragon Lady" role, her brief appearances on-screen caught the attention of audiences and critics alike. The film grossed more than $2 million and helped introduce Wong to the public.
After this second prominent role, Wong moved out of the family home into her own apartment. Conscious that Americans viewed her as "foreign born" even though she was born and raised in California, Wong began cultivating a flapper
image. In March 1924, planning to make films about Chinese myths
, she signed a deal creating Anna May Wong Productions; when her business partner was found to be engaging in dishonest practices, Wong brought a lawsuit against him and the company was dissolved.
It soon became evident that Wong's career would continue to be limited by American anti-miscegenation laws
, which prevented her from sharing an on-screen kiss with any person of another race, even if the character was Asian, but being portrayed by a white actor. The only leading Asian man in U.S. films in the silent era was Sessue Hayakawa
. Unless Asian leading men could be found, Wong could not be a leading lady.
Wong continued to be offered supporting roles in minor films, in which she was often singled out for critical praise. Despite such favorable reviews, she became increasingly disappointed with her casting and began to seek other roads to success. In early 1925 she joined a group of serial
stars on a tour of the vaudeville
circuits; when the tour proved to be a failure, Wong and the rest of the group returned to Hollywood.
In 1926, Wong put the first rivet into the structure of Grauman's Chinese Theatre
when she joined Norma Talmadge
for its groundbreaking
ceremony, although she was not invited to leave her hand- and foot-prints in cement.
In the same year Wong starred in The Silk Bouquet. Re-titled The Dragon Horse in 1927, the film was one of the first U.S. films to be produced with Chinese backing, provided by San Francisco's Chinese Six Companies
. The story was set in China during the Ming Dynasty
, and featured Asian actors playing the Asian roles.
Wong continued to be assigned supporting roles. Hollywood's Asian female characters tended toward two stereotypical poles: the naïve and self-sacrificing "Butterfly" and the sly and deceitful "Dragon Lady". In Old San Francisco
(1927), directed by Alan Crosland
for Warner Brothers, Wong played a "Dragon Lady", a gangster's daughter. In Mr. Wu
(1927) she played a supporting role as increasing censorship against mixed race onscreen couples cost her the lead. In The Crimson City
, released the following year, this happened again.
In Europe, Wong became a sensation, starring in notable films such as Schmutziges Geld (aka Song and Show Life, 1928), and Großstadtschmetterling (City Butterfly). Of the German critics' response to Song, The New York Times reported that Wong was "acclaimed not only as an actress of transcendent talent but as a great beauty". The article noted that Germans passed over Wong's American background: "Berlin critics, who were unanimous in praise of both the star and the production, neglect to mention that Anna May is of American birth. They mention only her Chinese origins." In Vienna, she played the title role in the operetta
Tschun Tschi in fluent German. An Austrian critic wrote, "Fräulein Wong had the audience perfectly in her power and the unobtrusive tragedy of her acting was deeply moving, carrying off the difficult German-speaking part very successfully."
While in Germany, Wong became an inseparable friend of the director Leni Riefenstahl
. Her close friendships with several women throughout her life, including Marlene Dietrich
and Cecil Cunningham
, led to rumors of lesbian
ism which damaged her public reputation. These rumors, in particular of her supposed relationship with Dietrich, embarrassed Wong's family who in any case had long been opposed to her acting career, at that time not considered to be an entirely respectable profession.
London producer Basil Dean
bought the play A Circle of Chalk for Wong to appear in with the young Laurence Olivier
, her first stage performance in the UK. Criticism of her Californian accent, described by one critic as a "Yankee squeak", led to Wong seeking vocal tutoring at Cambridge University, where she acquired a British accent. Composer Constant Lambert
, infatuated with the actress after having seen her in films, attended the play on its opening night and subsequently composed Eight Poems of Li Po, dedicated to her.
Wong made her last silent film, Piccadilly
, in 1929, the first of five English films in which she had a starring role. The film caused a sensation in the UK. Gilda Gray
was the top-billed actress, but Variety
commented that Wong "outshines the star", and that "from the moment Miss Wong dances in the kitchen's rear, she steals 'Piccadilly' from Miss Gray." Though the film presented Wong in her most sensual role in a British film, once again she was not permitted to kiss her Caucasian love interest, and a controversial planned scene involving a kiss was cut before the film was released. Forgotten for decades after its release, Piccadilly was later restored by the British Film Institute
. Time
magazine's Richard Corliss
calls Piccadilly Wong's best film, and The Guardian
reports that the rediscovery of this film and Wong's performance in it has been responsible for a restoration of the actress' reputation.
While in London, Wong was romantically linked with writer and broadcasting executive Eric Maschwitz
, who wrote the lyrics to These Foolish Things (Remind Me Of You)
as an evocation of his longing for her after they parted. Wong's first talkie was The Flame of Love (1930), which she recorded in French, English, and German. Though Wong's performance – particularly her handling of the three languages – was lauded, all three versions of the film received negative reviews.
in 1930. Enticed by the promise of lead roles and top billing, she returned to the United States. The prestige and training she had gained during her years in Europe led to a starring role on Broadway
in On the Spot, a drama that ran for 167 performances and which she would later film as Dangerous to Know
. When the play's director wanted Wong to use stereotypical Japanese mannerisms, derived from Madame Butterfly, in her performance of a Chinese character, Wong refused. She instead used her knowledge of Chinese style and gestures to imbue the character with a greater degree of authenticity. Following her return to Hollywood in 1930, Wong repeatedly turned to the stage and cabaret for a creative outlet.
In November 1930, Anna May's mother was run over and killed by an automobile in front of the Figueroa Street house. The family remained at the house until 1934, when Wong's father returned to his hometown in China with Anna May's younger brothers and sister. Anna May had been paying for the education of her younger siblings, who put their education to work after they relocated to China. Before the family left, Wong's father wrote a brief article for Xinning, a magazine for overseas Taishanese, in which he expressed his pride in his famous daughter.
With the promise of appearing in a Josef von Sternberg
film, Wong accepted another stereotypical role – the title character of Fu Manchu
's vengeful daughter in Daughter of the Dragon
(1931). This was the last stereotypically "evil Chinese" role Wong played, and also her one starring appearance alongside the only other well-known Asian actor of the era, Sessue Hayakawa
. Though she was given the starring role, this status was not reflected in her paycheck: she was paid $6,000, while Hayakawa received $10,000 and Warner Oland
, who is only in the film for 23 minutes, was paid $12,000.
Wong began using her newfound celebrity to make political statements: late in 1931, for example, she wrote a harsh criticism of the Mukden Incident
and Japan's subsequent invasion of Manchuria. She also became more outspoken in her advocacy for Chinese-American causes and for better film roles. In a 1933 interview for Film Weekly entitled "I Protest", Wong criticized the negative stereotyping in Daughter of the Dragon, saying, "Why is it that the screen Chinese is always the villain? And so crude a villain – murderous, treacherous, a snake in the grass! We are not like that. How could we be, with a civilization that is so many times older than the West?"
Wong appeared alongside Marlene Dietrich
as a self-sacrificing courtesan in Sternberg's Shanghai Express
. Her sexually charged scenes with Dietrich have been noted by many commentators, and fed rumors about the relationship between the two stars. Though contemporary reviews focused on Dietrich's acting and Sternberg's direction, film historians today judge that Wong's performance upstaged that of Dietrich.
The Chinese press had long given Wong's career very mixed reviews, and were less than favorable to her performance in Shanghai Express. A Chinese newspaper ran the headline: "Paramount Utilizes Anna May Wong to Produce Picture to Disgrace China", and continued, "Although she is deficient in artistic portrayal, she has done more than enough to disgrace the Chinese race." Critics in China believed that Wong's on-screen sexuality spread negative stereotypes of Chinese women. The most virulent criticism came from the Nationalist government
, but China's intellectuals
and liberals were not always so opposed to Wong, as demonstrated when Peking University
awarded the actress an honorary doctorate in 1932. Contemporary sources reported that this was probably the only time that an actor had been so honored.
In both America and Europe, Wong had been seen as a fashion icon for over a decade. In 1934, the Mayfair Mannequin Society of New York voted her "The World's best-dressed woman", and in 1938 Look
magazine named her "The World's most beautiful Chinese girl".
. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer deemed her "too Chinese to play a Chinese" in the film, and the Hays Office would not have allowed her to perform romantic scenes since the film's male lead, Ramón Novarro
, was not Asian. Wong was scheduled to play the role of a mistress to a corrupt Chinese general in Frank Capra
's The Bitter Tea of General Yen
(1933), but the role went instead to Toshia Mori
.
Again disappointed with Hollywood, Wong returned to Britain, where she stayed for nearly three years. In addition to appearing in four films she toured Scotland, Ireland, and outlying British provinces as part of a vaudeville show. She also appeared in the King George
Silver Jubilee
program in 1935. Her film Java Head (1934), though generally considered a minor effort, was the only film in which Wong kissed the lead male character, her white husband in the film. Wong's biographer, Graham Russell Hodges, commented that this may be why the film remained one of Wong's personal favorites. While in London, Wong met Mei Lanfang
, one of the most famous stars of the Beijing Opera
. She had long been interested in Chinese opera and Mei offered to instruct Wong if she ever visited China.
In the 1930s, the popularity of Pearl Buck's novels, especially The Good Earth
, as well as growing American sympathy for China in its struggles with Japanese Imperialism, opened up opportunities for more positive Chinese roles in U.S. films. Wong returned to the U.S. in June 1935 with the goal of obtaining the role of O-lan, the lead female character in MGM's film version of The Good Earth. Since its publication in 1931, Wong had made known her desire to play O-lan in a film version of the book; and as early as 1933, Los Angeles newspapers were touting Wong as the best choice for the part. Nevertheless, the studio apparently never seriously considered Wong for the role because Paul Muni
, an actor of European descent, was to play O-lan's husband, Wang Lung. The Chinese government also advised the studio against casting Wong in the role. The Chinese advisor to MGM commented: "whenever she appears in a movie, the newspapers print her picture with the caption 'Anna May again loses face for China' ".
According to Wong, she was instead offered the part of Lotus, a deceitful song girl
who helps to destroy the family and seduces the family's oldest son. Wong refused the role, telling MGM head of production Irving Thalberg
, "If you let me play O-lan, I will be very glad. But you're asking me – with Chinese blood – to do the only unsympathetic role in the picture featuring an all-American cast portraying Chinese characters." The role Wong hoped for went to Luise Rainer
, who won the Best Actress Oscar for her performance. Wong's sister, Mary Liu Heung Wong, appeared in the film in the role of the Little Bride. MGM's refusal to consider Wong for this most high-profile of Chinese characters in U.S. film is remembered today as "one of the most notorious cases of casting discrimination in the 1930s".
. Wong's father had returned to his hometown in China with her younger brothers and sister in 1934. Aside from Mei Lanfang's offer to teach her, she wanted to learn more about the Chinese theater, and through English translations to better perform some Chinese plays before international audiences. She told the San Francisco Chronicle
on her departure, "... for a year, I shall study the land of my fathers. Perhaps upon my arrival, I shall feel like an outsider. Perhaps instead, I shall find my past life assuming a dreamlike quality of unreality."
Embarking in January 1936, she chronicled her experiences in a series of articles printed in U.S. newspapers such as the New York Herald Tribune
, the Los Angeles Examiner, the Los Angeles Times
, and Photoplay
. In a stopover in Tokyo on the way to Shanghai, local reporters, ever curious about her romantic life, asked if she had marriage plans, to which Wong replied, "No, I am wedded to my art." The following day, however, Japanese newspapers reported that Wong was married to a wealthy Cantonese man named Art.
During her travels in China, Wong continued to be strongly criticized by the Nationalist government and the film community. She had difficulty communicating in many areas of China because she was raised with the Taishan dialect
rather than Standard Chinese
. She later commented that some of the Chinese dialects
sounded "as strange to me as Gaelic
. I thus had the strange experience of talking to my own people through an interpreter."
The toll of international celebrity on Wong's personal life manifested itself in bouts of depression and sudden anger, as well as excessive smoking and drinking. Feeling irritable when she disembarked in Hong Kong, Wong was uncharacteristically rude to the awaiting crowd, which then quickly turned hostile. One person shouted: "Down with Huang Liu Tsong – the stooge that disgraces China. Don't let her go ashore." Wong began crying, and a stampede ensued. After she left for a short trip to the Philippines, the situation cooled and Wong joined her family in Hong Kong. With her father and her siblings, Wong visited his family and his first wife at the family's ancestral home near Taishan. Conflicting reports claim that she was either warmly welcomed or met with hostility by the villagers. She spent over 10 days in the family's village, and some time in neighboring villages before continuing her tour of China. After returning to Hollywood, Wong reflected on her year in China and her career in Hollywood: "I am convinced that I could never play in the Chinese Theatre. I have no feeling for it. It's a pretty sad situation to be rejected by Chinese because I'm 'too American' and by American producers because they prefer other races to act Chinese parts." Wong's father returned to Los Angeles in 1938.
(1937) and King of Chinatown (1939).
In Daughter of Shanghai, Wong played the Asian-American female lead in a role that was rewritten for her as the heroine of the story, actively setting the plot into motion rather than the more passive character originally planned. The script was so carefully tailored for Wong that at one point it was titled, Anna May Wong Story. Of this film, Wong told Hollywood Magazine, "I like my part in this picture better than any I've had before ... because this picture gives Chinese a break – we have sympathetic parts for a change! To me that means a great deal." The New York Times gave the film a generally positive review, commenting of its B-movie origins, "An unusually competent cast saves the film from the worst consequences of certain inevitable banalities. [The cast] ... combine with effective sets to reduce the natural odds against any pictures in the Daughter of Shanghai tradition." In October 1937, the press carried rumors that Wong had plans to marry her male co-star in this film, childhood friend and Korean-American
actor Philip Ahn. Wong replied, "It would be like marrying my brother."
Bosley Crowther
was not so kind to Dangerous to Know
(1938), which he called a "second-rate melodrama, hardly worthy of the talents of its generally capable cast". In King of Chinatown Wong played a surgeon who sacrifices a high-paying promotion in order to devote her energies to helping the Chinese fight the Japanese invasion. The New York Times Frank Nugent gave the film a negative review. Though he commented positively on its advocacy of the Chinese in their fight against Japan, he wrote, "... Paramount should have spared us and its cast ... the necessity of being bothered with such folderol".
Paramount also employed Wong as a tutor to other actors, such as Dorothy Lamour
in her role as a Eurasian in Disputed Passage
. Wong performed on radio several times, including a 1939 role as "Peony" in Pearl Buck's The Patriot on Orson Welles
' The Campbell Playhouse
. Wong's cabaret act, which included songs in Cantonese, French, English, German, Danish, Swedish, and other languages, took her from the U.S. to Europe and Australia through the 1930s and 1940s.
In 1938, having auctioned off her movie costumes and donated the money to Chinese aid, the Chinese Benevolent Association of California honored Wong for her work in support of Chinese refugees. The proceeds from the preface that she wrote in 1942 to a cookbook titled New Chinese Recipes, one of the first Chinese cookbooks, were also dedicated to United China Relief. Between 1939 and 1942, she made few films, instead engaging in events and appearances in support of the Chinese struggle against Japan
.
(1942) and Bombs over Burma
(1943), both anti-Japanese propaganda made by the poverty row
studio Producers Releasing Corporation
. She donated her salary for both films to United China Relief. The Lady from Chungking differed from the usual Hollywood war film in that the Chinese were portrayed as heroes rather than as victims rescued by Americans. Even after American characters are captured by the Japanese, the primary goal of the heroes is not to free the Americans, but to prevent the Japanese from entering the city of Chongqing
(Chungking). Also, in an interesting twist, the Chinese characters are portrayed by Chinese-American actors, while the Japanese villains – normally played by Chinese-American actors – are acted by European-Americans. The film ends with Wong making a speech for the birth of a "new China". The Hollywood Reporter and Variety both gave Wong's performance in The Lady from Chungking positive reviews, but commented negatively on the film's plot.
Later in life, Wong invested in real estate and owned a number of properties in Hollywood. She converted her home on San Vincente Boulevard in Santa Monica
into four apartments which she called "Moongate Apartments". She served as the apartment house manager from the late 1940s until 1956, when she moved in with her brother Richard on 21st Place in Santa Monica.
In 1949, Wong's father died in Los Angeles at the age of 91. After a six-year absence, Wong returned to film the same year with a small role in a B movie called Impact
. From August 27 to November 21, 1951, Wong starred in a detective series that was written specifically for her, the DuMont Television Network
series The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
, in which she played the title role which used her birth name. Wong's character was a dealer in Chinese art
whose career involved her in detective work and international intrigue. The ten half-hour episodes aired during prime time
, from 9:00 to 9:30 p.m. Although there were plans for a second season, DuMont canceled the show in 1952. No copies of the show or its scripts are known to exist. After the completion of the series, Wong's health began to deteriorate. In late 1953 she suffered an internal hemorrhage
, which her brother attributed to the onset of menopause
, her continued heavy drinking, and financial worries.
In 1956, Wong hosted one of the first U.S. documentaries on China narrated entirely by a Chinese-American. Broadcast on the ABC
travel series Bold Journey
, the program consisted of film footage from her 1936 trip to China. Wong also did guest spots on television series such as Adventures in Paradise
, The Barbara Stanwyck Show
, and The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp
.
For her contribution to the film industry, Anna May Wong received a star at 1708 Vine Street on the inauguration of the Hollywood Walk of Fame
in 1960. She is also depicted larger-than-life as one of the four supporting pillars of the "Gateway to Hollywood" sculpture located on the southeast corner of Hollywood Boulevard and La Brea Avenue, with the actresses Dolores del Río
(Hispanic American
), Dorothy Dandridge
(African American
) and Mae West
.
In 1960, Wong returned to film in Portrait in Black
, starring Lana Turner
. She still found herself stereotyped, with one press release explaining her long absence from films with a supposed proverb, which was claimed to have been passed down to Wong by her father: "Don't be photographed too much or you'll lose your soul", a quote that would be inserted into many of her obituaries.
She was scheduled to play the role of Madame Liang in the film production of Rodgers and Hammerstein
's Flower Drum Song
, but was unable to take the role due to failing health. On February 3, 1961, at the age of 56, Wong died of a heart attack
at home in Santa Monica, two days after her final screen performance on the television show Danger Man
. Her cremated remains were interred in her mother's grave at Rosedale Cemetery in Los Angeles, frequently reported to be only marked by her mother's name on the tombstone. In 2008, a fan campaign started to raise funds to create and purchase a headstone for Wong.
. It was a romance largely unknown of at the time and highlighted by the fact that it was an interracial relationship
and that Wong was underage.
Wong's image and career have left a lasting legacy. Through her films, public appearances, and prominent magazine features, she helped to "humanize" Asian-Americans to white audiences during a period of overt racism and discrimination. Asian-Americans, especially the Chinese, had been viewed as perpetually foreign in U.S. society, but Wong's films and public image established her firmly as an Asian-American citizen at a time when laws specifically discriminated against Asian immigration and citizenship. Wong's hybrid image dispelled contemporary notions that the East and West were inherently different.
Among Wong's films, only Shanghai Express retained critical attention in the U.S. in the decades after her death. In Europe, and especially England, her films appeared occasionally at festivals. Wong remained popular with the gay community who often claimed her as one of their own, and for whom her marginalization by the mainstream became a symbol. Although the Chinese Nationalist criticism of her portrayals of the "Dragon Lady" and "Butterfly" stereotypes lingered, Wong herself was forgotten in China. Nevertheless, the importance of Wong's legacy within the Asian-American film community can be seen in the Anna May Wong Award of Excellence which is given out yearly at the Asian-American Arts Awards; the annual award given out by the Asian Fashion Designers was also named after Wong in 1973.
For decades following her death, Wong's image remained as a symbol in literature, as well as in film. In the 1971 poem "The Death of Anna May Wong", Jessica Hagedorn
saw Wong's career as one of "tragic glamour", and portrayed the actress as a "fragile maternal presence, an Asian-American woman who managed to 'birth,' however ambivalently, Asian-American screen women in the jazz age". Wong's character in Shanghai Express was the subject of John Yau
's 1989 poem "No One Ever Tried to Kiss Anna May Wong", which interprets the actress' career as a series of tragic romances. In David Cronenberg
's 1993 film version
of David Henry Hwang
's 1986 play, M. Butterfly
, Wong's image was used briefly as a symbol of a "tragic diva". Her life was the subject of China Doll, The Imagined Life of an American Actress, an award-winning fictional play written by Elizabeth Wong
in 1995.
As the centennial of Wong's birth approached, a re-examination of her life and career took shape; three major works on the actress appeared, and comprehensive retrospectives of her films were held at both the Museum of Modern Art
and the American Museum of the Moving Image
in New York City. Anthony Chan's 2003 biography, Perpetually Cool: The Many Lives of Anna May Wong (1905–1961), was the first major work on Wong, and was written, Chan says, "from a uniquely Asian-American perspective and sensibility". In 2004, Philip Leibfried and Chei Mi Lane
's exhaustive examination of Wong's career, Anna May Wong: A Complete Guide to Her Film, Stage, Radio and Television Work was published, as well as a second full-length biography, Anna May Wong: From Laundryman's Daughter to Hollywood Legend by Graham Russell Hodges. Though Anna May Wong's life, career, and legacy reflect many complex issues which remain decades after her death, Anthony Chan points out that her place in Asian-American cinematic history, as its first female star, is permanent.
Chinese American
Chinese Americans represent Americans of Chinese descent. Chinese Americans constitute one group of overseas Chinese and also a subgroup of East Asian Americans, which is further a subgroup of Asian Americans...
movie star, and the first Asian American
Asian American
Asian Americans are Americans of Asian descent. The U.S. Census Bureau definition of Asians as "Asian” refers to a person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent, including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan,...
to become an international star. Her long and varied career spanned both silent and sound film, television, stage, and radio.
Born near the Chinatown neighborhood of Los Angeles
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
to second-generation Chinese-American parents, Wong became infatuated with the movies and began acting in films at an early age. During the silent film
Silent film
A silent film is a film with no synchronized recorded sound, especially with no spoken dialogue. In silent films for entertainment the dialogue is transmitted through muted gestures, pantomime and title cards...
era, she acted in The Toll of the Sea
The Toll of the Sea
The Toll of the Sea is an American drama film, directed by Chester M. Franklin, produced by the Technicolor Motion Picture Corporation, released by Metro Pictures, and featuring Anna May Wong in her first leading role....
(1922), one of the first movies made in color and Douglas Fairbanks
Douglas Fairbanks
Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. was an American actor, screenwriter, director and producer. He was best known for his swashbuckling roles in silent films such as The Thief of Bagdad, Robin Hood, and The Mark of Zorro....
' The Thief of Bagdad
The Thief of Bagdad (1924 film)
The Thief of Bagdad is a 1924 American swashbuckler film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Douglas Fairbanks. Freely adapted from One Thousand and One Nights, it tells the story of a thief who falls in love with the daughter of the Caliph of Bagdad...
(1924). Wong became a fashion icon, and by 1924 had achieved international stardom.
Frustrated by the stereotypical supporting roles she reluctantly played in Hollywood
Classical Hollywood cinema
Classical Hollywood cinema or the classical Hollywood narrative, are terms used in film history which designates both a visual and sound style for making motion pictures and a mode of production used in the American film industry between roughly the 1910s and the early 1960s.Classical style is...
, she left for Europe in the late 1920s, where she starred in several notable plays and films, among them Piccadilly
Piccadilly (film)
Piccadilly is a British film directed by Ewald André Dupont, written by Arnold Bennett and starring Gilda Gray, Anna May Wong, and Jameson Thomas. The film was produced by British International Pictures and released by Wardour Films Ltd...
(1929).
She spent the first half of the 1930s traveling between the United States and Europe for film and stage work. Wong was featured in films of the early sound era, such as Daughter of the Dragon
Daughter of the Dragon
Daughter of the Dragon is a movie directed by Lloyd Corrigan, released by Paramount Pictures, and starring Anna May Wong as Princess Ling Moy, Sessue Hayakawa as Ah Kee, and Warner Oland as Dr. Fu Manchu...
(1931) and Daughter of Shanghai
Daughter of Shanghai
Daughter of Shanghai is a 1937 American motion picture directed by Robert Florey, written by Gladys Unger and Garnett Weston, and starring Anna May Wong and Philip Ahn. The film was unusual in that Asian American actors played the lead roles...
(1937), and with Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
in Josef von Sternberg
Josef von Sternberg
Josef von Sternberg — born Jonas Sternberg — was an Austrian-American film director. He is particularly noted for his distinctive mise en scène, use of lighting and soft lens, and seven-film collaboration with actress Marlene Dietrich.-Youth:Von Sternberg was born Jonas Sternberg to a Jewish...
's Shanghai Express
Shanghai Express (film)
Shanghai Express is a 1932 American film directed by Josef von Sternberg. The pre-Code picture stars Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook, Anna May Wong, and Warner Oland. It was written by Jules Furthman, based on a story by Harry Hervey. It was the fourth of seven teamings of Sternberg and Dietrich.The...
(1932).
In 1935 Wong was dealt the most severe disappointment of her career, when Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
refused to consider her for the leading role in its film version of Pearl S. Buck
Pearl S. Buck
Pearl Sydenstricker Buck also known by her Chinese name Sai Zhenzhu , was an American writer who spent most of her time until 1934 in China. Her novel The Good Earth was the best-selling fiction book in the U.S. in 1931 and 1932, and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1932...
's The Good Earth
The Good Earth
The Good Earth is a novel by Pearl S. Buck published in 1931 and awarded the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1932. The best selling novel in the United States in both 1931 and 1932, it was an influential factor in Buck winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938...
, choosing instead the German actress Luise Rainer
Luise Rainer
Luise Rainer is a former German film actress. Known as The "Viennese Teardrop", she was the first woman to win two Academy Awards, and the first person to win them consecutively. She was discovered by MGM talent scouts while acting on stage in Austria and Germany and after appearing in Austrian...
to play the leading role. Wong spent the next year touring China, visiting her family's ancestral village and studying Chinese culture. In the late 1930s, she starred in several B movie
B movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
s for Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
, portraying Chinese-Americans in a positive light. She paid less attention to her film career during World War II, when she devoted her time and money to helping the Chinese cause against Japan
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...
. Wong returned to the public eye in the 1950s in several television appearances as well as her own series in 1951, The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong was an American television series which aired on the now defunct DuMont Television Network. It starred Chinese American silent film and talkie star Anna May Wong, who played a detective in a role written specifically for her. The Gallery of Madame Liu Tsong was the...
, the first U.S. television show starring an Asian-American. She had been planning to return to film in Flower Drum Song
Flower Drum Song (film)
Flower Drum Song is a 1961 film adaptation of the 1958 Broadway musical Flower Drum Song, written by the composer Richard Rodgers and the lyricist/librettist Oscar Hammerstein II. The film and stage play were based on the 1957 novel of the same name by the Chinese American author C. Y...
when she died in 1961, at the age of 56.
For decades after her death, Wong was remembered principally for the stereotypical "Dragon Lady
Dragon Lady (stereotype)
A Dragon Lady is a stereotype of East Asian women as strong, deceitful, domineering or mysterious. The term's origin and usage is Western, not Chinese. Inspired by the characters played by actress Anna May Wong, the term was coined from the villain in the comic strip Terry and the Pirates...
" and demure "Butterfly" roles that she was often given. Her life and career were re-evaluated in the years around the centennial of her birth, in three major literary works and film retrospectives. Interest in her life story continues and another biography, Shining Star: The Anna May Wong Story, was published in 2009.
Early life
Anna May Wong was born Wong Liu Tsong (meaning "frosted yellow willows") on January 3, 1905, on Flower Street in Los AngelesLos Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, one block north of Chinatown, in an integrated community of Chinese, Irish, German, and Japanese residents. She was the second of seven children born to Wong Sam Sing, owner of the Sam Kee Laundry in Los Angeles, and his second wife Lee Gon Toy.
Anna May Wong's parents were second-generation Chinese-Americans; her maternal and paternal grandparents had resided in the U.S. since at least 1855. Her paternal grandfather, A Wong Wong, was a merchant who owned two stores in Michigan Hills, a gold-mining area in Placer County
Placer County, California
Placer County is a county located in both the Sacramento Valley and Sierra Nevada regions of the U.S. state of California, in what is known as the Gold Country. It stretches from the suburbs of Sacramento to Lake Tahoe and the Nevada border. Because of the expansion of the Greater Sacramento,...
. He had come from Chang On, a village near Taishan
Taishan
Taishan is a coastal county-level city in Guangdong Province, China. The city is part of the Greater Taishan Region....
, Guangdong Province, China in 1853. Anna May's father spent his youth traveling between the U.S. and China, where he married his first wife and fathered a son in 1890. He returned to the U.S. in the late 1890s, and in 1901, while continuing to support his family in China, he married a second wife, Anna May's mother. Anna May's older sister Lew Ying (Lulu) was born in late 1902, and Anna May was born in 1905, followed by five more children.
In 1910, the family moved to a neighborhood on Figueroa Street
Figueroa Street
Figueroa Street is a street in Los Angeles County, California named for General José Figueroa , governor of Alta California from 1833 to 1835, who oversaw the secularization of the missions of California...
where they were the only Chinese on their block, living alongside mostly Mexican and Eastern European families. The two hills separating their new home from Chinatown helped Wong to assimilate into American culture. At first she attended public school with her older sister, but when the girls were the target of racist taunts from other students, their parents moved them to a Presbyterian Chinese school. Classes were taught in English, but Wong attended a Chinese language school
Chinese school
In Western countries, a Chinese school is a school established explicitly for the purpose of teaching the Chinese languages and dialects to Americans with Chinese ancestry, Canadians with Chinese ancestry, Americans with Taiwanese ancestry, Canadians with Taiwanese ancestry, and the youth born in...
afternoons and on Saturdays.
About that same time, U.S. motion picture production began to relocate from the east coast to the Los Angeles area. Movies were shot constantly in and around Wong's neighborhood. She began going to Nickelodeon movie theaters and quickly became obsessed with the "flickers
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
", missing school and using lunch money to attend the cinema. Her father was not happy with her interest in films, feeling that it interfered with her studies, but Wong decided to pursue a career in film regardless. At nine years of age, she begged filmmakers for parts, earning herself the nickname "C.C.C." or "Curious Chinese Child". By the age of 11, Wong had come up with her stage name
Stage name
A stage name, also called a showbiz name or screen name, is a pseudonym used by performers and entertainers such as actors, wrestlers, comedians, and musicians.-Motivation to use a stage name:...
of Anna May Wong, formed by joining both her English and family names.
Early career
Metro Pictures
Metro Pictures Corporation was an American motion picture production company founded in late 1915 by Richard A. Rowland . Louis B. Mayer who worked for Metro Pictures Corporation early on. It is not to be confused with MGM which is a much later franchise concerning itself, Goldwyn and Louis B....
needed 300 girl extras
Extra (actor)
A background actor or extra is a performer in a film, television show, stage, musical, opera or ballet production, who appears in a nonspeaking, nonsinging or nondancing capacity, usually in the background...
to appear in Alla Nazimova
Alla Nazimova
Alla Nazimova , was a Russian American film and theatre actress, a screenwriter and film producer. She is perhaps best known as simply Nazimova, but also went under the name Alia Nasimoff.-Early life:...
's film The Red Lantern
The Red Lantern
The Red Lantern is a 1919 silent film starring Alla Nazimova and directed by Albert Capellani. It is notable today for Anna May Wong's screen debut in an uncredited role. A single solitary print survives in Europe as well as rumors of a copy at Gosfilmofond, Moscow.-Synopsis:In China, a...
(1919). Without her father's knowledge, a friend of his with movie connections helped Anna May land an uncredited role as an extra carrying a lantern.
She worked steadily for the next two years as an extra in various movies, including Priscilla Dean
Priscilla Dean
Priscilla Dean was an American actress popular in movies as well as in theatre.-Life and career:Born in New York to an active theatrical family , Priscilla Dean made her stage debut at the age of four, appearing in plays starring her parents...
and Colleen Moore
Colleen Moore
Colleen Moore was an American film actress, and one of the most fashionable stars of the silent film era.-Early life:...
pictures. While still a student, Wong came down with an illness identified as St. Vitus's Dance
Chorea (disease)
Choreia is an abnormal involuntary movement disorder, one of a group of neurological disorders called dyskinesias. The term choreia is derived from the Greek word χορεία , see choreia , as the quick movements of the feet or hands are vaguely comparable to dancing or piano playing.The term...
which caused her to miss months of school. She was on the verge of emotional collapse when her father took her to a practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine
Traditional Chinese medicine
Traditional Chinese Medicine refers to a broad range of medicine practices sharing common theoretical concepts which have been developed in China and are based on a tradition of more than 2,000 years, including various forms of herbal medicine, acupuncture, massage , exercise , and dietary therapy...
. The treatments proved successful, though Wong later claimed this had more to do with her dislike of the methods. Other Chinese thought such as Confucianism
Confucianism
Confucianism is a Chinese ethical and philosophical system developed from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius . Confucianism originated as an "ethical-sociopolitical teaching" during the Spring and Autumn Period, but later developed metaphysical and cosmological elements in the Han...
and particularly Taoism
Taoism
Taoism refers to a philosophical or religious tradition in which the basic concept is to establish harmony with the Tao , which is the mechanism of everything that exists...
and the teachings of Laozi
Laozi
Laozi was a mystic philosopher of ancient China, best known as the author of the Tao Te Ching . His association with the Tao Te Ching has led him to be traditionally considered the founder of Taoism...
had a strong influence on Wong's personal philosophy throughout her life. The family's religious life also included Christian
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
thought, in the form of Presbyterianism
Presbyterianism
Presbyterianism refers to a number of Christian churches adhering to the Calvinist theological tradition within Protestantism, which are organized according to a characteristic Presbyterian polity. Presbyterian theology typically emphasizes the sovereignty of God, the authority of the Scriptures,...
, and as an adult she was a Christian Scientist
Christian Science
Christian Science is a system of thought and practice derived from the writings of Mary Baker Eddy and the Bible. It is practiced by members of The First Church of Christ, Scientist as well as some others who are nonmembers. Its central texts are the Bible and the Christian Science textbook,...
for some time.
Finding it difficult to keep up with both her schoolwork and her passion, she dropped out of Los Angeles High School
Los Angeles High School
Los Angeles High School is the oldest public high school in the Southern California Region and in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Its colors are blue and white and the teams are called the Romans....
in 1921 to pursue a full-time acting career. Reflecting on her decision, Wong told Motion Picture Magazine in 1931: "I was so young when I began that I knew I still had youth if I failed, so I determined to give myself 10 years to succeed as an actress."
In 1921, Wong received her first screen credit for Bits of Life
Bits of Life
Bits of Life is a 1921 American film produced, written and directed by Marshall Neilan. It is notable as the first anthology film. For her performance in this film, Anna May Wong received her first screen credit...
, the first anthology film
Anthology film
An anthology film is a feature film consisting of several different short films, often tied together by only a single theme, premise, or brief interlocking event . Sometimes each one is directed by a different director...
, in which she played the wife of Lon Chaney
Lon Chaney, Sr.
Lon Chaney , nicknamed "The Man of a Thousand Faces," was an American actor during the age of silent films. He was one of the most versatile and powerful actors of early cinema...
's character, Toy Ling, in a segment entitled "Hop". She later recalled it fondly as the only time she played the role of a mother; her appearance earned her a cover photo in the British magazine Picture Show.
At the age of 17 she played her first leading role, in the early Metro two-strip Technicolor
Technicolor
Technicolor is a color motion picture process invented in 1916 and improved over several decades.It was the second major process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color process in Hollywood from 1922 to 1952...
movie The Toll of the Sea
The Toll of the Sea
The Toll of the Sea is an American drama film, directed by Chester M. Franklin, produced by the Technicolor Motion Picture Corporation, released by Metro Pictures, and featuring Anna May Wong in her first leading role....
. Written by Frances Marion
Frances Marion
Frances Marion was an American journalist, author, and screenwriter often cited as the most renowned female screenwriter of the twentieth century alongside June Mathis and Anita Loos.-Career:...
, the story was based loosely on Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly
Madama Butterfly is an opera in three acts by Giacomo Puccini, with an Italian libretto by Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa. Puccini based his opera in part on the short story "Madame Butterfly" by John Luther Long, which was dramatized by David Belasco...
. Variety magazine
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
singled Wong out for praise, noting her "extraordinarily fine" acting. The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
commented, "Miss Wong stirs in the spectator all the sympathy her part calls for, and she never repels one by an excess of theatrical 'feeling'. She has a difficult role, a role that is botched nine times out of ten, but hers is the tenth performance. Completely unconscious of the camera, with a fine sense of proportion and remarkable pantomimic accuracy ... She should be seen again and often on the screen."
Despite such reviews, Hollywood proved reluctant to create starring roles for Wong; her ethnicity prevented U.S. filmmakers from seeing her as a leading lady. David Schwartz, the chief curator of the Museum of the Moving Image, notes, "She built up a level of stardom in Hollywood, but Hollywood didn’t know what to do with her." She spent the next few years in supporting roles providing "exotic atmosphere", for instance playing a concubine in Tod Browning
Tod Browning
Tod Browning was an American motion picture actor, director and screenwriter.Browning's career spanned the silent and talkie eras...
's Drifting
Drifting (film)
Drifting is a 1923 drama film directed by Tod Browning and featuring Wallace Beery in a supporting role. The movie was produced and distributed by Universal Pictures. Priscilla Dean is the main female antagonist....
(1923). Film producers capitalized on Wong's growing fame by using her brief appearances in these supporting roles to promote their films. Still optimistic about a film career, in 1923 Wong said: "Pictures are fine, and I'm getting along all right, but it's not so bad to have the laundry back of you, so you can wait and take good parts and be independent when you're climbing."
Stardom
At the age of 19, Anna May Wong was cast in a supporting role as a Mongol slave in the Douglas FairbanksDouglas Fairbanks
Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. was an American actor, screenwriter, director and producer. He was best known for his swashbuckling roles in silent films such as The Thief of Bagdad, Robin Hood, and The Mark of Zorro....
picture The Thief of Bagdad
The Thief of Bagdad (1924 film)
The Thief of Bagdad is a 1924 American swashbuckler film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Douglas Fairbanks. Freely adapted from One Thousand and One Nights, it tells the story of a thief who falls in love with the daughter of the Caliph of Bagdad...
(1924). Playing a stereotypical "Dragon Lady" role, her brief appearances on-screen caught the attention of audiences and critics alike. The film grossed more than $2 million and helped introduce Wong to the public.
After this second prominent role, Wong moved out of the family home into her own apartment. Conscious that Americans viewed her as "foreign born" even though she was born and raised in California, Wong began cultivating a flapper
Flapper
Flapper in the 1920s was a term applied to a "new breed" of young Western women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered acceptable behavior...
image. In March 1924, planning to make films about Chinese myths
Chinese mythology
Chinese mythology is a collection of cultural history, folktales, and religions that have been passed down in oral or written tradition. These include creation myths and legends and myths concerning the founding of Chinese culture and the Chinese state...
, she signed a deal creating Anna May Wong Productions; when her business partner was found to be engaging in dishonest practices, Wong brought a lawsuit against him and the company was dissolved.
It soon became evident that Wong's career would continue to be limited by American anti-miscegenation laws
Anti-miscegenation laws
Anti-miscegenation laws, also known as miscegenation laws, were laws that enforced racial segregation at the level of marriage and intimate relationships by criminalizing interracial marriage and sometimes also sex between members of different races...
, which prevented her from sharing an on-screen kiss with any person of another race, even if the character was Asian, but being portrayed by a white actor. The only leading Asian man in U.S. films in the silent era was Sessue Hayakawa
Sessue Hayakawa
was a Japanese and American Issei actor who starred in American, Japanese, French, German, and British films. Hayakawa was the first and one of the few Asian actors to find stardom in the United States as well as Europe. Between the mid-1910s and the late 1920s, he was as well known as actors...
. Unless Asian leading men could be found, Wong could not be a leading lady.
Wong continued to be offered supporting roles in minor films, in which she was often singled out for critical praise. Despite such favorable reviews, she became increasingly disappointed with her casting and began to seek other roads to success. In early 1925 she joined a group of serial
Serial (film)
Serials, more specifically known as Movie serials, Film serials or Chapter plays, were short subjects originally shown in theaters in conjunction with a feature film. They were related to pulp magazine serialized fiction...
stars on a tour of the vaudeville
Vaudeville
Vaudeville was a theatrical genre of variety entertainment in the United States and Canada from the early 1880s until the early 1930s. Each performance was made up of a series of separate, unrelated acts grouped together on a common bill...
circuits; when the tour proved to be a failure, Wong and the rest of the group returned to Hollywood.
In 1926, Wong put the first rivet into the structure of Grauman's Chinese Theatre
Grauman's Chinese Theatre
Grauman's Chinese Theatre is a movie theater at 6925 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood. It is on the historic Hollywood Walk of Fame.The Chinese Theatre was commissioned following the success of the nearby Grauman's Egyptian Theatre which opened in 1922...
when she joined Norma Talmadge
Norma Talmadge
Norma Talmadge was an American actress and film producer of the silent era. A major box office draw for more than a decade, her career reached a peak in the early 1920s, when she ranked among the most popular idols of the American screen.Her most famous film was Smilin’ Through , but she also...
for its groundbreaking
Groundbreaking
Groundbreaking, also known as cutting, sod-cutting, turning the first sod or a sod-turning ceremony, is a traditional ceremony in many cultures that celebrates the first day of construction for a building or other project. Such ceremonies are often attended by dignitaries such as politicians and...
ceremony, although she was not invited to leave her hand- and foot-prints in cement.
In the same year Wong starred in The Silk Bouquet. Re-titled The Dragon Horse in 1927, the film was one of the first U.S. films to be produced with Chinese backing, provided by San Francisco's Chinese Six Companies
Chinese Six Companies
The Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association is a historical Chinese Association established in various parts of the United States with large populations of Chinese...
. The story was set in China during the Ming Dynasty
Ming Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
, and featured Asian actors playing the Asian roles.
Wong continued to be assigned supporting roles. Hollywood's Asian female characters tended toward two stereotypical poles: the naïve and self-sacrificing "Butterfly" and the sly and deceitful "Dragon Lady". In Old San Francisco
Old San Francisco (film)
Old San Francisco is a silent movie which was released by Warner Brothers.-Production background:The film was released in a silent version and in a Vitaphone version, with sound-on-disc recording of music and sound effects only. The film was released by Warner Brothers, directed by Alan Crosland,...
(1927), directed by Alan Crosland
Alan Crosland
Alan Crosland was an American stage actor and film director.-Early life and career:Born in New York City, New York to a well-to-do family, Alan Crosland attended Dartmouth College. After graduation he took a job as a writer with the New York Globe magazine...
for Warner Brothers, Wong played a "Dragon Lady", a gangster's daughter. In Mr. Wu
Mr. Wu
Mr. Wu is a 1927 silent movie about a Chinese patriarch who tries to exact revenge on the Englishman who seduced his daughter.-Cast:*Lon Chaney - Mr. Wu/Grandfather Wu*Louise Dresser - Mrs. Gregory*Renee Adoree - Wu Nang Ping...
(1927) she played a supporting role as increasing censorship against mixed race onscreen couples cost her the lead. In The Crimson City
The Crimson City
The Crimson City is an American silent film produced by Warner Brothers written by Anthony Coldeway and directed by Archie Mayo. Actors include Myrna Loy, Anna May Wong, Sojin, John Miljan, Leila Hyams and Richard Tucker.-Synopsis:...
, released the following year, this happened again.
Move to Europe
Tired of being both typecast and being passed over for lead Asian character roles in favor of non-Asian actresses, Wong left Hollywood in 1928 for Europe. Interviewed by Doris Mackie for Film Weekly in 1933, Wong complained about her Hollywood roles: "I was so tired of the parts I had to play." She commented: "There seems little for me in Hollywood, because, rather than real Chinese, producers prefer Hungarians, Mexicans, American Indians for Chinese roles."In Europe, Wong became a sensation, starring in notable films such as Schmutziges Geld (aka Song and Show Life, 1928), and Großstadtschmetterling (City Butterfly). Of the German critics' response to Song, The New York Times reported that Wong was "acclaimed not only as an actress of transcendent talent but as a great beauty". The article noted that Germans passed over Wong's American background: "Berlin critics, who were unanimous in praise of both the star and the production, neglect to mention that Anna May is of American birth. They mention only her Chinese origins." In Vienna, she played the title role in the operetta
Operetta
Operetta is a genre of light opera, light in terms both of music and subject matter. It is also closely related, in English-language works, to forms of musical theatre.-Origins:...
Tschun Tschi in fluent German. An Austrian critic wrote, "Fräulein Wong had the audience perfectly in her power and the unobtrusive tragedy of her acting was deeply moving, carrying off the difficult German-speaking part very successfully."
While in Germany, Wong became an inseparable friend of the director Leni Riefenstahl
Leni Riefenstahl
Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl was a German film director, actress and dancer widely noted for her aesthetics and innovations as a filmmaker. Her most famous film was Triumph des Willens , a propaganda film made at the 1934 Nuremberg congress of the Nazi Party...
. Her close friendships with several women throughout her life, including Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
and Cecil Cunningham
Cecil Cunningham
Cecil Cunningham was an American film and stage actress. She appeared in more than 80 movies between 1929 and 1946...
, led to rumors of lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
ism which damaged her public reputation. These rumors, in particular of her supposed relationship with Dietrich, embarrassed Wong's family who in any case had long been opposed to her acting career, at that time not considered to be an entirely respectable profession.
London producer Basil Dean
Basil Dean
Basil Herbert Dean CBE was an English actor, writer, film producer/director and theatrical producer/director....
bought the play A Circle of Chalk for Wong to appear in with the young Laurence Olivier
Laurence Olivier
Laurence Kerr Olivier, Baron Olivier, OM was an English actor, director, and producer. He was one of the most famous and revered actors of the 20th century. He married three times, to fellow actors Jill Esmond, Vivien Leigh, and Joan Plowright...
, her first stage performance in the UK. Criticism of her Californian accent, described by one critic as a "Yankee squeak", led to Wong seeking vocal tutoring at Cambridge University, where she acquired a British accent. Composer Constant Lambert
Constant Lambert
Leonard Constant Lambert was a British composer and conductor.-Early life:Lambert, the son of Russian-born Australian painter George Lambert, was educated at Christ's Hospital and the Royal College of Music...
, infatuated with the actress after having seen her in films, attended the play on its opening night and subsequently composed Eight Poems of Li Po, dedicated to her.
Wong made her last silent film, Piccadilly
Piccadilly (film)
Piccadilly is a British film directed by Ewald André Dupont, written by Arnold Bennett and starring Gilda Gray, Anna May Wong, and Jameson Thomas. The film was produced by British International Pictures and released by Wardour Films Ltd...
, in 1929, the first of five English films in which she had a starring role. The film caused a sensation in the UK. Gilda Gray
Gilda Gray
Gilda Gray was a Polish born American actress and dancer who became famous in the US for popularizing a dance called the "shimmy" which became fashionable in 1920s films and theater productions....
was the top-billed actress, but Variety
Variety (magazine)
Variety is an American weekly entertainment-trade magazine founded in New York City, New York, in 1905 by Sime Silverman. With the rise of the importance of the motion-picture industry, Daily Variety, a daily edition based in Los Angeles, California, was founded by Silverman in 1933. In 1998, the...
commented that Wong "outshines the star", and that "from the moment Miss Wong dances in the kitchen's rear, she steals 'Piccadilly' from Miss Gray." Though the film presented Wong in her most sensual role in a British film, once again she was not permitted to kiss her Caucasian love interest, and a controversial planned scene involving a kiss was cut before the film was released. Forgotten for decades after its release, Piccadilly was later restored by the British Film Institute
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
. Time
Time (magazine)
Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...
magazine's Richard Corliss
Richard Corliss
Richard Nelson Corliss is a writer for Time magazine who focuses on movies, with the occasional article on music or sports. Corliss is the former editor-in-chief of Film Comment...
calls Piccadilly Wong's best film, and The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
reports that the rediscovery of this film and Wong's performance in it has been responsible for a restoration of the actress' reputation.
While in London, Wong was romantically linked with writer and broadcasting executive Eric Maschwitz
Eric Maschwitz
Albert Eric Maschwitz OBE , known as Eric Maschwitz and sometimes credited as Holt Marvell, was an English entertainer, writer, broadcaster and broadcasting executive.-Life and work:...
, who wrote the lyrics to These Foolish Things (Remind Me Of You)
These Foolish Things (Remind Me Of You)
"These Foolish Things " is a standard with words by Eric Maschwitz and music by Jack Strachey. Harry Link, an American, sometimes appears as a co-writer, but his input was probably limited to changes to suit the U.S. market. It is one of a group of 'Mayfair Songs', like "A Nightingale Sang in...
as an evocation of his longing for her after they parted. Wong's first talkie was The Flame of Love (1930), which she recorded in French, English, and German. Though Wong's performance – particularly her handling of the three languages – was lauded, all three versions of the film received negative reviews.
Return to Hollywood
During the 1930s, American studios were looking for fresh European talent. Ironically, Wong caught their eye and she was offered a contract with Paramount StudiosParamount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
in 1930. Enticed by the promise of lead roles and top billing, she returned to the United States. The prestige and training she had gained during her years in Europe led to a starring role on Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
in On the Spot, a drama that ran for 167 performances and which she would later film as Dangerous to Know
Dangerous to Know
Dangerous to Know is a 1938 crime film starring Anna May Wong, Akim Tamiroff, Gail Patrick, Lloyd Nolan, and Anthony Quinn. The movie was directed by Robert Florey...
. When the play's director wanted Wong to use stereotypical Japanese mannerisms, derived from Madame Butterfly, in her performance of a Chinese character, Wong refused. She instead used her knowledge of Chinese style and gestures to imbue the character with a greater degree of authenticity. Following her return to Hollywood in 1930, Wong repeatedly turned to the stage and cabaret for a creative outlet.
In November 1930, Anna May's mother was run over and killed by an automobile in front of the Figueroa Street house. The family remained at the house until 1934, when Wong's father returned to his hometown in China with Anna May's younger brothers and sister. Anna May had been paying for the education of her younger siblings, who put their education to work after they relocated to China. Before the family left, Wong's father wrote a brief article for Xinning, a magazine for overseas Taishanese, in which he expressed his pride in his famous daughter.
With the promise of appearing in a Josef von Sternberg
Josef von Sternberg
Josef von Sternberg — born Jonas Sternberg — was an Austrian-American film director. He is particularly noted for his distinctive mise en scène, use of lighting and soft lens, and seven-film collaboration with actress Marlene Dietrich.-Youth:Von Sternberg was born Jonas Sternberg to a Jewish...
film, Wong accepted another stereotypical role – the title character of Fu Manchu
Fu Manchu
Dr. Fu Manchu is a fictional character introduced in a series of novels by British author Sax Rohmer during the first half of the 20th century...
's vengeful daughter in Daughter of the Dragon
Daughter of the Dragon
Daughter of the Dragon is a movie directed by Lloyd Corrigan, released by Paramount Pictures, and starring Anna May Wong as Princess Ling Moy, Sessue Hayakawa as Ah Kee, and Warner Oland as Dr. Fu Manchu...
(1931). This was the last stereotypically "evil Chinese" role Wong played, and also her one starring appearance alongside the only other well-known Asian actor of the era, Sessue Hayakawa
Sessue Hayakawa
was a Japanese and American Issei actor who starred in American, Japanese, French, German, and British films. Hayakawa was the first and one of the few Asian actors to find stardom in the United States as well as Europe. Between the mid-1910s and the late 1920s, he was as well known as actors...
. Though she was given the starring role, this status was not reflected in her paycheck: she was paid $6,000, while Hayakawa received $10,000 and Warner Oland
Warner Oland
Warner Oland was a Swedish American actor most remembered for his screen role as the detective Charlie Chan.-Biography:He was born Johan Verner Ölund in the village of Nyby, Bjurholm Municipality,...
, who is only in the film for 23 minutes, was paid $12,000.
Wong began using her newfound celebrity to make political statements: late in 1931, for example, she wrote a harsh criticism of the Mukden Incident
Mukden Incident
The Mukden Incident, also known as the Manchurian Incident, was a staged event that was engineered by Japanese military personnel as a pretext for invading the northern part of China known as Manchuria in 1931....
and Japan's subsequent invasion of Manchuria. She also became more outspoken in her advocacy for Chinese-American causes and for better film roles. In a 1933 interview for Film Weekly entitled "I Protest", Wong criticized the negative stereotyping in Daughter of the Dragon, saying, "Why is it that the screen Chinese is always the villain? And so crude a villain – murderous, treacherous, a snake in the grass! We are not like that. How could we be, with a civilization that is so many times older than the West?"
Marlene Dietrich
Marlene Dietrich was a German-American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself, professionally and characteristically. In the Berlin of the 1920s, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
as a self-sacrificing courtesan in Sternberg's Shanghai Express
Shanghai Express (film)
Shanghai Express is a 1932 American film directed by Josef von Sternberg. The pre-Code picture stars Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook, Anna May Wong, and Warner Oland. It was written by Jules Furthman, based on a story by Harry Hervey. It was the fourth of seven teamings of Sternberg and Dietrich.The...
. Her sexually charged scenes with Dietrich have been noted by many commentators, and fed rumors about the relationship between the two stars. Though contemporary reviews focused on Dietrich's acting and Sternberg's direction, film historians today judge that Wong's performance upstaged that of Dietrich.
The Chinese press had long given Wong's career very mixed reviews, and were less than favorable to her performance in Shanghai Express. A Chinese newspaper ran the headline: "Paramount Utilizes Anna May Wong to Produce Picture to Disgrace China", and continued, "Although she is deficient in artistic portrayal, she has done more than enough to disgrace the Chinese race." Critics in China believed that Wong's on-screen sexuality spread negative stereotypes of Chinese women. The most virulent criticism came from the Nationalist government
Kuomintang
The Kuomintang of China , sometimes romanized as Guomindang via the Pinyin transcription system or GMD for short, and translated as the Chinese Nationalist Party is a founding and ruling political party of the Republic of China . Its guiding ideology is the Three Principles of the People, espoused...
, but China's intellectuals
Chinese intellectualism
The current status of Chinese intellectuals reflects traditions established in the imperial period. For most of this period, government officials were selected from among the literati on the basis of the Confucian civil service examination system. Intellectuals were both participants in and critics...
and liberals were not always so opposed to Wong, as demonstrated when Peking University
Peking University
Peking University , colloquially known in Chinese as Beida , is a major research university located in Beijing, China, and a member of the C9 League. It is the first established modern national university of China. It was founded as Imperial University of Peking in 1898 as a replacement of the...
awarded the actress an honorary doctorate in 1932. Contemporary sources reported that this was probably the only time that an actor had been so honored.
In both America and Europe, Wong had been seen as a fashion icon for over a decade. In 1934, the Mayfair Mannequin Society of New York voted her "The World's best-dressed woman", and in 1938 Look
Look (American magazine)
Look was a bi-weekly, general-interest magazine published in Des Moines, Iowa from 1937 to 1971, with more of an emphasis on photographs than articles...
magazine named her "The World's most beautiful Chinese girl".
Atlantic crossings
After her success in Europe and prominent role in Shanghai Express, Wong's Hollywood career returned to its old pattern. Because of the Hays Code's anti-miscegenation rules, she was passed over for the leading female role in The Son-Daughter in favor of Helen HayesHelen Hayes
Helen Hayes Brown was an American actress whose career spanned almost 70 years. She eventually garnered the nickname "First Lady of the American Theatre" and was one of twelve people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award...
. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer deemed her "too Chinese to play a Chinese" in the film, and the Hays Office would not have allowed her to perform romantic scenes since the film's male lead, Ramón Novarro
Ramón Novarro
Ramón Novarro was a Mexican leading man actor in Hollywood in the early 20th century. He was the next male "Sex Symbol" after the death of Rudolph Valentino...
, was not Asian. Wong was scheduled to play the role of a mistress to a corrupt Chinese general in Frank Capra
Frank Capra
Frank Russell Capra was a Sicilian-born American film director. He emigrated to the U.S. when he was six, and eventually became a creative force behind major award-winning films during the 1930s and 1940s...
's The Bitter Tea of General Yen
The Bitter Tea of General Yen
The Bitter Tea of General Yen is a pre-Code 1933 film, directed by Frank Capra based on the novel by Grace Zaring Stone and starring Barbara Stanwyck and Nils Asther....
(1933), but the role went instead to Toshia Mori
Toshia Mori
Toshia Mori was a Japanese born actress, who had a brief career in American films during the 1930s. Born as Toshia Ichioka in Kyoto, Mori moved to the United States when she was ten years old....
.
George V of the United Kingdom
George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 through the First World War until his death in 1936....
Silver Jubilee
Silver Jubilee
A Silver Jubilee is a celebration held to mark a 25th anniversary. The anniversary celebrations can be of a wedding anniversary, ruling anniversary or anything that has completed a 25 year mark...
program in 1935. Her film Java Head (1934), though generally considered a minor effort, was the only film in which Wong kissed the lead male character, her white husband in the film. Wong's biographer, Graham Russell Hodges, commented that this may be why the film remained one of Wong's personal favorites. While in London, Wong met Mei Lanfang
Méi Lánfang
Mei Lanfang was one of the most famous Beijing opera artists in modern history, exclusively known for his qingyi roles, a type of dan role. Méi Lánfāng is his stage name, and in Chinese it is generally considered a feminine name. His real name was Méi Lán...
, one of the most famous stars of the Beijing Opera
Beijing opera
Peking opera or Beijing opera is a form of traditional Chinese theatre which combines music, vocal performance, mime, dance and acrobatics. It arose in the late 18th century and became fully developed and recognized by the mid-19th century. The form was extremely popular in the Qing Dynasty court...
. She had long been interested in Chinese opera and Mei offered to instruct Wong if she ever visited China.
In the 1930s, the popularity of Pearl Buck's novels, especially The Good Earth
The Good Earth
The Good Earth is a novel by Pearl S. Buck published in 1931 and awarded the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel in 1932. The best selling novel in the United States in both 1931 and 1932, it was an influential factor in Buck winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938...
, as well as growing American sympathy for China in its struggles with Japanese Imperialism, opened up opportunities for more positive Chinese roles in U.S. films. Wong returned to the U.S. in June 1935 with the goal of obtaining the role of O-lan, the lead female character in MGM's film version of The Good Earth. Since its publication in 1931, Wong had made known her desire to play O-lan in a film version of the book; and as early as 1933, Los Angeles newspapers were touting Wong as the best choice for the part. Nevertheless, the studio apparently never seriously considered Wong for the role because Paul Muni
Paul Muni
Paul Muni was an Austrian-Hungarian-born American stage and film actor...
, an actor of European descent, was to play O-lan's husband, Wang Lung. The Chinese government also advised the studio against casting Wong in the role. The Chinese advisor to MGM commented: "whenever she appears in a movie, the newspapers print her picture with the caption 'Anna May again loses face for China' ".
According to Wong, she was instead offered the part of Lotus, a deceitful song girl
Sing-song girls
Sing-song girls is an English term for the courtesans in China during the early 19th century.-Origin:Prior to the founding of modern China in 1911, concubinage was legal. In Chinese custom, males carry the family name and the family's heritage after marriage...
who helps to destroy the family and seduces the family's oldest son. Wong refused the role, telling MGM head of production Irving Thalberg
Irving Thalberg
Irving Grant Thalberg was an American film producer during the early years of motion pictures. He was called "The Boy Wonder" for his youth and his extraordinary ability to select the right scripts, choose the right actors, gather the best production staff and make very profitable films.-Life and...
, "If you let me play O-lan, I will be very glad. But you're asking me – with Chinese blood – to do the only unsympathetic role in the picture featuring an all-American cast portraying Chinese characters." The role Wong hoped for went to Luise Rainer
Luise Rainer
Luise Rainer is a former German film actress. Known as The "Viennese Teardrop", she was the first woman to win two Academy Awards, and the first person to win them consecutively. She was discovered by MGM talent scouts while acting on stage in Austria and Germany and after appearing in Austrian...
, who won the Best Actress Oscar for her performance. Wong's sister, Mary Liu Heung Wong, appeared in the film in the role of the Little Bride. MGM's refusal to consider Wong for this most high-profile of Chinese characters in U.S. film is remembered today as "one of the most notorious cases of casting discrimination in the 1930s".
Tour of China
After the major disappointment of losing the role in The Good Earth, Wong announced plans for a year-long tour of China, to visit her father and his family in TaishanTaishan
Taishan is a coastal county-level city in Guangdong Province, China. The city is part of the Greater Taishan Region....
. Wong's father had returned to his hometown in China with her younger brothers and sister in 1934. Aside from Mei Lanfang's offer to teach her, she wanted to learn more about the Chinese theater, and through English translations to better perform some Chinese plays before international audiences. She told the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
on her departure, "... for a year, I shall study the land of my fathers. Perhaps upon my arrival, I shall feel like an outsider. Perhaps instead, I shall find my past life assuming a dreamlike quality of unreality."
Embarking in January 1936, she chronicled her experiences in a series of articles printed in U.S. newspapers such as the New York Herald Tribune
New York Herald Tribune
The New York Herald Tribune was a daily newspaper created in 1924 when the New York Tribune acquired the New York Herald.Other predecessors, which had earlier merged into the New York Tribune, included the original The New Yorker newsweekly , and the Whig Party's Log Cabin.The paper was home to...
, the Los Angeles Examiner, the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
, and Photoplay
Photoplay
Photoplay was one of the first American film fan magazines. It was founded in 1911 in Chicago, the same year that J. Stuart Blackton founded a similar magazine entitled Motion Picture Story...
. In a stopover in Tokyo on the way to Shanghai, local reporters, ever curious about her romantic life, asked if she had marriage plans, to which Wong replied, "No, I am wedded to my art." The following day, however, Japanese newspapers reported that Wong was married to a wealthy Cantonese man named Art.
During her travels in China, Wong continued to be strongly criticized by the Nationalist government and the film community. She had difficulty communicating in many areas of China because she was raised with the Taishan dialect
Taishan dialect
Taishanese is a dialect of Yue Chinese. The dialect is closely related to Cantonese.Taishanese is spoken in the southern part of Guangdong Province in China, particularly in and around the city-level county of Taishan...
rather than Standard Chinese
Standard Chinese
Standard Chinese, or Modern Standard Chinese, also known as Mandarin or Putonghua, is the official language of the People's Republic of China and Republic of China , and is one of the four official languages of Singapore....
. She later commented that some of the Chinese dialects
Spoken Chinese
Chinese comprises many regional language varieties sometimes grouped together as the Chinese dialects, the primary ones being Mandarin, Wu, Cantonese, and Min. These are not mutually intelligible, and even many of the regional varieties are themselves composed of a number of...
sounded "as strange to me as Gaelic
Goidelic languages
The Goidelic languages or Gaelic languages are one of the two branches of the Insular Celtic languages, the other consisting of the Brythonic languages. Goidelic languages historically formed a dialect continuum stretching from the south of Ireland through the Isle of Man to the north of Scotland...
. I thus had the strange experience of talking to my own people through an interpreter."
The toll of international celebrity on Wong's personal life manifested itself in bouts of depression and sudden anger, as well as excessive smoking and drinking. Feeling irritable when she disembarked in Hong Kong, Wong was uncharacteristically rude to the awaiting crowd, which then quickly turned hostile. One person shouted: "Down with Huang Liu Tsong – the stooge that disgraces China. Don't let her go ashore." Wong began crying, and a stampede ensued. After she left for a short trip to the Philippines, the situation cooled and Wong joined her family in Hong Kong. With her father and her siblings, Wong visited his family and his first wife at the family's ancestral home near Taishan. Conflicting reports claim that she was either warmly welcomed or met with hostility by the villagers. She spent over 10 days in the family's village, and some time in neighboring villages before continuing her tour of China. After returning to Hollywood, Wong reflected on her year in China and her career in Hollywood: "I am convinced that I could never play in the Chinese Theatre. I have no feeling for it. It's a pretty sad situation to be rejected by Chinese because I'm 'too American' and by American producers because they prefer other races to act Chinese parts." Wong's father returned to Los Angeles in 1938.
Late 1930s
To complete her contract with Paramount Pictures, Wong made a string of B movies in the late 1930s. Often dismissed by critics, the films gave Wong non-stereotypical roles which were publicized in the Chinese-American press for their positive images. These smaller-budgeted films could be bolder than the higher-profile releases, and Wong used this to her advantage to portray successful, professional, Chinese-American characters. Competent and proud of their Chinese heritage, these roles worked against the prevailing U.S. film portrayals of Chinese-Americans. In contrast to the usual official Chinese condemnation of Wong's film roles, the Chinese consul to Los Angeles gave his approval to the final scripts of two of these films, Daughter of ShanghaiDaughter of Shanghai
Daughter of Shanghai is a 1937 American motion picture directed by Robert Florey, written by Gladys Unger and Garnett Weston, and starring Anna May Wong and Philip Ahn. The film was unusual in that Asian American actors played the lead roles...
(1937) and King of Chinatown (1939).
Korean American
Korean Americans are Americans of Korean descent, mostly from South Korea, with a small minority from North Korea...
actor Philip Ahn. Wong replied, "It would be like marrying my brother."
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther
Bosley Crowther was a journalist and author who was film critic for The New York Times for 27 years. His reviews and articles helped shape the careers of actors, directors and screenwriters, though his reviews, at times, were unnecessarily mean...
was not so kind to Dangerous to Know
Dangerous to Know
Dangerous to Know is a 1938 crime film starring Anna May Wong, Akim Tamiroff, Gail Patrick, Lloyd Nolan, and Anthony Quinn. The movie was directed by Robert Florey...
(1938), which he called a "second-rate melodrama, hardly worthy of the talents of its generally capable cast". In King of Chinatown Wong played a surgeon who sacrifices a high-paying promotion in order to devote her energies to helping the Chinese fight the Japanese invasion. The New York Times Frank Nugent gave the film a negative review. Though he commented positively on its advocacy of the Chinese in their fight against Japan, he wrote, "... Paramount should have spared us and its cast ... the necessity of being bothered with such folderol".
Paramount also employed Wong as a tutor to other actors, such as Dorothy Lamour
Dorothy Lamour
Dorothy Lamour was an American film actress. She is best remembered for appearing in the Road to... movies, a series of successful comedies starring Bing Crosby and Bob Hope .-Early life:Lamour was born Mary Leta Dorothy Slaton in New Orleans, Louisiana, the daughter of Carmen Louise Dorothy...
in her role as a Eurasian in Disputed Passage
Disputed Passage
Disputed Passage is a 1939 American film starring John Howard, Dorothy Lamour, Akim Tamiroff, Judith Barrett, and William Collier, Sr. Set in war-torn China, the film was described by the New York Times as a "lavish soap opera". The 87 minute-long film was based on the best-selling novel of the...
. Wong performed on radio several times, including a 1939 role as "Peony" in Pearl Buck's The Patriot on Orson Welles
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...
' The Campbell Playhouse
The Campbell Playhouse
The Campbell Playhouse was a CBS radio drama series directed by and starring Orson Welles. Produced by John Houseman, it was a sponsored continuation of the Mercury Theatre on the Air...
. Wong's cabaret act, which included songs in Cantonese, French, English, German, Danish, Swedish, and other languages, took her from the U.S. to Europe and Australia through the 1930s and 1940s.
In 1938, having auctioned off her movie costumes and donated the money to Chinese aid, the Chinese Benevolent Association of California honored Wong for her work in support of Chinese refugees. The proceeds from the preface that she wrote in 1942 to a cookbook titled New Chinese Recipes, one of the first Chinese cookbooks, were also dedicated to United China Relief. Between 1939 and 1942, she made few films, instead engaging in events and appearances in support of the Chinese struggle against Japan
Second Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...
.
Later years
Wong starred in Lady from ChungkingLady from Chungking
The Lady from Chungking is a 1942 American War film.-Synopsis:The film tells the story of an aristocratic Chinese woman leading a group of Chinese fighters against Japan during World War II.-Cast:* Anna May Wong... Kwan Mei...
(1942) and Bombs over Burma
Bombs over Burma
-Plot:The film tells the story of Chinese guerrillas fighting for the Allied cause in Burma during World War II. During the construction of a military supply road like the Ledo Road, the project is sabotaged by an English nobleman who is a Nazi agent....
(1943), both anti-Japanese propaganda made by the poverty row
Poverty Row
Poverty Row is a slang term used in Hollywood from the late silent period through the mid-fifties to refer to a variety of small and mostly short-lived B movie studios...
studio Producers Releasing Corporation
Producers Releasing Corporation
Producers Releasing Corporation was one of the more lower-end Hollywood film studios on Poverty Row from the late '30s to the mid-'40s. PRC, as it was commonly known, made low-budget B-movies for the lower-half of a double bill. A few of its films have gained a respectable reputation over the...
. She donated her salary for both films to United China Relief. The Lady from Chungking differed from the usual Hollywood war film in that the Chinese were portrayed as heroes rather than as victims rescued by Americans. Even after American characters are captured by the Japanese, the primary goal of the heroes is not to free the Americans, but to prevent the Japanese from entering the city of Chongqing
Chongqing
Chongqing is a major city in Southwest China and one of the five national central cities of China. Administratively, it is one of the PRC's four direct-controlled municipalities , and the only such municipality in inland China.The municipality was created on 14 March 1997, succeeding the...
(Chungking). Also, in an interesting twist, the Chinese characters are portrayed by Chinese-American actors, while the Japanese villains – normally played by Chinese-American actors – are acted by European-Americans. The film ends with Wong making a speech for the birth of a "new China". The Hollywood Reporter and Variety both gave Wong's performance in The Lady from Chungking positive reviews, but commented negatively on the film's plot.
Later in life, Wong invested in real estate and owned a number of properties in Hollywood. She converted her home on San Vincente Boulevard in Santa Monica
Santa Mônica
Santa Mônica is a town and municipality in the state of Paraná in the Southern Region of Brazil.-References:...
into four apartments which she called "Moongate Apartments". She served as the apartment house manager from the late 1940s until 1956, when she moved in with her brother Richard on 21st Place in Santa Monica.
In 1949, Wong's father died in Los Angeles at the age of 91. After a six-year absence, Wong returned to film the same year with a small role in a B movie called Impact
Impact (1949 film)
Impact is a 1949 film noir starring Brian Donlevy and Ella Raines. It was filmed entirely in California and included scenes at San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf. The film was based on a story by film noir writer Jay Dratler.-Plot:...
. From August 27 to November 21, 1951, Wong starred in a detective series that was written specifically for her, the DuMont Television Network
DuMont Television Network
The DuMont Television Network, also known as the DuMont Network, DuMont, Du Mont, or Dumont was one of the world's pioneer commercial television networks, rivalling NBC for the distinction of being first overall. It began operation in the United States in 1946. It was owned by DuMont...
series The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong was an American television series which aired on the now defunct DuMont Television Network. It starred Chinese American silent film and talkie star Anna May Wong, who played a detective in a role written specifically for her. The Gallery of Madame Liu Tsong was the...
, in which she played the title role which used her birth name. Wong's character was a dealer in Chinese art
Chinese art
Chinese art is visual art that, whether ancient or modern, originated in or is practiced in China or by Chinese artists or performers. Early so-called "stone age art" dates back to 10,000 BC, mostly consisting of simple pottery and sculptures. This early period was followed by a series of art...
whose career involved her in detective work and international intrigue. The ten half-hour episodes aired during prime time
Prime time
Prime time or primetime is the block of broadcast programming during the middle of the evening for television programing.The term prime time is often defined in terms of a fixed time period—for example, from 19:00 to 22:00 or 20:00 to 23:00 Prime time or primetime is the block of broadcast...
, from 9:00 to 9:30 p.m. Although there were plans for a second season, DuMont canceled the show in 1952. No copies of the show or its scripts are known to exist. After the completion of the series, Wong's health began to deteriorate. In late 1953 she suffered an internal hemorrhage
Internal bleeding
Internal bleeding is bleeding occurring inside the body. It can be a serious medical emergency depending on where it occurs , and can potentially cause death and cardiac arrest if proper medical treatment is not received quickly....
, which her brother attributed to the onset of menopause
Menopause
Menopause is a term used to describe the permanent cessation of the primary functions of the human ovaries: the ripening and release of ova and the release of hormones that cause both the creation of the uterine lining and the subsequent shedding of the uterine lining...
, her continued heavy drinking, and financial worries.
In 1956, Wong hosted one of the first U.S. documentaries on China narrated entirely by a Chinese-American. Broadcast on the ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...
travel series Bold Journey
Bold Journey
Bold Journey was a travelogue program broadcast by ABC television in the United States during the late 1950s.Bold Journey consisted of films taken by explorers and adventurers during their travels to remote parts of the world...
, the program consisted of film footage from her 1936 trip to China. Wong also did guest spots on television series such as Adventures in Paradise
Adventures in Paradise
Adventures in Paradise is an American television series which ran on ABC from 1959 until 1962. It starred Gardner McKay as Adam Troy, the captain of the schooner Tiki III which sailed the South Pacific looking for passengers and adventure. The show was created by James Michener...
, The Barbara Stanwyck Show
The Barbara Stanwyck Show
The Barbara Stanwyck Show is an American anthology drama television series which ran on NBC from September 1960 to September 1961. Barbara Stanwyck served as hostess, and starred in all but four of the half-hour productions. The four she did not star in were actually pilot episodes of potential...
, and The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp
The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp
The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp is a Western television series loosely based on the adventures of frontier marshal Wyatt Earp. The half-hour black and white series ran on ABC-TV from 1955 to 1961 and featured Hugh O'Brian as Earp. An off-camera barbershop quartet sang the theme song and hummed...
.
For her contribution to the film industry, Anna May Wong received a star at 1708 Vine Street on the inauguration of the Hollywood Walk of Fame
Hollywood Walk of Fame
The Hollywood Walk of Fame consists of more than 2,400 five-pointed terrazzo and brass stars embedded in the sidewalks along fifteen blocks of Hollywood Boulevard and three blocks of Vine Street in Hollywood, California...
in 1960. She is also depicted larger-than-life as one of the four supporting pillars of the "Gateway to Hollywood" sculpture located on the southeast corner of Hollywood Boulevard and La Brea Avenue, with the actresses Dolores del Río
Dolores del Río
Dolores del Río was a Mexican film actress. She was a star of Hollywood films during the silent era and in the Golden Age of Hollywood...
(Hispanic American
Hispanic and Latino Americans
Hispanic or Latino Americans are Americans with origins in the Hispanic countries of Latin America or in Spain, and in general all persons in the United States who self-identify as Hispanic or Latino.1990 Census of Population and Housing: A self-designated classification for people whose origins...
), Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Dandridge
Dorothy Jean Dandridge was an American actress and popular singer, and was the first African-American to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actress...
(African American
African American
African Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have at least partial ancestry from any of the native populations of Sub-Saharan Africa and are the direct descendants of enslaved Africans within the boundaries of the present United States...
) and Mae West
Mae West
Mae West was an American actress, playwright, screenwriter and sex symbol whose entertainment career spanned seven decades....
.
In 1960, Wong returned to film in Portrait in Black
Portrait in Black
Portrait in Black is a thriller released by Universal International. Produced by Ross Hunter, who also produced Airport and other films for Universal, the film starred Lana Turner and Anthony Quinn...
, starring Lana Turner
Lana Turner
Lana Turner was an American actress.Discovered and signed to a film contract by MGM at the age of sixteen, Turner first attracted attention in They Won't Forget . She played featured roles, often as the ingenue, in such films as Love Finds Andy Hardy...
. She still found herself stereotyped, with one press release explaining her long absence from films with a supposed proverb, which was claimed to have been passed down to Wong by her father: "Don't be photographed too much or you'll lose your soul", a quote that would be inserted into many of her obituaries.
She was scheduled to play the role of Madame Liang in the film production of Rodgers and Hammerstein
Rodgers and Hammerstein
Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II were a well-known American songwriting duo, usually referred to as Rodgers and Hammerstein. They created a string of popular Broadway musicals in the 1940s and 1950s during what is considered the golden age of the medium...
's Flower Drum Song
Flower Drum Song (film)
Flower Drum Song is a 1961 film adaptation of the 1958 Broadway musical Flower Drum Song, written by the composer Richard Rodgers and the lyricist/librettist Oscar Hammerstein II. The film and stage play were based on the 1957 novel of the same name by the Chinese American author C. Y...
, but was unable to take the role due to failing health. On February 3, 1961, at the age of 56, Wong died of a heart attack
Myocardial infarction
Myocardial infarction or acute myocardial infarction , commonly known as a heart attack, results from the interruption of blood supply to a part of the heart, causing heart cells to die...
at home in Santa Monica, two days after her final screen performance on the television show Danger Man
Danger Man
Danger Man is a British television series that was broadcast between 1960 and 1962, and again between 1964 and 1968. The series featured Patrick McGoohan as secret agent John Drake. Ralph Smart created the program and wrote many of the scripts...
. Her cremated remains were interred in her mother's grave at Rosedale Cemetery in Los Angeles, frequently reported to be only marked by her mother's name on the tombstone. In 2008, a fan campaign started to raise funds to create and purchase a headstone for Wong.
Romances
In the early 1920s Wong had an affair with director Tod BrowningTod Browning
Tod Browning was an American motion picture actor, director and screenwriter.Browning's career spanned the silent and talkie eras...
. It was a romance largely unknown of at the time and highlighted by the fact that it was an interracial relationship
Miscegenation
Miscegenation is the mixing of different racial groups through marriage, cohabitation, sexual relations, and procreation....
and that Wong was underage.
Legacy
Among Wong's films, only Shanghai Express retained critical attention in the U.S. in the decades after her death. In Europe, and especially England, her films appeared occasionally at festivals. Wong remained popular with the gay community who often claimed her as one of their own, and for whom her marginalization by the mainstream became a symbol. Although the Chinese Nationalist criticism of her portrayals of the "Dragon Lady" and "Butterfly" stereotypes lingered, Wong herself was forgotten in China. Nevertheless, the importance of Wong's legacy within the Asian-American film community can be seen in the Anna May Wong Award of Excellence which is given out yearly at the Asian-American Arts Awards; the annual award given out by the Asian Fashion Designers was also named after Wong in 1973.
For decades following her death, Wong's image remained as a symbol in literature, as well as in film. In the 1971 poem "The Death of Anna May Wong", Jessica Hagedorn
Jessica Hagedorn
Jessica Tarahata Hagedorn is a Filipino-American playwright, writer, poet, storyteller, musician, and multimedia performance artist.-Biography:...
saw Wong's career as one of "tragic glamour", and portrayed the actress as a "fragile maternal presence, an Asian-American woman who managed to 'birth,' however ambivalently, Asian-American screen women in the jazz age". Wong's character in Shanghai Express was the subject of John Yau
John Yau
John Yau is an American poet and critic who lives in New York City. He received his B.A. from Bard College in 1972 and his M.F.A. from Brooklyn College in 1978...
's 1989 poem "No One Ever Tried to Kiss Anna May Wong", which interprets the actress' career as a series of tragic romances. In David Cronenberg
David Cronenberg
David Paul Cronenberg, OC, FRSC is a Canadian filmmaker, screenwriter and actor. He is one of the principal originators of what is commonly known as the body horror or venereal horror genre. This style of filmmaking explores people's fears of bodily transformation and infection. In his films, the...
's 1993 film version
M. Butterfly (film)
M. Butterfly is a 1993 romantic drama film directed by David Cronenberg. The screenplay was written by David Henry Hwang based on his play of the same name...
of David Henry Hwang
David Henry Hwang
David Henry Hwang is an American playwright who has risen to prominence as the preeminent Asian American dramatist in the U.S.He was born in Los Angeles, California and was educated at the Yale School of Drama and Stanford University...
's 1986 play, M. Butterfly
M. Butterfly
M. Butterfly is a 1988 play by David Henry Hwang loosely based on the relationship between French diplomat Bernard Boursicot and Shi Pei Pu, a male Peking opera singer....
, Wong's image was used briefly as a symbol of a "tragic diva". Her life was the subject of China Doll, The Imagined Life of an American Actress, an award-winning fictional play written by Elizabeth Wong
Elizabeth Wong (playwright)
Elizabeth Wong is an award-winning contemporary American playwright, television writer, librettist, theatrical director, college professor, social essayist, and a writer of plays for young audiences...
in 1995.
As the centennial of Wong's birth approached, a re-examination of her life and career took shape; three major works on the actress appeared, and comprehensive retrospectives of her films were held at both the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
and the American Museum of the Moving Image
American Museum of the Moving Image
The Museum of the Moving Image is a media museum located in Astoria, Queens on the former site of the Kaufman Astoria Studios. The museum originally opened in 1988 as the American Museum of the Moving Image. The museum began a $67 million expansion in March 2008 and reopened in January 2011...
in New York City. Anthony Chan's 2003 biography, Perpetually Cool: The Many Lives of Anna May Wong (1905–1961), was the first major work on Wong, and was written, Chan says, "from a uniquely Asian-American perspective and sensibility". In 2004, Philip Leibfried and Chei Mi Lane
Chei Mi Lane
Chei Mi Lane lives in Saint Louis, Missouri and is coauthor of the book Anna May Wong: A Complete Guide to Her Film, Stage, Radio and Television along with Philip Leibfried.-References:...
's exhaustive examination of Wong's career, Anna May Wong: A Complete Guide to Her Film, Stage, Radio and Television Work was published, as well as a second full-length biography, Anna May Wong: From Laundryman's Daughter to Hollywood Legend by Graham Russell Hodges. Though Anna May Wong's life, career, and legacy reflect many complex issues which remain decades after her death, Anthony Chan points out that her place in Asian-American cinematic history, as its first female star, is permanent.
See also
- Portrayal of East Asians in Hollywood
- Racism in Film of the United States
- Stereotypes of East and Southeast Asians in American media
Selected filmography
(includes her television work)- The Red LanternThe Red LanternThe Red Lantern is a 1919 silent film starring Alla Nazimova and directed by Albert Capellani. It is notable today for Anna May Wong's screen debut in an uncredited role. A single solitary print survives in Europe as well as rumors of a copy at Gosfilmofond, Moscow.-Synopsis:In China, a...
(1919) debut – uncredited - Bits of LifeBits of LifeBits of Life is a 1921 American film produced, written and directed by Marshall Neilan. It is notable as the first anthology film. For her performance in this film, Anna May Wong received her first screen credit...
(1921) - The Toll of the SeaThe Toll of the SeaThe Toll of the Sea is an American drama film, directed by Chester M. Franklin, produced by the Technicolor Motion Picture Corporation, released by Metro Pictures, and featuring Anna May Wong in her first leading role....
(1922) as Lotus Flower - The Thief of BagdadThe Thief of Bagdad (1924 film)The Thief of Bagdad is a 1924 American swashbuckler film directed by Raoul Walsh and starring Douglas Fairbanks. Freely adapted from One Thousand and One Nights, it tells the story of a thief who falls in love with the daughter of the Caliph of Bagdad...
(1924) as a Mongol Slave - A Trip to ChinatownA Trip to Chinatown (film)A Trip to Chinatown is a 1926 silent film starring Margaret Livingston. The supporting cast includes Anna May Wong and Charles Farrell. The movie was scripted by Beatrice Van from Charles Hale Hoyt's hit Broadway musical of the same name and directed by Robert P. Kerr.Livingston played the "Woman...
(1926) as Ohati - Old San FranciscoOld San Francisco (film)Old San Francisco is a silent movie which was released by Warner Brothers.-Production background:The film was released in a silent version and in a Vitaphone version, with sound-on-disc recording of music and sound effects only. The film was released by Warner Brothers, directed by Alan Crosland,...
(1927) - PiccadillyPiccadilly (film)Piccadilly is a British film directed by Ewald André Dupont, written by Arnold Bennett and starring Gilda Gray, Anna May Wong, and Jameson Thomas. The film was produced by British International Pictures and released by Wardour Films Ltd...
(1929) as Shosho - Elstree CallingElstree CallingElstree Calling is a film directed by Andre Charlot, Jack Hulbert, Paul Murray, and Alfred Hitchcock at Elstree Studios. The film, referred to as "A Cine-Radio Revue" in its original publicity, is a lavish musical film revue and was Britain's answer to the Hollywood revues which had been produced...
(1930) as Herself - Daughter of the DragonDaughter of the DragonDaughter of the Dragon is a movie directed by Lloyd Corrigan, released by Paramount Pictures, and starring Anna May Wong as Princess Ling Moy, Sessue Hayakawa as Ah Kee, and Warner Oland as Dr. Fu Manchu...
(1931) as Princess Ling Moy - Shanghai ExpressShanghai Express (film)Shanghai Express is a 1932 American film directed by Josef von Sternberg. The pre-Code picture stars Marlene Dietrich, Clive Brook, Anna May Wong, and Warner Oland. It was written by Jules Furthman, based on a story by Harry Hervey. It was the fourth of seven teamings of Sternberg and Dietrich.The...
(1932) as Hui Fei - A Study in ScarletA Study in Scarlet (1933 film)A Study in Scarlet is a drama film directed by Edwin L. Marin and starring Reginald Owen as Sherlock Holmes and Anna May Wong as Mrs. Pyke. The title comes from Arthur Conan Doyle's novel of the same name, the first in the Holmes series, but the screenplay by Robert Florey was original.Despite her...
(1933) - Dangerous to KnowDangerous to KnowDangerous to Know is a 1938 crime film starring Anna May Wong, Akim Tamiroff, Gail Patrick, Lloyd Nolan, and Anthony Quinn. The movie was directed by Robert Florey...
(1938) as Lan Ying - Island of Lost MenIsland of Lost MenIsland of Lost Men is a 1939 American movie directed by Kurt Neumann and starring Anna May Wong, J. Carrol Naish, and Anthony Quinn. It tells the story of the daughter of a general who goes to look for her father after he disappears...
(1939) as Kim Ling - Lady from ChungkingLady from ChungkingThe Lady from Chungking is a 1942 American War film.-Synopsis:The film tells the story of an aristocratic Chinese woman leading a group of Chinese fighters against Japan during World War II.-Cast:* Anna May Wong... Kwan Mei...
(1942) as Kwan Mei - Bombs Over BurmaBombs over Burma-Plot:The film tells the story of Chinese guerrillas fighting for the Allied cause in Burma during World War II. During the construction of a military supply road like the Ledo Road, the project is sabotaged by an English nobleman who is a Nazi agent....
(1943) as Lin Ying - Impact (1949) as Su Lin
- Portrait in BlackPortrait in BlackPortrait in Black is a thriller released by Universal International. Produced by Ross Hunter, who also produced Airport and other films for Universal, the film starred Lana Turner and Anthony Quinn...
(1960) as Tawny
Further reading
- Doerr, Conrad. "Reminiscences of Anna May Wong." Films in Review. New York, December 1968. ISSN 015-1688.
- Griffith, Richard and Richard Mayer. The Movies. New York: Fireside, 1970. ISBN 0-60036-044-X.
- Schneider, Steven Jay, ed. 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die. Hauppauge, New York: Barron's Educational Series, 2005. ISBN 0-76415-907-0.