Marion E. Wong (January 2, 1895 – February 4, 1969) was an American company director, costume designer, director, actress, producer, music performer and screenwriter.
Biography
Marion Evelyn Wong was born on January 2, 1895, in San Francisco but was raised in Oakland, California. In 1911, Wong travelled to China to meet her future husband. Her two brothers, who were looking for wives, accompanied her. Due to citizenship policies at the time, the Wong siblings, who were all born and raised in California, would only be allowed to travel to China for one year or they would risk losing citizenship. As such, they had a condensed timeline during which they could find an appropriate suitor to bring back to the United States. One of her brothers died in China due to smallpox. The other brother Albert Wong, married Violet, who was the sister-in-law to Marion. Violet would prove to become a lifelong supporter and friend in Marion's career, and would soon star in Wong's first motion picture. Wong returned home without a husband because she refused to marry him. Wong was also a student at the University of California for some time where she took up special work.
The birth of the Mandarin Film Company
During the early 1900s, Wong had established a reputable career in Oakland as a singer-entertainer. In 1916, at the age of 21, she established the Mandarin Film Company. Her uncle, Ben Lim, described in a 1916 newspaper article as a “wealthy Chinese merchant and landowner”, provided the funding. She served as a writer, director, producer, designer, and actor for her works, establishing the company as a promising independent studio. At the time, the film industry was growing through the burgeoning studio system and models were still being established for how the industry would function. The Mandarin Film Company was the first Asian-American based film company and was entirely funded and produced by Asian American individuals.
The Curse of Quon Gwon
Wong's trip to China also served as inspiration for The Curse of Quon Gwon: When the Far East Mingles with the West, Marion's first film in the Mandarin Film Company. The film was regarded as the first Chinese-American feature film. The film was also written, produced, and directed by Wong, who also designed the costumes and sceneries. Marion also cast herself as one of the characters in the film. The Curse of Quon Gwon was the first and only film made by an all-Chinese cast and an all-Chinese company. An article in the July 17, 1917, issue of The Moving Picture World said that the film “deals with the curse of a Chinese god that follows his people because of the influence of western civilization.” It is also about Chinese assimilation into American society. The film was a familial labor of love, featuring sister-in-law Violet in the lead role, playing a modern Chinese American woman in San Francisco. Marion was also featured in the film in a smaller role, with parts also written for her mother, as well as Violet's daughter, Stella. Professional actor Henry Soo Hoo portrayed the romantic male lead. A professional actor, he and Violet's performances were celebrated as the heart of the film.
The primary inspiration for the film came from the Charlie Chaplin film A Night Out. Wong subsequently hired one of Chaplin's cameramen for the project. This resulted in a pristinely shot film, especially for independent standards.
In an Oakland Tribune article dated May 11, 1916, Wong said that she had never seen any Chinese movies.
A July 1917 edition of The Motion Picture World describes the plot.
Even with all of her efforts, The Curse of Quon Gwon only had two screenings after its completion. A rough cut of the film was viewed in 1916 at the Kinema Theater and a formal premiere of the film was shown in 1917 but the film did not receive commercial distribution. This is cited for many reasons, the key one being that distributors were worried audiences would not respond to an Asian American narrative that did not identify or celebrate the racist tropes that had become familiar to white audiences. The Curse of Quon Gwon does not feature any “calculating dragon ladies or bumbling coolies”, and as a result, distributors prevented the film from being seen across the nation, despite its critical acclaim and tremendous scope.
Seen as a financial failure, Wong asked her family to never speak of the film again. Her uncle Lim at this time also declared bankruptcy, for he did not see any possibility of return of his investment. Wong's company did not produce any other films after the financial failure of The Curse of Quon Gwon.