\n<\/p>\n
A<\/span>nna May Wong is everywhere these days. The chic Chinese-American actor who first made a splash in the silent era has been fictionalised in films and TV shows, including Ryan Murphy\u2019s Hollywood and Damien Chazelle\u2019s Babylon, and an excellent novel, Amanda Lee Koe\u2019s Delayed Rays of a Star. She has her face on the quarter, the first Asian-American to be honoured in that way, and she is the subject of a page-turner of a biography, Not Your China Doll by Katie Gee Salisbury. But what about the films? This month, BFI Southbank in London hosts a retrospective of this remarkable star\u2019s career, titled Anna May Wong: the Art of Reinvention.<\/p>\n Wong was born in Los Angeles to second-generation Chinese parents in 1905. At the very beginning of her film career in 1921, she self-consciously told a movie magazine that she was \u201ca considerable spot of yellow that\u2019s come to stay on the silver of the screen\u201d, announcing her difference as a rare Asian-American leading lady and her determination to become a star in the same breath. As her career continued, she would become more outspoken about the challenges of typecasting and her disappointment with the representation of Chinese characters on screen.<\/p>\n \u201cI was killed in virtually every picture I appeared in. Pathetic dying seemed to be the best thing I did,\u201d she said. She never got the career she deserved, banned from playing romantic leading roles where she would kiss a white co-star, and passed over for Chinese roles in favour of white actors in yellowface. \u201cShe was forced to reinvent herself at different points of her career,\u201d says season curator Xin Peng, assistant professor in film and screen studies at the University of Cambridge. \u201cShe didn\u2019t have the option to repeat what she was doing, or retire in luxury.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Her first leading role \u2026 The Toll of the Sea.<\/span> Photograph: BFI<\/p>\n The season traces Wong\u2019s career from her first leading role in early Technicolor silent The Toll of the Sea (1922) through to her last film appearance in the Lana Turner vehicle Portrait in Black (1960) \u2013 plus, Flower Drum Song, the spectacular musical she was preparing to star in when she died in 1961. \u201cBy watching those films, we can imagine the kind of alternative futures that she may have had,\u201d says Peng.<\/p>\n There is plenty in the season to show how impressive Wong was on screen, charismatic even in small roles in silent fantasy The Thief of Bagdad (1924) starring Douglas Fairbanks, or Peter Pan (1924), beautifully shot by Chinese-American cinematographer James Wong Howe. Not to mention the unforgettable Shanghai Express (1932) where she shares a railway compartment and a worldly glamour with Marlene Dietrich. \u201cThey put Wong in the background, but I\u2019m not sure she\u2019s very good at staying there,\u201d says Peng. \u201cThe Thief of Bagdad is exemplary of Wong\u2019s ability to steal the show, because even with the most fleeting appearance, she was able to shift your attention from any of the stars. You wonder: \u2018Who\u2019s that?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n <\/span>Shared glamour \u2026 with Marlene Dietrich in Shanghai Express.<\/span> Photograph: BFI<\/p>\n In search of better roles, Wong went to Europe, where she made two beautiful silent melodramas in Germany and another in the UK: Piccadilly (1929), a romance set in multicultural London, with a screenplay by Arnold Bennett. She was particularly warmly received in the UK, at least at first, after her struggles for recognition in Hollywood. In Piccadilly, director EA Dupont filmed a kiss between Wong and her white leading man, Jameson Thomas, which was cut before release against the director\u2019s wishes. In 1930\u2019s Hai-Tang, an early talkie filmed in English, French and German, once again her kiss, with John Longden, was cut for British audiences. Not until 1934\u2019s Java Head would Wong break that taboo, kissing John Loder on screen \u2013 a landmark for British cinema.<\/p>\n Wong did return to Hollywood in the 1930s, for Shanghai Express and plenty more besides. These films are something of a rollercoaster. Daughter of the Dragon (1931), in which Wong gets top billing, nevertheless contains a collection of orientalist stereotypes, with Wong playing the vengeful child of Fu Manchu. Bizarrely, Wong plays opposite Japanese actor Sessue Hayakawa and Swedish Warner Oland, all three playing Chinese characters.<\/p>\n <\/span>\u2018It\u2019s the most spectacular ending, with a virtuosic performance from Wong\u2019 \u2026 Dangerous to Know.<\/span> Photograph: BFI<\/p>\n Wong finally visited China in 1936, where she was roundly criticised for her portrayals of Chinese villains and stereotypes in foreign films. On her return, she determined to take charge of her career. In B-movies such as Daughter of Shanghai (1937) and King of Chinatown (1939), she was able to play characters with more control over their destiny, and formed Hollywood cinema\u2019s first Asian-American screen couple, with her childhood friend Philip Ahn, a Korean-American actor and activist.<\/p>\n In the Edgar Wallace adaptation Dangerous to Know (1938), Wong revives a role she played to great acclaim on stage. Although Wong plays the marginal role of the gangster\u2019s mistress, the climax of the film contains one of her greatest moments on screen. \u201cIt\u2019s the most spectacular ending, with a virtuosic performance from Wong, and that performance was possible because of her life experience, her whole career of being typecast in a certain character with a certain fate,\u201d says Peng. \u201cI was completely shocked when I first watched the film.\u201d<\/p>\n Wong has many such arresting scenes. Even when playing hackneyed characters, she strikes a bold, modern tone. Following the strange course of her career across these films tells a remarkable story of a woman with a powerful talent, who indeed made her mark on the silver screen \u2013 as both a brilliant actor, and a trailblazer in an often hostile industry.<\/p>\n Anna May Wong: The Art of Reinvention is at BFI Southbank, London, until 6 October<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Anna May Wong is everywhere these days. The chic Chinese-American actor who first made a splash in the silent era has been fictionalised in films and TV shows, including Ryan Murphy\u2019s Hollywood and Damien Chazelle\u2019s Babylon, and an excellent novel, Amanda Lee Koe\u2019s Delayed Rays of a Star. She has her face on the quarter,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[6037,11580,7581,1171,632,1394,622,11579,11582,11578,11581],"class_list":{"0":"post-18934","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-anna","9":"tag-chineseamerican","10":"tag-cinema","11":"tag-film","12":"tag-killed","13":"tag-movies","14":"tag-star","15":"tag-trailblazing","16":"tag-upended","17":"tag-virtually","18":"tag-wong"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18934"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18934\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}