Juvy

Sessue Hayakawa: Soaring to Stardom

Sessue Hayakawa (June 10,1889-November 23, 1973) was a Japanese silent film actor who was one of the first of few Asian actors to find stardom in the United States and Europe. He was one of the highest paid stars of his time from acting and from his own production company.

Hayakawa, born Kintaro Hayakawa, was born in Japan and groomed to be a naval officer. After a swimming incident, he failed the navy’s physical and thus could not become an officer. He tries to commit suicide due to his strained relationship with his father after failing to become a naval officer. He went to the University of Chicago to become a banker. After quitting university, he went back to Los Angeles to take a train to Japan and wandered into a Japanese Theatre in Little Tokyo. This fascinated him with acting and performing plays.

He became the first Asian to star in a Hollywood film, The Typhoon in 1914, which made him a star. He grew even more popular with the movie The Cheat, a 1915 silent drama film directed by Cecil B. DeMille, and also starred Fannie Ward and Jack Dean. Hayakawa plays a wealthy man who Ward owes money to. He wants her in return for the loan he gave her. When she resist, he brands her shoulder with a Japanese sign of his ownership. She shoots him but her husband, played by Dean, takes the blame. With this film, he became the first Asian American superstar, “receiving $200,000, driving a gold-plated Pierce–Arrow and shrugging off a million dollar gambling loss in Monte Carlo.” He becomes the romantic matinee idol of millions of American women in the late 1910s.

Hayakawa’s role alternated between “charismatic villain” and “romantic hero” showing his versatility and rivaling many top White male stars of the 1910s. He co-starred with many of the screen’s top leading ladies like Florence Vidor and Jane Novak in such romantic melodrama films as Secret Game and The White Man’s Law. He was typecast as the exotic lover or villain forced to relinquish the heroine in the last act. This typecasting pushed him to create his own production company in 1918.

There were many Asian actors in silent films. but only Sessue Hayakawa played leading roles. Hayakawa’s success represents transnational stardom. He embodied American stereotypical depictions of Japanese people and represented a model minority who was successfully assimilated into American society. The fact that he was successful not only in Japan but also in the United States showed the two countries’ intersecting cultural standards, specifically when it comes to famous and successful people.