Considering Charlie Chan Charlie Chan, one of the most famous of fictional detectives, has become the one least seen. Until the 1960s, old Charlie Chan movies remained a staple of afternoon television. And then, in the early ‘70s, flush with the example of black, brown and red power, came young Chinese-American activists denouncing the celluloid sleuth as a negative stereotype. It seemed as if Inspector Chan was forced into quiet retirement—“like old horse in fresh pasture” as he might have said in his fortune cookie way.
Recently, a friend lent me a DVD set, “Warner Oland is Charlie Chan Vol. 1,” comprised of four films from the 1930s. Oland was not the only actor to play the cagey detective. Chan was first depicted in 1926 by Japanese-American actor George Kuwa; after Oland’s death in 1938 the role went to Sidney Toler. Upon the latter’s demise, Roland Winters filled the sleuth’s Panama hat. Arguably, Oland is the player who left the most lasting impression.
Priggish political correctness should be set aside when watching Charlie Chan, yet it’s impossible not to weigh these movies on the scales of history and social justice. The first thing to bear in mind was the paucity of heroes in Golden Age Hollywood who were not of Northern European heritage. Most anyone of African, Asian, Near Eastern and Southern European extraction was either subservient or dangerous in movies from those days—an accomplice to imperialism or a foe to be defeated in the final reel. Zoro, Charlie Chan and his Japanese counterpart, Mr. Moto, stood virtually alone amid the ranks of hardy all-Americans, doughty Celts and stalwart Englishmen. Chan was no one’s fetch-it boy or even a loyal sidekick but his own man.
In the Earl Derr Biggers detective novels from whence he came, Chan was mouthier to the whites than he was allowed in old-time Hollywood. “I detect in your eyes slight flame of hostility. Quench it, if you will be so kind,” he snapped at a bigot in one of the stories. In the movies he was forced to suffer fools, but he brushed off their contempt or condescension with a light flick of his hand.
In any event, being right is the best revenge. Chan always got his man, even in the face of barely veiled racism and outright xenophobia. His dignified patience only allowed him to stand taller. The humor became more pronounced under Toler’s stewardship. The movies in the Oland DVD set often introduced Chan on a comical note, as if to reassure audiences that he wasn’t the evil Oriental mastermind of most Hollywood movies but an endearing figure. Soon enough the joke was on those who underestimated the Chinese-American detective from multi-cultural Honolulu. Chan reinforced some Oriental stereotypes while subtly undermining others. However, there was some egregious typecasting of secondary characters. The shiftless African-American servant in Charlie Chan in Egypt is among the worst screen depictions of blacks from that era.
Although makeup can accomplish wonders, Oland already possessed an Oriental cast from his Russian heritage. “I owe my Chinese appearance to the Mongol invasion,” he once explained, an insight that complicates racial politics. In recent years the critics of Charlie Chan tend to be stuffy academics parroting Edward Said’s tunnel-vision theories from his influential book Orientalism. Neglecting the role of the Oriental Other in critiquing Western society or offering an alternative, Said held that virtually all depictions of the East were designed to subjugate the inhabitants of those regions under Western imperialism. Well, as the detective quipped in Charlie Chan in Egypt: “Theory like mist on eyeglasses—obscures facts.”
On Tuesday evenings through the month of June, TCM will focus on “Race & Hollywood: Asian Images on Film,” allowing audiences to see how Asians were portrayed over the years in Hollywood movies. For Tuesday, June 10, Charlie Chan at the Circus and Charlie Chan in Hollywood will be shown along with Thank You Mr. Moto.
