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Apologies are in order, folks. Not from you, from me. Wow, that would be so awkward the other way around... I've been AWOL due to some personal problems and am s-l-o-w-l-y getting back to normal. Your patience is appreciated.
Today's filmmaker is one that I've looked forward to researching for quite some time now. To say she was a trailblazer in early filmmaking would be an understatement! Distinguished readers, introducing a woman we will hold in the highest regard henceforth...Miss Marion E. Wong.
1895-1969
IMDb: Marian E. Wong
Marion Evelyn Wong was born in San Fransisco, California (USA), but was raised in nearby Oakland. When Marion was the ripe old age of 16, she and her 2 American-born brothers made a trip to China to meet their (pre-arranged) spouses. They had to move fast, because Marion and her brothers were at risk of losing their citizenship if they stayed in China for too long (!). One of Marion's brothers sadly passed away from smallpox during their trip. Her other brother, Albert, married a good woman named Violet. Violet would not only become Marion's new sister-in-law, but would also become a friend and one of her strongest supporters in the new industry of filmmaking! We don't know what exactly happened with Marion's husband-to-be, but word has it that she refused to marry him. Sis has her standards. Deal with it.
Marion & Violet
Marion already had made a reputation for herself as a talented singer and entertainer in Oakland, and attended the University of California. By the time she was 21, Marion decided to establish her own production company, entitled "Mandarin Film Company", funded by her wealthy merchant-landowner uncle, Ben Lim. It helps to have rich relatives, folks. Write that down. The Mandarin Film Company was the first Asian-American film company, entirely funded and produced by Asian-Americans! But the driving force behind this new venture was noneother than Marion herself. She acted, produced, directed, wrote and designed...and Mandarin Film Company became a promising independent film studio after her first film was released, "The Curse of Quon Gwon: When the Far East Mingles with the West" (1916). Not only was Marion one of the actresses, so was her Day One - her sister-in-law Violet, as well as her mother and her niece. Why not make your relatives movie stars if you can, I mean...
The inspiration for her film came from a filmmaker whose career was already on the rise: Charlie Chaplin and his film "A Night Out". Marion, an all-American girl, was only familiar with American movies and had not seen a genuine Asian film. So, she hired one of Charlie's cameramen, which resulted in a film shot in excellent quality, particularly for an independent filmmaker! In a 1916 newspaper interview, Marion said:
“…I first wrote the love story. Then I decided that people who are interested in my people and my country would like to see some of the customs and manners of China. So I added to the love drama many scenes depicting these things. I do hope it will be a success.”
Unfortunately, the finished film only had 2 (count 'em! 2) screenings, and never received the distribution that Marion and her company had hoped for. The reasons? Well, let me put it this way - the general American "public" was, quite frankly, influenced by white supremacy. This doesn't mean that all of them wore the hoods, but even the most well-meaning white Americans could (and frequently did) exhibit bias towards Americans who looked differently than them. Thus, distributors were afraid that if they picked up the film, which had gotten critical acclaim, audiences wouldn't respond to it because it wouldn't be "familiar" to them. Audiences at the time only identified with white American narratives and racist stereotypes of Asians that Marion's film (thankfully) did not include. To read: the distributors felt it wasn't white and racist enough to keep audiences' attention.
Unsurprisingly, the financial failure of Marion's film was devastating to the young filmmaker. Her uncle declared bankruptcy, and Marion asked her family to never speak of the film again. Who could blame her? But you can't keep a good woman down, and the following year (1917), Marion married Kim Seung Hong, the first Chinese graduate of the University of California - Berkeley. He was also the first Chinese American electrical engineer in the U.S.! Anyway, soon after the couple married, Marion opened a restaurant called the Singapore Hut. One of the star cabaret performers? Marion herself, of course! She also managed to simultaneously tour the country in vaudeville because AS I SAID, YOU CAN'T KEEP A GOOD WOMAN DOWN, FOLKS.
Marion (1940s)
Many years passed. Marion's family, true to form, never said a word about her film to the younger generations. Marion's children had no idea she was once a wild, young, 21-year-old filmmaker whose brilliant movie never launched. Until...2 reels mysteriously showed up in the Chinese American Historical Society's basement. They were labeled reel 4 and reel 7, which means the original film probably ran about 90 minutes. Well, that let the cat out of the bag, Marion's kids discovered their mom's film for the first time, and in 1948 they had a screening of the 2 reels Berkeley, California. In 1974, Marion's family gathered for another viewing. Sadly, Marion was not present for the second screening, as she passed away in 1969.
In 1917, the Oakland Tribune said Marion was “energy personified,” a Chinese girl with “imagination, executive ability, wit and beauty.” What a wonderful way to be remembered! Have a peek at the surviving footage of "The Curse of Quon Gwon" below!
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