Stolen Roles: Yellowface

Many actresses like Anna May Wong have lost prominent roles to being replaced by white actresses in yellowface. This is either caused by the Hays Code prohibiting interracial romance or the director's need to attract viewers through well-known white names.

Many found the hays code as being hypocritical since Asian actors and actresses to portray white characters, but yellowface by white actors and actresses are never criticized. Matter of fact, many white entertainers would take on the role to showcase variability.

Check out Michelle Villemaire's work in her blog where she corrected roles that were whitewashed https://www.homemademimi.com/get-picture-adventures-correcting-yellowface/

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Katharine Hepburn in Dragon Seed

Chinese and Asians in America are seen as the non-western "other". They have different clothing, language, tradition, religion, and even food. All of these aspects are viewed as inferiror.

Luise Rainer as O-Lan in 'The Good Earth'

Luise Rainer won an Oscar for lead actress for this role. The same role that was meant to be Anna May Wong's big opportunity to play a main lead but because of the Hays code, the role was passed to Rainer. Everyone else on set was Asian except the two main leads. Which makes sense since the movie is about Chinese farmers.

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Mary Pickford in Madame Butterfly

In various Madame Butterfly films and operas, the role of Butterfly is played by a white woman dressed in traditional Japanese clothing. Showcasing the stereotypical yellowface: Asian clothing, asian makeup, "slanted eyes, slick black hair, heavy makeup"

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Jennifer Jones in Love is Many Splendored Thing

In this movie Jones plays an Eurasian doctor from China who's relationship with a white man is not approved by those around them. The movie is set in Hong Kong.

Shirley Maclaine in My Geisha

Based on Eugene F Wong quoted in Laura Johnson's thesis

Hired cosmetologists would mold "oriental shaped" eyes based on wax impressions of Maclaine's eyes. The whole process takes 4 days to complete. Not to mention how they would use "Flesh coloured plastic tabs placed on Maclaine's temples with rubber bands to hold them together beneath the Geisha wig.