Filling in the Blanks of History: The Lost Legacies of Hollywood’s Actors of Color

by Amanda La

The Golden Age of Hollywood, spanning from the 1910s to 1960s, is mostly remembered today for Charlie Chaplin, white actors playing other races, and racist caricatures. Though it is important to remember Hollywood’s horrible acts of racism, we cannot let the pioneers who opened the door for future actors of color to be erased from Hollywood history either.

Lilian St. Cyr (“Red Wing”) 1884-1974

Lilian St. Cyr was a Winnebago actress and the first Indigenous actress to star in a Hollywood feature film. Although her career in Hollywood only lasted 15 years, she managed to act in more than 70 films. She was significant not only because she was an actress, but because she was also a cultural consultant, costume designer, and writer on film sets. Even after leaving Hollywood, she continued to be an advocate for the Indigenous community. For example, she helped start the American Indian Community House, which became a leading resource center in the tristate area at the time. She was also involved with the Indian Unity Fraternal Organization, which sought to assert the importance of Native American heritage and establish a National Indian Day.

Kintarō Hayakawa (“Sessue Hayakawa”) 1886-1973

Hayakawa was the first Asian actor to be a leading man in both the United States and Europe. Amidst a time of rampant racial discrimination, especially anti-Japanese sentiment, Hayakawa still became one of the first sex symbols in Hollywood after regularly playing domineering villains and forbidden lovers. His career spanned 52 years, and he was nominated for an Academy Award when he was nearly 70.

His villainious roles often perpetuated racist stereotypes which angered the Japanese and Asian-American communities. An infamous example occurred in 1915 when Hayakawa starred as Hishuru Tori — a villain that brands the main character and coerces her to give him sexual favor in exchange for money. The character caused LA-based Japanese newspaper, Rafu Shimpo, to call for a boycott against the film. Subsequently, Hayakawa apologized for his role in the film and expressed his desire to play a hero. Because this was not possible in Hollywood at the time, he eventually established Haworth Pictures in 1918. Its goal was to produce films that would provide himself and other Japanese actors an opportunity to play more favorable roles that would grant them critical and commercial success.

Estelle Merle O’Brien Thompson (“Merle Oberon”) 1911-1979

Merle Oberon was an Anglo-Indian actress whose career spanned over 50 years. Today, she remains the first

and only Indian actress in history to have been nominated for an Academy Award. During her time in Hollywood, she was incredibly successful, starring in “The Private Life of Henry VIII,” “The Dark Angel,” and “Wuthering Heights.” Despite Oberon’s fame, she went to great lengths to hide her true heritage from audiences. Only those in her inner circle knew about her true heritage and would protect her secret. Hollywood at the time was not accepting of non-white or mixed parentage so she changed her name and fabricated her origin story. She told the public she was from Tasmania, which had a large British presence, instead of India and would frequently wear heavy makeup to cover her darker complexion. Her husband at the time, Lucien Ballard, even invented the catch light, often referred to as Obies after Oberon, to make her appear lighter on camera.

Anna May Wong (“Wong Liutsong”) 1905-1961

Having been introduced back into mainstream media thanks to Ryan Murphy’s Netflix series “Hollywood” and an upcoming biopic starring Gemma Chan, many people have been discussing the adversities Wong has faced in the industry, painting her as a tragic figure who was often passed from roles that would go to her white peers. But Wong is more than that, she is a fashion icon of her time and the first Chinese American woman to act in film and television and gain international success. When Hollywood studios wouldn’t cast her in any desirable Chinese roles, she moved to Europe where she produced and performed her own cabaret shows; developed and starred as the titular character (named after herself) in “The Gallery of Madame LiuTsong” which became the first U.S. television series to feature an Asian-American lead; and would speak out in interviews about the prejudice and racism she endured. Wong was quoted to have pointed out how she was often typecast as the villain: “How should we [Chinese] be, with a civilization that’s so many times older than that of the West. We have our own virtues. We have our rigid code of behavior, of honor. Why do they never show these on the screen?” Moreover, to break from racial stereotypes at the time, she spoke with an American

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accent in films with sound and would take on roles as the American working woman, like the exceptional Dr. Mary Ling in “King of Chinatown.” She also directed and produced a documentary-like film, “My China Film” about her first and only trip to China to show the country’s beauty and history, and to depict how she rose above Hollywood’s rejection.

María Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado García (“Katy Jurado”) 1924-2002

Katy Jurado started her acting career in Mexico and starred in 16 films during the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema. Alongside her career as an actress, she also worked as a movie columnist, bullfight critic, and radio reporter. During one of her assignments, she was cast in a Hollywood film which launched her career in the States. Although her studio wanted to label her as Spanish, Jurado was firm on embracing her Mexican heritage. She would introduce American cinema to an identifiably Mexican woman without any of the stereotypical traits portrayed in films. As an actress, she took on a variety of roles which helped expand roles that Mexican actresses could play in Hollywood, breaking free from the sexualized roles that they were often bound to. Jurado was the first Latin American actress to be nominated for an Oscar for her supporting role in “Broken Lance,” and the first to win a Golden Globe for “High Noon.”

José Ramón Gil Samaniego (“Ramon Novarro”) 1899-1968

Novarro was a Mexican-American actor who topped the box office throughout the 1920s and into the early 1930s. He is often considered the first Latin American actor to succeed in Hollywood through MGM’s promotion of him as a “Latin lover,” turning him into a sex symbol in the eyes of the public. Unlike his contemporary, Hayakawa, Novarro often received dignified leading roles, starring opposite prolific actresses like Joan Crawford and Greta Garbo. He was also regarded as one of the best romantic actors of the silent era and made roughly $100,000 per film and $10,000 a week. After his brutal murder, it was revealed that Novarro was gay — a fact that he, the press, and others in the film industry kept secret — and he inadvertently became a symbol of Gay Hollywood.

Oscar Micheaux 1884-1951

Micheaux was an African-American author, film director, and independent producer. He was the first major Black feature filmmaker and was also the first Black filmmaker to produce a sound feature film. Outside of the white mainstream Hollywood films produced during the Silent Era, there was an alternative industry which produced “race films” — films produced for black audiences, by Black actors, crewmembers, and production companies. Micheaux was active in this scene and produced more than 44 films. His films, often intended for middle and low-class audiences, sought to refute the negative portrayals of African Americans in films by portraying Black characters in the same ways their white counterparts would be portrayed on screen. Featuring complex characters, the films he wrote and produced often centered around contemporary Black life, racial injustice, and the challenges African Americans faced when trying to achieve success in the larger society.

Hazel Scott 1920-1981

Born in Trinidad, Hazel Scott was a musician, actress, and civil rights activist. She used her influence to speak out against racial discrimination and segregation. Scott was one of the first Black performers who refused to play in front of segregated audiences — a clause that she included in her contracts — demanded equal pay to that of her white peers, and was adamant about receiving proper credits in Hollywood films. Moreover, she was one of the first Black actresses to gain respectable roles in Hollywood features as she would turn down any role that wanted her to play a maid. Instead, she would often play the role of a sophis-

ticated woman with musical talents. She was the first Black American woman to have her own television show, “The Hazel Scott Show,” which was also one of the first U.S. network series to be hosted by any person of African descent. However, her career in the United States was cut short due to her choosing to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee after being accused of being a communist by the government.

James Young Johnson (“James Young Deer”) 1876-1946

Deer first started as an actor before becoming the first Native American director. He specialized in producing Westerns and oversaw the California branch of the world’s largest production company at the time. When he first came to fame, he claimed to be Winnebago like his wife Lillian, which led to his heritage being disputed because of contradictory records. This led to questions of whether he was actually Indigenous or if he was African American charading as Indigenous. Centuries later, historians have traced his ancestry to a secluded community in Delaware referred to as “Deleware’s Forgotten Folks” consisting of whites, African Americans, and Indigenous people. The largest tribe of the region, the Nanticoke, which Deer belonged to, was erased by records due to government records only having “Black” or “White” options for classification. Because of his darker complexion, Deer’s records labeled him as Black. Despite the controversies about his origins, his films were important. As a director, he had creative controls and as a result, pushed away from negative tropes at the time: the Indigenous characters in his Westerns were not villains or unsophisticated people, but instead heroes who had justice on their side. Even with the change in narrative, his films were celebrated and enjoyed by the audiences of the time.

This list is by no means exhaustive, and hopefully it serves as a starting point for people to discover more of Hollywood’s past. Many of the actors of color in this list were at the height of their popularity in the industry during their era, but have seemingly become neglected in the present. Seeing as how these actors broke out of the restrictions that Hollywood had set for them and created better roles for themselves and their respective communities, we can also observe how much or little the industry has changed as a result. After all, if these legacies and their successes are now considered as obscure trivia facts and forgotten history, what would the future look like for the current generation of prominent actors and filmmakers of color?

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