SAG-AFTRA

Spring 2020

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95 SAG-AFTRA | Spring 2020 | sagaftra.org T his California girl had every qualification for "moving picture" stardom. But Anna May Wong was ethnically Chinese in an industry dominated by Caucasian performers, executives and audiences in early to mid 20th century America. By January 1919, with her first film appearance as an uncredited 14-year-old among several hundred Asian extras in the silent feature The Red Lantern, only one Asian had attained American film stardom: Japanese actor Sessue Hayakawa, who also became an international star. Challenges and long odds never deterred Anna May Wong. She became the first Chinese-American movie star and the first Asian American to star in her own TV series. She was born in Los Angeles as Wong Liu Tsong in 1905 and explained her name in a 1930 interview: "Wong, of course, is my family name. 'Tsong' and 'Liu,' merely by a change of inflection, can mean two entirely different things. Say it one way and it means 'second of a pair.' That's how I got the name (she was the second-born child). But it can also mean 'frosted yellow willow,' which is much prettier I think." By 1922, she won her first starring role in The Toll of the Sea, now the earliest-surviving feature shot in two-color Technicolor. On Jan. 22, 2020, the 97th anniversary of the film's 1923 release, Wong was celebrated with a Google Doodle slideshow. Wong battled stereotyping throughout her career and, in 1938, The New York Times reported her efforts on Paramount's King of Chinatown: "Anna May Wong, who is starring, aided in molding the Paramount attitude, for she has long argued that her race should be portrayed as normal human beings. She succeeded in having such phrases as 'Honorable Father' deleted and having the kiss substituted for nose-rubbing which, she says, Hollywood stole from the Eskimos and inflicted on the Chinese. She also convinced the producers that not all Chinese can be reduced to two classifications, the dreamy poet and the sinister figure. Her reasoning, coupled with Chinese representation, has altered considerably Paramount's treatment of her race." She made a handful of films in the 1940s then, in late August 1951, made her television debut as the first Asian-American to star in a TV series, The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong, shot in New York. Using her birth name for the title character, it ran 13 episodes, and over the next nine years she made occasional TV appearances. Just four days before her sudden death from a heart attack at age 56, her final performance was broadcast on an episode of The Barbara Stanwyck Show. Although her ethnicity restricted her opportunities within the Hollywood studio system, Wong is an inspiration to anyone with the talent, drive and grit, determined to "buck the odds" to pursue a dream. And win. Sheer Determination: ANNA MAY WONG Anna May Wong's first starring role came at the age of 18 in the early Technicolor feature The Toll of the Sea in 1922. You can view this at the National Film Preservation Foundation's website. SAG-AFTRA SPECIAL COLLECTIONS Snapshot by Valerie Yaros

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