Orson Welles and China
Posted: November 2nd, 2010 | 7 Comments »
A follow up post after my previous comments on the strangely named (Lady From Shanghai) film version of Sherwood King’s noir novel If I Die Before I Wake. Why did Orson Welles introduce the Shanghai/China angle to the movie and have Rita Hayworth as a kind of returned home Shanghai Lil?
Robin Lung, a documentary film maker from Hawaii who is currently working on a project to restore KUKAN, a colour documentary on China that was filmed from 1939-1940 and was the first American feature length documentary to win an Academy Award in 1941, enlightens me somewhat as to Welles’s China interests (you can find more on Robin’s fascinating project at Facebook – click here).
“Orson Welles wrote a blurb for KUKAN when it came out in 1941 (see poster below), so I’ve had an eye out for his name in connection with China. Actually he does seem to have had a particular interest in China – He traveled with his father to China and Japan in 1930, was a big fan of Chinese magicians and Chinese theater and helped to entertain Madame Chiang Kai Shek when she visited Hollywood in 1943. Also, here is a link to an early 1939 radio broadcast of Orson Welles performing Pearl Buck’s THE PATRIOT.”
I’m responding to an earlier post of yours (in year 2008) about Chinese Gordon. You wondered why a statue of him had been erected in Melbourne. I’ve learnt from some website that Gordon’s death was widely mourned in the British Empire. People of Melbourne contributed money to erecting that statue. Elsewhere, a suburb in Sydney and another one in Brisbane were named after him. Gordon was a celebrity. I’ve just found archive of newpaper reports on his stopover in Hong Kong when he visited China in 1880 (his second visit to the country).
That KUKAN restoration project sound fascinating. Thanks for highlighting.
If you want to know more I’m sure Robin Lung down in Hawaii would love to tell you – it’s his project
that’s great – I never knew he actually visited Australia
Sorry, I know this is not the right spot to talk about General Gordon. ( I do whatever is convenient.)
I’m not sure if your note “that’s great – I never knew he actually visited Australia” was a response to my message. If yes, please allow to clarify that Gordon never visited Australia. I was just saying that his death caused some reaction in Australia, and people there donated money to erect a statue. The visit I talked about (with newspaper archive which I recently found) was his visit to Hong Kong in July 1880. From the descriptions in the papers, it can be deduced that he was quite a well-known personality then.
Hi Paul. I’m actually a “her” — the name Robin went through a sex change several decades ago.
Anyway, thanks for the plug!
ooops – sorry about that – i just assumed,the whole evolution of Robin as a female name passed me by somehow!