Widely thought-about the primary Chinese language American Hollywood star, Anna Might Wong has solely just lately begun to get her due after an extended interval of neglect following her loss of life in 1961. In 2020 Google celebrated her breakthrough function within the 1922 movie The Toll of the Sea with a Doodle, and that very same yr she was featured as a recurring character in Ryan Murphy’s Netflix drama collection, Hollywood. In 2022, the US Mint introduced her inclusion on quarters – one of many first girls to ever obtain such an honor – and in 2023 Mattel launched a Barbie doll celebrating her. A biopic of the actor is presently within the works.
Within the meantime, these curious to know the ins and outs of Wong’s life can get pleasure from Katie Gee Salisbury’s fast-paced, completely researched biography, Not Your China Doll. Salisbury, who has written and spoken broadly on the Chinese language-American expertise and who grew up not removed from Wong’s stomping grounds in southern California, is the best creator to information us by means of the actor’s life. She successfully leverages her private expertise with systemic injustice, in addition to her wide-ranging information of Hollywood and cinema, to offer Wong the biography that she has lengthy deserved however sadly has not but obtained.
The a long time that Wong was neglected – to not point out the second-rate roles she was largely granted in her lifetime – are significantly unjust given the actor’s unbelievable perseverance and noteworthy cinematic presence. At age 9 she was nicknamed “Curious Chinese language Youngster” for the best way that she persistently lingered round silent film units, begging to be part of the method. At a precocious 11 she had adopted a stage title, declaring herself Anna Might Wong, and she or he went on to earn roles as an additional from the age of 14. Earlier than she had turned 20, Wong was garnering vital consideration in supporting roles, turning into generally known as a flapper, and starting her relentless climb to stardom.
For the following 4 a long time Wong would maintain herself within the highlight, partially by ably managing the technological transitions from silent films to talkies to tv. “She’s on the forefront of each shift in expertise,” Salisbury mentioned throughout an interview. As with lots of Wong’s decisions, her embrace of expertise was as a lot a matter of steely pragmatism as anything. At age 45, as an example, thought-about outdated and undesirable by Hollywood requirements, she selected to make the leap to TV the place she may stay a commodity and get higher roles. “Lots of the massive title actors didn’t wish to do tv as a result of it didn’t have the identical status,” mentioned Salisbury. “But it surely was folks like Anna Might who noticed it as a possibility. She turned the primary Asian American to steer a TV present.”
As with expertise, Wong additionally embraced geography in a manner advantageous to her profession – she lived and labored for years in Europe as a protest in opposition to Hollywood’s discrimination, and she or he additionally spent a yr touring China, partially to be taught extra about her roots and partially to lodge a PR offensive in opposition to the nationalist authorities, who made no secret of its scorn for her. These sudden swerves usually had superb penalties: as an example, dismayed on the lesser roles handed to her by the Hollywood studios, Wong went overseas to Europe in 1928 to proceed her climb – amongst different issues she rubbed shoulders with an up and coming Marlene Dietrich within the final of Weimar Berlin’s glory days, ending up in an iconic portrait along with her and Leni Riefenstahl who had but to select up a movie digicam.
These had been canny strikes by Wong, reflections of her exceptional dedication to steer the life she wished, despite the big obstacles frequently strewn in her path as a girl of Chinese language descent. What makes her story compelling, and significantly resonant at this time, is the methods wherein she managed to change into a world starlet regardless of ongoing battles in opposition to racism and sexism.
Based on Salisbury, this makes her a job mannequin these a few years later, despite the darker chapters of her life. “I actually hope that individuals see Anna Might in a brand new gentle,” mentioned Salisbury. “There are undoubtedly tragic points to her profession, however there’s a lot extra pleasure and inspiration and triumph to be present in her story. I hope that individuals deal with the issues she did and her legacy. That kind of dedication to only keep it up is, I feel, actually inspiring to folks at this time.” Salisbury added that Wong has change into a kind of private function mannequin, telling me that, “studying about her was a manner of studying about myself.”
Whereas Wong skilled unbelievable quantities of success in her life, her life-style and the oppression she confronted additionally introduced her to low locations. At a comparatively younger age she was experiencing well being impacts rendered upon her physique by her lifelong consuming behavior, and she or he died fairly younger, at 56, of a coronary heart assault. Via her life Wong would skilled intense turmoil, in addition to sharp temper swings and bouts of despair.
The image that emerges by means of Not Your China Doll is of a girl who propelled herself ahead by means of life through the glamorous world of the flicks, and who was amazingly expert at determining methods to get the following hit in her lifelong relationship with stardom. “One of the spectacular issues about her was her resiliency,” mentioned Salisbury. “It was actually necessary to her to proceed to make movies. There have been so many setbacks and hurdles, however she all the time discovered a manner round them.” She’s additionally portrayed as a girl who opened doorways for different Asian American actors; Salisbury writes: “Anna Might’s ultimate act was at hand on the torch to a brand new technology of Asian American hopefuls who would keep it up the work she’d begun a half century earlier.”
Salisbury confirmed nice resilience herself, as she discovered some skepticism over her perception {that a} Wong biography was vital – despite many nice conferences with publishers, gives for her guide had been scarce. “There was doubt – not from the editors however from the publishers – that this particular person was worthy of a guide,” she mentioned. “I felt like I encountered some problem there.” We’re lucky that Salisbury remained steadfast despite the continued bias in opposition to girls like Wong – and there’s some proof that, with books like hers, issues are altering for the higher. “After I first found her, no person knew who she was,” she mentioned. “That remained true till comparatively just lately. Now extra folks have heard of her.”
