Hollywood Goes Oriental: CaucAsian Performance in American Film

Index

index Page numbers in italics refer to illustrations Abdul-Jabbar, Kareem, 235 Adamson, Joe: Bugs Bunny: Fifty Years and Only One Grey Hare, 138 African American performers: parodies of Chinese immigrants, 9; tragic mulatto archetype, 210. See also blackface Agee, James, 145 Ahn, Philip, 127, 236 Amos and Andy, 10 An American Guerrilla in the Philippines, 177 Anderson, Robert, 211 animated shorts, 125, 126 Anna and the King, 241–42 Anna and the King of Siam, 1999 versions of, 241–42 anti-Chinese legislation, 8 anti-Chinese songs, 8 anti-Japanese climate, 23 Antin, Eleanor, 17 Aoki, Keith, 7, 130 Apana, Chang, 91 The Aristocats, 125 Armstrong, Robert, 126 Around the World in 80 Days, 226 asexuality, and yellowface, 183–84, 192 Asian actors: limited dramatic roles, 241–42; protest against Oriental guise performance practice, 237; struggle to play own roles, 235 Asian American artists, 243 Asian American studies, 12 Asian women immigrants, as victims of exploitation, 24–25 Astaire, Fred, 10 Asther, Nils, 36, 40–41, 42, 43, 45, 46, 47 Barthelmess, Richard, 21 The Battle of China, 161 Behind That Curtain, 82 Behind the Rising Sun, 19 Belasco, David, 54 Bernstein, Matthew: Visions of the East: Orientalism in Film (with Studlar), 12–13 Bey, Turhan, ix, 151, 152 Bhabha, Homi, 29 Bice, Robert, 150 Biggers, Earl Derr, 91–92; feminized and infantilized figure of Chan, 92–93, 100; The House without a Key, 92–93 Biograph Company films, 15 The Bitter Tea of General Yen, ix, 13, 36, 40–47, 49, 60, 232; construction of General Yen’s appearance, 40–41; dream sequence, 40, 41–45; fiendish Mandarin figure, 68; index 278 The Bitter Tea of General Yen (cont.) Fu Manchu masquerade, 42–44; General Yen as construct in mind of another character, 41, 45–47; “interracial” kiss, 44; techniques of positioning the viewer, 43–44 black bodies, exploitation of, 17 Black Dragons, 170 blackface, 28–29, 243; comedy or caricature as chief form of, 10; and definition of white characters, 190; as form of “racial cross-dressing,” 14; and mitigation of societal fears, 6–7 Blood on the Sun, 126–27 B movie production, 79; virulent depictions of Japanese after Pearl Harbor, 130 Bordwell, David, 15 Boublil, Alain, 4 Bourke-White, Margaret: Halfway to Freedom, 174 Brando, Marlon, in Sayonara, 202, 206 Brando, Marlon, in The Teahouse of the August Moon, 15, 175, 178–87, 181; asexuality, 183–84; comic buffoonery and trickery, 182, 234; ironic and ambiguous interpretation of yellowface performance, 184–85; reviews of, 186–87; speech style, 182; traditional Oriental duplicity as patriotic, 184; training for performance, 185, 187; yellowface physical guise, 182–83 Breakfast at Tiffany’s, ix, 175, 187–92 Breen, Joseph, 147, 254n19 Bren, J. Robert, 170 The Bridge on the River Kwai, 23 Broken Blossoms, 13, 21 Brown, Harry, 211 Buck, Pearl S., 26, 145, 155, 158 Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips, 126, 171, 232, 253n12; Oriental clichés, 137–43, 234; physical distortions attributed to Japanese, 140–41, 143; physical references to Mr. Moto, 141–42, 143 Buttons, Red, 202 Cagney, Jimmy, 15, 126 Capote, Truman, 188 Capra, Frank, ix, xi, 60, 64, 67, 160, 161; The Name above the Title, 40 caricature: and Charlie Chan character, 93–99; designed to define leading white characters, 190–91; Oriental, in wartime cartoons, xi, 131–43; of yellowface characters, 177–78 Carlson, Marvin: Performance: A Critical Introduction, 16–17 Carradine, David, 235–36 casting procedures: and belief that Asians are deficit in acting skills, 126–27; of Caucasian actors in Oriental detective films, 72, 87–88, 93, 117; during classical Hollywood era, 26; controversy over Miss Saigon, 3–5; controversy over The Good Earth, 25–28; debate over Bruce Lee and David Carradine in Kung Fu, 126–27, 235–36; of Dragon Seed, 145–46, 154–55, 160; of Helen Hayes in The Son-Daughter, 54; and Hollywood ideas about deficient acting abilities of Asian actors, 127; of Juanita Hall in Flower Drum Song, 194, 197; of Myrna Loy in Thirteen Women, 38; of Ricardo Montalban in Sayonara, 201, 209; The Teahouse of the August Moon, 178. See also Oriental guise/masquerade Castle in the Desert, 130 censorship of film, 1915 Supreme Court ruling on, vii Chan, Charlie. See Charlie Chan character Chan, Jackie, ix, 240, 242 Chaney, Lon, 24 Chang, T. K., 131 Chang, Vincent, 123 index 279 Chan Is Missing, xii character type...