<
https://theconversation.com/the-first-asian-screenwriter-in-hollywoods-1920s-dream-factory-winnifred-eaton-challenged-its-racism-202292>
"A century before Michelle Yeoh became the first Asian woman to win an Oscar
for Best Actress, the daughter of a Chinese mother and a white English father,
Winnifred Eaton, was working behind the scenes in Hollywood.
Winnifred Eaton, often credited in Hollywood as Winnifred Reeve, was born in
Montréal in 1875. She wrote and adapted scores of screenplays for MGM and
Universal Studios, where she was literary advisor and editor-in-chief from 1925
to 1930.
Eaton was the first Asian screenwriter in Hollywood, and the first Asian — and
first woman — to head a Hollywood script department.
Together with a team of scholars, including Joey Takeda and Jean Lee Cole, we
are digitizing Eaton’s surviving screenplays so that her role in Hollywood, and
the tradition of Asians in Hollywood, from Eaton to Yeoh, can be better
understood.
Eaton was an advocate for more sympathetic depictions of women, the working
classes and some racialized people, but also complicit in her era’s racism and
sexism. That her efforts to hold space for Asian characters and themes were
ultimately rejected by Hollywood speaks volumes about its refusal to accept
Asians in its Golden Age."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
