Joy Ching: Girl in the Gilded Cage

"Miss Joy Ching imparts an Oriental touch to an old American art form as The Girl in the Gilded Cage — a San Francisco Chinatown striptease."

The above photo and caption, from an article that appeared in Collier's (February 28, 1942), luridly answers the question asked a few days ago about what exactly tourists hoped to see inside San Francisco's famous Forbidden City nightclub.

Joy Ching appears to have been a replacement for Noel Toy, the "Chinese Sally Rand" who made Forbidden City a solvent business with her popular bubble dance.

Owner Charlie Low didn't have to be a genius to figure out what made folks flock to his club. When Noel Toy left Forbidden City for more lucrative pastures, Charlie knew he had to find another exotic dancer to keep the cash flowing.

Charlie Low Dreams Up "The Girl in the Gilded (Neon) Cage"

The nation's no. 1 Chinese night club, whose excitements have been extolled by Life, Pic, and other national mags, is doing one of those crazy, wonderful things again.

From the fertile brain of Boss and MC Charlie Low comes the new storm that will sweep over Forbidden City any day now: a tempting Chinese thrush in a bird-cage of golden neon.

Watch for the nude Miss Blossom Lee, "The Girl in the Gilded Cage".

In fact, if you don't keep your eye on Forbidden City all the time, you'll be missing night-club history in the making. Charlie Low has conceived more novel, sprightly, exciting entertainment ideas than any two other showmen in town...

—The Coast, May 1941

Blossom Lee, soon to be known as Joy Ching, was partnered with Jack Mei Ling, one of Forbidden City's first, and longest staying, dancers. At various times, Jack performed as a duo with Jadin Wong and Jade Ling and also as a trio with Mary Mammon and Dorothy Sun. Not only did he choreograph the dances, but he also designed the costumes. As Anthony Lee writes in his fascinating book Picturing Chinatown, Jack developed a unique Orientalist camp style that allowed him to come out of the closet as a gay man on stage in his performances.

Customers Love (!) Charlie Low's (!) Caged Honey (!)

Her name was Betty Lee. Then it became Blossom Lee. Now it's Joy Ching. Under any name she's The Girl in the Gilded Cage. Under any name, too, she's un-Orientally lush with a wallop in nearly all of her dextrous extremities. And this, you may be sure, brings a twinkle to the eyes of customers... and a double twinkle into the eyes of smart Charlie Low, who's the Boss... and the guy who cooked up the Gilded Cage idea in the first place.

That's Joy in the picture above, after emerging from the Cage... in the act of being pursued by another bird, Jack Mei Ling.

—The Coast, June 1941

An act like "The Girl in the Gilded Cage" is one example of how performers at Forbidden City used burlesque to confuse and overturn the definitions of "Chinese" and "American" in U.S. popular culture at the time. Besides its obvious visual reference to the crib prostitutes of old Chinatown, the act also references American vaudeville — the song "A Bird in a Gilded Cage" was an enormous hit in 1900. Add the humorous touch of the neon cage and Jack Mei Ling's camp aesthetic, and you've got a unique twist on the yellowface tradition.

The performers of Forbidden City and San Francisco's other "all-Chinese" nightclubs were more than a novelty. They may not have overturned the unequal representation of Asian Americans on the stage and screen, but they nevertheless found a way to express their talent and ambition.