In many countries around the world, they commemorate their greatest artists in this way by printing the appearance of artists on their currencies.
The other day, however, we saw something encouraging. During 2022, the U.S. Mint will issue five coins, each featuring a great American woman, two of whom are artists. One of them is Anna May Wong, Hollywood's first Chinese-American actress.
Born in Los Angeles, Huang was the first Chinese-American Hollywood film star and the first Asian-American actress to achieve international fame. Her career has been long and rich, spanning silent films, sound films, television series, stage plays and radio dramas.
Some people know the name, but even among these people, very few have seen her films.
Throughout her career, her debut can be said to be quite difficult. Because the racism at the time prevented her from having a white male lead. The studios didn't dare to let her kiss a white man, and there were no Asian male stars in Hollywood at the time.
Still, she left a deep impression on the audience. Her voice was low and noticeable, but authoritative.
But she was trapped in "exotic" roles, such as Dragon Girl (1931), and despite the film's suck, she did a great job in the film. However, when big-budget films centered around Asia were released, Huang Liushuang was always replaced by white actresses. One of the most famous examples is The Good Earth, in which she ceded the lead role to a German actress. She was told she was too Chinese to play Chinese — perhaps in a vulgar way, acknowledging that there was a real Asian in the cast would make the yellow-faced white actor look weird.
Throughout her career, Huang has complained that she never had the opportunity to play a "normal American woman" and when people met her, they wished she could speak Chinese, even though she was Chinese-American. In an era full of love stories, she was a beautiful actress, but she couldn't appear in a regular romantic story.
Tired of always playing the same roles in the film, he could only play the ugly Chinese role in the eyes of the typical American to make up for the gap of Asian actors in Hollywood. Huang decided to leave Hollywood and leave for Europe. In a 1933 interview with Doris Mackie, a reporter from The Filmweek, Huang recounted his dissatisfaction with the roles he had played in Hollywood: "They only let me play those roles."
In 1961, Huang Xi died of a heart attack at the age of 56, the stress and disappointment of this talented woman after years of alcoholism and cirrhosis.
Now that the United States has finally recognized Huang Liushuang's status as a Hollywood movie star, the American Mint will also mint commemorative coins for her. It is a pity that she did not receive honors when she was born, and finally realized it many years after her death.