Anna May Wong: In Her Own Words

Earlier today I saw Yunah Hong's new documentary Anna May Wong: In Her Own Words (2010) at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival. I deliberately went in with modest expectations after my tepid response a few years ago to Elaine Mae Woo's documentary, Anna May Wong: Frosted Yellow Willows (2007). Woo's documentary struck me as being a little too reverent for such a groundbreaking individual as Anna May. Besides some rare footage, there wasn't much to recommend for those already familiar with her work.

Hong's documentary also features similarly rare footage: a young Anna May doing the Charleston; her 1936 trip to China, including a shot with Shanghai movie queen Hu Die; and scenes from the rarely screened Song (1928), her first European film. There are lots of great still photos as well. My favorite — and one I've never seen before — shows Anna May in boxing gloves, shorts, and a tank top with the initials HR, which must have been taken when she was working for the Hal Roach Studio in 1927.

The talking heads include actor James Hong, biographers Graham Hodges and Karen Leong, and cinematographer Jack Cardiff. Most surprising were Conrad Doerr (who rented an apartment from Anna May during the 1950s) and Susan Ahn Cuddy (who, along with her brother, actor Philip Ahn, grew up in the same Los Angeles neighborhood as Anna May).

But the heart of Hong's film — although most reviewers so far emphatically regard it as a glaring distraction — is the reenactment of Anna May by actress Doan Ly. She performs, in interview fashion, excerpts from Anna May's voluminous correspondence (evidently, much of it taken from letters to her dear friend, the noted photographer Carl Van Vechten), as well as songs from her European stage shows (the Chinese folk song "Jasmine Flower", "Parlez-moi d'amour", and Noel Coward's "Half-Caste Woman"). At first, Doan Ly's lack of resemblance to Anna May proved a stumbling block for me, but as soon as I let go of that unrealistic expectation, I began to appreciate her sensitive performance and Hong's use of this technique.

Anna May Wong is such an icon that it's often difficult to get a sense of her as a flesh-and-blood person. The performance of her letters and songs gives Hong's documentary an emotional depth that is quite touching. Incidents that I'd read about, such as Wong's absence from her mother's funeral because of her decision to keep working during the Broadway run of On the Spot (1930-31), are brought to life with great poignancy.

Yunah Hong's Anna May Wong: In Her Own Words paints a remarkably vivid portrait of one of the 20th century's most fascinating icons and is highly recommended to fans and strangers alike. It is screening one last time at the SFIAFF this coming Wednesday evening and will undoubtedly be making the festival rounds. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a not-too-distant DVD release (with lots of extras, please!).

Anna May Wong: La Malinche

Currently up for auction on eBay is this fabulous portrait by Armando Drechsler of Anna May Wong as the controversial "Mother of Modern Mexico", La Malinche. It's not as odd as first seems. During her early career, Anna May played a variety of "exotic" ethnicities besides her own: for example, the Arab girl Zira in The 40th Door (1924) and the Inuit girl Keok in The Alaskan (1924). Such ethnic transformations were commonplace in Hollywood at the time, not to mention the institutionalized practice of yellowface.

Drechsler's choice of Anna May Wong as his model for La Malinche is especially provocative because many of the charges leveled against La Malinche — even still today — were also leveled against Anna May: harlot, race traitor, miscegenist.

But it seems plausible to me that Drechsler, who was originally from Germany and likely familiar with Anna May's European sojourns, instead regarded both women as boundary-crossing pioneers.

Whatever the inspiration, with this painting he created a stunning testament to Anna May Wong's global appeal and world-class beauty.

* For more examples of Armando Drechsler's work, see Mexican Calendar Girls by Angela Villalba.

Anna May Wong: Style Goddess

The always fashionable Anna May Wong on the cover of Spanish movie magazine Cinegramas (March 1935). Find the real deal here.

Anna May Wong's Painted Knees

Ever hear of painted knees? Nope? Me neither. Evidently it was quite the fashion accessory for flappers back in '25. Reminds me of the body painting of the sixties. I guess the flappers were the original mod girls.

The following headline and blurb accompanied this cute photo of Anna May, which appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle on August 1, 1925:

Painted Monkey Graces Knee of Almond-Eyed Film Star
Anna May Wong, Chinese screen actress, who has adopted the fad of having her knees painted. The much-discussed evolution monkey adorns Anna May's limbs.

Pretty cool, huh! However, I'm of the opinion that it's not Scopes' monkey who's climbing Anna May's calf — but mischievous Sun Wukong, the Monkey King!

Anna May and Her Automobiles

Anna May Wong and her Moon "6-60" coupe (1926)

Anna May sure loved her cars. One of her first was a six-cylinder Willys-Knight, which she wrecked on a bridge trying to evade a motorcycle cop. Below is a little piece about a Buick she bought in 1924 — perhaps as a replacement for that Willys-Knight!

CLEVER LITTLE CHINESE MOVIE STAR
JOINS FAMILY OF BUICK OWNERS



Anna May Wong, the little Oriental film star who is taking a prominent part in the support of Douglas Fairbanks in "A Thief of Bagdad", spends her leisure hours in motoring.

The above picture of little Miss Wong was caught by the photographer while she was taking a "constitutional" in her favorite car, a Buick.

— San Antonio Express, June 22, 1924

P.S. I just found the following driving-related item about Anna May from The Oxnard Daily Courier (February 3, 1925). Seems like she was a bit of a daredevil!

Anna May Wong, a well known Chinese actress of Los Angeles, was arrested in Ventura Saturday night. She was driving at the rate of 35 miles an hour and will appear before Judge Meilandt tomorrow.

Don't Look Back

Anna May Wong and Wang Renmei

This photo of Anna May Wong in Shanghai, taken during her 1936 trip to China, was just auctioned on eBay. I love Anna May, but I don't even try to collect her memorabilia, since it usually ends up priced way beyond my wallet's comfort level. Nevertheless, I now wish I made a bid for this particular piece — especially after I figured out the movie featured in the background advertisements: Song of Everlasting Regret (長恨歌), a 1936 melodrama starring "Wildcat" Wang Renmei as a divorced housewife who aspires to become a singer but ends up an exploited sing-song girl driven to murder.

I suppose this post is but my own small song of regret...


Shanghai film star Wang Renmei
Courtesy of the amazing Shanghai Memory website (only in Chinese)

Take a Tumble with Anna May

Now you can fall in love over and over again with the eminently photogenic Anna May Wong at Anna May, a new tumblr recently set up by Rebecca of Anna May Wong Daily.

I absolutely adore these "photo-cartoons" of Anna May. If anyone knows anything about who made them and where they were published, do let me know.

Happy Birthday Anna May!

Here's a belated toast to Anna May Wong (born January 3, 1905), one of this blog's behind-the-scenes muses. I was flipping through Anna May Wong: From Laundryman's Daughter to Hollywood Legend by Graham Russell Gao Hodges yesterday but somehow overlooked that it was her birthday.

This photo, taken by Paul Tanqueray, comes from the March 1930 issue of Theatre World and proves that, eighty years later, Anna May is still the coolest thing around.

Special thanks to Anna May Wong Daily for the birthday reminder!

*Photo courtesy of the eBay Archive

Happy Autumn Moon Festival

Best wishes to all my friends and readers!

Anna May Wong and Her Technicolor Cheongsams

I was greeted with an unexpected surprise recently when I watched the DVD of The Good Earth (1937). The film adaptation of Pearl Buck's famous novel is mostly remembered nowadays for being the great denied opportunity of Anna May Wong's career. Before production started, there were reports of using an all-Chinese cast, including Anna May Wong, Soo Yong, and Shanghai star Hu Die. But, not surprisingly, the movie ended up featuring white actors in virtually all of the lead roles.

Anna May had been very keen to play the main character of O-Lan. It was an unprecedented chance to break out of the stereotype roles that she had been given by Hollywood throughout her career. When she was denied the role, the message could not have been more clear: Hollywood had no use for a Chinese American star.

Undoubtedly heartbroken, Anna May left at the beginning of 1936 for a nine-month tour of China. When she returned to the U.S., she appeared in the early Technicolor short Hollywood Party (1937), which is featured as an extra on The Good Earth DVD. I had no idea that Anna May appeared in this and only started watching it out of curiosity. I nearly stopped when I realized it was just a "yellow face" variety show. (Yet another missed opportunity, considering the abundance of talented Chinese American vaudeville performers.) But as I scrubbed through the film on my computer, I spotted two genuine Chinese girls on either side of a screen. I started watching again. One of the girls struck a gong, and who should emerge from behind the screen but Anna May Wong, modeling some of the exquisite cheongsams she picked up during her trip to China.

With the exception of her final film, Portrait in Black (1960) — in which she plays a maid — I believe Hollywood Party is Anna May's only other color film.* Okay, folks... here she is... the incomparable Anna May Wong in full Technicolor glory!



* I should mention that Anna May Wong does have the distinction of playing the lead in The Toll of the Sea (1922), the second two-strip Technicolor feature film ever made and the first to be given a wide release. Using only red and green, the experimental two-color process was an imperfect but impressive approximation of true color. The Toll of the Sea essentially launched Anna May's career. Just seventeen years old at the time, she was widely praised for her performance, both in the U.S. and overseas press.

From the eBay Archive: Anna May Wong in Cartoonland

It's safe to say, considering the puzzling lack of legitimate DVD releases for many of her films (Shanghai Express, anyone?), that a lot of folks nowadays have become acquainted with Anna May Wong through her myriad portraits rather than her movies. Let's face it: Anna May Wong was extremely photogenic. The camera loved her, and so did a host of famous photographers, from George Hurrell to Carl Van Vechten.

Here's a series of Anna May Wong "photo-cartoons" of which I am particularly fond. They date from 1928, when Anna May left the U.S. to make a name for herself in Europe. I know nothing about their creator or the circumstances of their creation. All I know is that they are absolutely charming, playfully capturing Anna May's humor and love of dressing up.






Links

• Anna May Wong exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery


• Search for "Anna May Wong" at Corbis