Follow us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter Watch us on Youtube Join the Archive Mailing List Read our Blog

Canceled: Nitrate Screening: Daughter of Shanghai

Daughter of Shanghai
March 21, 2020 - 7:30 pm

A message for our patrons:

The university has recommended that we suspend events drawing more than 100 people. With this in mind, and considering the health and well-being of our entire community, the UCLA Film & Television Archive is canceling upcoming events at the Billy Wilder Theater. Learn more


“Anna May Wong Visits Shanghai, China”  (5/1/1936) 

Stock footage shot for, but never used in, Hearst Metrotone news of Anna May Wong arriving on a Dollar Line boat, surrounded by a group of cameramen and newspapermen. She enters Park Hotel, and visits Star Motion Picture Studios and a flower market.

35mm print from the UCLA Film & Television Archive. B/w, silent, 8 min.

Daughter of Shanghai  (1937)

35mm nitrate print from the UCLA Film & Television Archive!

Created as a star vehicle for Anna May Wong, the Los Angeles-born daughter of a Chinese immigrant family and the first Asian American female star in Hollywood, Paramount teamed her up with sympathetic French émigré director Robert Florey and high school friend/on-screen love interest Philip Ahn, as the first Asian G-man depicted on screen. Together, they elevate this B-movie thriller to another level with two Asian American lead characters, in an era of accepted yellowface where white actors often played Asian characters, and as a fresh departure, a plot centered around the villainy of its white characters.

35mm nitrate, b/w, 62 min. Director: Robert Florey. Based on a story by Garnett Weston. Screenwriter: Gladys Unger, Garnett Weston. Cinematographer: Charles Schoenbaum. Editor: Ellsworth Hoagland. Cast: Anna May Wong, Philip Ahn, Charles Bickford, Buster Crabbe, Cecil Cunningham.