According to the University of Oregon Professor Daisuke Miyao in his seminal work on the actor, “Sessue Hayakawa: Silent Cinema and Transnational Stardom,” he was “enthusiastically embraced” by the French. He also became immensely popular in France. In 1930, for instance, he performed a one-act play, “Samurai,” for Great Britain’s King George V and Queen Mary. Nevertheless, Hayakawa persevered, eventually making a successful transition to “talkies,” and achieving fame outside the United States.
#SESSUE HAYAKAWA THE CHEAT MOVIE#
Unfortunately, due to anti-miscegenation laws at the time, Hayakawa very rarely, if ever, got to “get the girl.” This was so well known that in 1957, while interviewing Hayakawa, Joe Franklin quipped, “there were two things we were sure of in the silent movie era the Indians never got the best of it, and Sessue Hayakawa never got the girl.” The only times Hayakawa did wind up with a romantic interest at the end was when he starred opposite his wife, Japanese actress Tsuru Aoki, in “The Dragon Painter” (1919).
#SESSUE HAYAKAWA THE CHEAT SERIAL#
Very often, he would star opposite a white woman, most notably the serial actress Marin Sais, whom Hayakawa personally chose to be his leading lady. He had total control over the 23 films that Haworth made, producing, starring in, and contributing to the design, writing, editing, and directing of the movies. He was so successful that, in 1918, he started his own movie studio, Haworth Pictures, which produced vehicles specifically for him. For context, that’s equivalent to roughly $28 million today. Often cast as a forbidden lover or sexually dominant villain, like in his breakout role in “The Cheat“ (1915), Hayakawa had a huge fan base of mostly white women, and at his peak, was paid up to $2 million a year. His fame was on par with that of Charlie Chaplin. In the 1910s and 1920s, Japanese actor Sessue Hayakawa was one of the biggest stars of silent Hollywood. Anyone remember Long Duk Dong from “16 Candles” (1984) or Hop Sing from “Bonanza” (1959-1973)?īut what if I told you that there already was an Asian actor who’d achieved success as a romantic lead? Not only that, what if I was to inform you that this same Asian actor was the first big screen sex symbol, the highest-paid performer of his day, and the first Asian person ever to be nominated for an acting Academy Award? After all, Asian men have routinely been emasculated, humiliated and denigrated in American films and TV shows.
Specifically, he insisted that it was time for Asian American males to be seen as romantic leads.
In a 2015 interview with the Coalition of Asian Pacifics in Entertainment, actor Daniel Dae Kim described how he thought it was time for Asian performers to take leading roles.
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