Fox Movie Channel Bans Charlie Chan Movies

CNSNEWS.com ^ | 7/01/03 | Marc Morano

[kattracks]

(CNSNews.com) - The Fox Movie Channel abruptly cancelled its planned Charlie Chan film festival last week after complaints from an Asian American group that the character was "one of the most offensive Asian caricatures of America's cinematic past."

The Fox Movie Channel announced on June 27 on its website that it was canceling its several-months-long "Charlie Chan's Mystery Tour" because the "films may contain situations or depictions that are sensitive to some viewers."

The note to viewers said, "Fox Movie Channel realizes that these historic films were produced at a time where racial sensitivities were not as they are today. As a result of the public response to the airing of these films, Fox Movie Channel will remove them from the schedule." The detective series featured the Asian character Charlie Chan in more than 40 movies beginning in the silent era of the 1920s and continuing into the late 1940s.

The pressure to cancel the movie broadcasts came from the National Asian American Telecommunications Association (NAATA), which called Chan "a hoary stereotype that has dogged Asian Americans for decades."

In a letter to the Fox Movie Channel, Eddie Wong, executive director of NAATA, wrote that growing up in 1950s Los Angeles,...Charlie Chan's shuffling, subservient manner and exaggerated accent and fortune-cookie chatter did not resemble my parents, friends or any Chinese person I knew.

"By running the Chan movies, the Fox Movie Channel (is) reviving hurtful stereotypes instead of helping our society move toward harmony," Wong added.

The decision is not sitting well with Charlie Chan fans.

Tim Lucas, editor and co-publisher of the monthly magazine Video Watchdog, said: "Fox [Movie Channel] caved in" and decided to cancel the Chan films in an attempt to rewrite history.

"There is nothing objectionable about the character of Chan himself ... It boils down to over-sensitivity," Lucas said in an interview with CNSNews.com.

Lucas dismissed Wong's contention that the Chan character had engaged in "fortune-cookie chatter" in the films.

"Actually, what Charlie Chan does much of the time is quote the teaching of Confucius, which is philosophy and not on the level of fortune-cookie aphorisms at all," Lucas explained.

"It seems to me Eddie Wong is insulting his own people more so than Charlie Chan," he added.

The fictional character Charlie Chan is based on the historical figure of Honolulu Police Department Detective Chang Apana. Apana worked on the Honolulu police force for 34 years in the early 20th century and was known for his "remarkable achievements" and "daring feats" as a detective, according to the Honolulu Police Department.

Novelist Earl Derr Biggers modeled the fictional Charlie Chan after Apana's legendary feats.

The Chan series featured various actors portraying the detective. Swedish actor Warner Oland, who according to Lucas, credits his Asian appearance to Mongolian ancestry, popularized the role of Chan. The movies also featured actor Keye Luke as Charlie Chan's "number one son," who attempted to help his dad solve cases but mostly served as comic relief in the films.

'Multicultural society'

Fox Movie Channel justified its original decision to broadcast the films in its website statement.

" ... Fox Movie Channel scheduled these films in a showcase intended to illustrate the positive aspects of these movies, such as the complex storylines/characters and Charlie Chan's great intellect. Additionally, numerous subscribers to Fox Movie Channel, as well as film historians, have long requested that Fox Movie Channel broadcast these films," the website stated.

"In the hope that [the cancellation] will evoke discussion about the progress made in our modern, multicultural society, we invite you to please click CONTACT US to send us your thoughts on the matter," the website statement concluded.

Lucas contacted the Fox Movie Channel to protest its decision to cancel the Chan movie festival.

"If the Charlie Chan films continue to be branded unfit entertainment, where does that leave a film like D.W. Griffith's Broken Blossoms (with Richard Barthelmess as a Chinese man), or Luise Rainer's Oscar-winning performance in The Good Earth, or Spielberg's Indiana Jones films, which actually demonize its Eastern and German characters in the manner of a '40s pulp magazine?" Lucas wrote in a letter to Fox Movie Channel.

"Or is it acceptable to portray an Asian as the Devil incarnate as long as a real Asian or Asian-American is playing the role?" he asked.

'Politically correct world'

Charlie Chan fan websites are full of angry fans expressing disgust with Fox Movie Channel and condemning the "politically correct world" that made the ban possible.

This is not the first time television channels have faced the decision about whether to air potentially offensive stereotypes of racial or ethnic groups. The television program Amos n' Andy has been absent from television for decades, and certain cartoons featuring Bugs Bunny and Tom and Jerry have been pulled or edited by the Cartoon Network because of concern over the portrayals of Japanese characters, Native Americans and other minorities.

The cartoon character Speedy Gonzales was nearly taken off the Cartoon Network in 2001 because the rodent was deemed an offensive stereotype to Hispanics. However, a coalition of Hispanic groups led by the League of Latin American Citizens successfully fought to have Speedy return to the airwaves, under the slogan "Viva Speedy."

See Related Story:
Cartoon Censorship Blamed on 'Politically Correct White Mentality' (Sept. 27, 2002)

E-mail a news tip to Marc Morano.

Send a Letter to the Editor about this article.

[Las Vegas Dave]

WHAT??? Ban Charlie Chan Movies?

What is next, Sherlock Holmes?
(No, he's OK, he was just addicted to the 7% solution. The LIBS will give him a pass.)

[TLI]

Lawyers trying to out PC each other. The banana-broccoli shakes are next. How PATHETIC!

[superloser]

I am very grateful for my DVD player suddenly.

Its time to have this PC/Diversity crap declared the official state religion and have it rendered unconstitutional.

Anyone up to help start and fund such an effort?

I'm certain that videotapes of crowds swaying to the preacher can be used to great effect in the courtroom.

Heck, with what the Supremes have done lately, maybe they would accept a case like this....

[Flyer]

the character was "one of the most offensive Asian caricatures of America's cinematic past."

The next time a Burt Reynolds film fest comes up I hope they have the same sensitivity because his characters were "one of the most offensive good old boy caricatures of America's cinematic past."

[TN4Liberty]

Charlie Chan's shuffling, subservient manner and exaggerated accent and fortune-cookie chatter did not resemble my parents, friends or any Chinese person I knew.

Kinda like Jed Clampett doesn't resemble my parents, friends, or anyone I know?

What a pity.

[Banjoguy]

Cheez! Chan is a cartoon character. Somebody doesn't get it. It's not supposed to represent reality.

[Right_in_Virginia]

We are really living in A Brave New World.

[tet68]

This just in.

X Broadcasting will not be showing it's planned performance
of Mel Gibson's The Patriot because of viewer complaints about it's "jingoist, nationalist, and false view of American prehistory and it's use of child violence.
The portrayal of British troops as government oppressors
was also objected to."

Instead the station will be running," Ten days that changed the world, and The North Star".

Please stay tuned to this station for furthur government announcements.

[NYer]

The television program Amos n' Andy has been absent from television for decades, and certain cartoons featuring Bugs Bunny and Tom and Jerry have been pulled or edited by the Cartoon Network because of concern over the portrayals of Japanese characters, Native Americans and other minorities.

Alvin Childress as Amos Jones

Tim Moore as George "The Kingfish" Stevens

Ernestine Wade as Sapphire Stevens

AFTER AMOS & ANDY

Where did they go after Amos and Andy went off the air.

From "The Adventures of Amos'N' Andy
by Melvin Patrick Ely
Available on the internet

It would have been hard to convince many black actors--especially those who had appeared on Amos ‘n’ Andy--that the aftermath of the protest of 1951 represented a victory at all. Like the show’s producers and the management of CBS, the cast had expected a long and profitable network run for the series. The actors received only limited residual payments from the syndication of the shows but not, apparently, because of racial discrimination. Rather, the precedent for paying substantial residuals had not been firmly established in the new business of TV syndication when they signed their contracts. At least twice after production of Amos ‘n’ Andy ceased, former cast members made personal appearance tours in their old TV roles--but by their own account, CBS stepped in to halt these.

Still, there was little truth in the popular legend of later years that pictured the former stars of the series living out their lives broken-hearted and impoverished. Spencer Williams had come out of retirement to play the role of Andy; when the show was cancelled, he lived on income from Social Security and a Military pension. Amanda Randolph (Mama) went on to play the maid in Danny Thomas’s long-running situation comedy series. Ernestine Wade (Sapphire) played the organ in funeral parlors, worked as a legal secretary and bookkeeper, and occasionally appeared on radio and television. Jester Hairston, who had filled the minor role of Henry Van Porter, a self-styled socialite, continued his principal career as a well-known director of black choral groups; years later, he provided music for Robert Schuller, the television minister, and returned to series TV in the mid-1980s as a supporting actor in the popular all-black sitcom, Amen! Alvin Childress (Amos) worked as a civil servant and sometime actor in movies and TV. Nick Stewart (Lightning), with his wife Edna, ran a theater in Los Angeles which they had founded earlier; plays were still being produced there in the 1980s.

Tim Moore (Kingfish), Amos ‘n’ Andy best-know alumnus, appeared several times on Jack Parr’s Tonight show and served as master of ceremonies in a Los Angeles nightclub. To his friends and to the world, he had become almost inseparable from his role in Amos ‘n’ Andy . He made headlines in 1958 when, having remarried after the death of his first wife, he fired a gun during an argument with members of his new spouse’s family, whom he accused of eating a beef roast he had left in his refrigerator. The local papers had a field day, with the prize for punning doubtless going to the worthy who headlined the story, “Police Hook Kingfish for Beef Over Roast.” “I’m the old Kingfish,” Moore reportedly told the police when they reached the scene. “You should have seen the in-laws scatter when I fired that gun.” Eleven months later, Moore was dead of tuberculosis. At his funeral, the church overflowed with “thousands of his friends and fans.” Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll served as honorary pallbearers, but it was Moore’s black colleagues, including Alvin Childress, Johnny Lee (lawyer Calhoun), Spencer Williams, and Flournoy Miller, who carried his remains to their final destination.

Gosden and Correll themselves did not suffer greatly from the controversy over Amos ‘n’ Andy . Though by turns perplexed, hurt, and angered by the protest of 1951, they continued to appear on radio until 1960. In a concession to the now-dominant format in commercial radio, the team in their last few years on the air mostly played popular records, with Amos, Andy, and the Kingfish as virtual disc jockeys. In 1962, after the failure of Calvin and the Colonel,a TV cartoon series in which the two supplied voices for animal characters, Gosden and Correll retired for good. Now in their early sixties and seventies respectively, they were wealthier than ever and, by most accounts, far from preoccupied by the criticism they had received over Amos ‘n’ Andy. The pair’s network employers hardly qualified as pitiable victims of the controversy either. CBS had some unpleasant moments in 1951 and made a good deal less money from Amos ‘n’ Andy than it had expected to, but the company still earned a healthy income by syndicating the TV show for more than ten years.

[NYer]

CharlieChan net is running a poll! Click here to cast your opinion vote on the Fox Movie Channel's decision to cancel the chan films.

Charlie Chan

Fox Movie Channel will discontinue the broadcast of the Charlie Chan mystery films.

Originally restored to meet the requests of mystery fans and film preservation buffs, Fox Movie Channel scheduled these films in a showcase intended to illustrate the positive aspects of these movies such as the complex story lines/ characters and Charlie Chan's great intellect. Additionally, numerous subscribers to Fox Movie Channel, as well as film historians, have long requested that Fox Movie Channel broadcast these films.

However, Fox Movie Channel has been made aware that the Charlie Chan films may contain situations or depictions that are sensitive to some viewers. Fox Movie Channel realizes that these historic films were produced at a time where racial sensitivities were not as they are today. As a result of the public response to the airing of these films, Fox Movie Channel will remove them from the schedule.

In the hope that this action will evoke discussion about the progress made in our modern, multicultural society, we invite you to please click to send us your thoughts on the matter.

Contact Fox

[aardvark1]

With no apologies to the PC crowd, no matter what race, I love Charlie Chan movies, and interestingly, now in middle age, I host Asian children in my home so they can experience America and enjoy a US education (in private school, btw).

According the PC crowd, shouldn't I either hate Asians or at least pigeon hole them into stereotypes?

[rubofthebrush]

I'am A HUGE fan of the CC series. I have spent many many hours watching these over and over again. I have most of them on tape. The funny thing is that Charlie is ALWAYS portrayed as the intellectual superior to the "white" police-dectectives. They fawn over him for his help on a "case".
Strange- we USED to be a multicultural country. Now we are subject to the whims of various groups of whining minoities that want to impose their will on our culture based on "feeeelings". Maybe we should change our national anthem to Feel-lings WO WO WO -feel-a-LINGS.

ps- my grandpappy was a CHEN.

[mewzilla]

Oh, for pete's sake.

[MJM59]

Wow, political correctness strikes again. This is just freakin' stupid. Does anybody base their opinion of a different ethnic culture on a movie such as the Chan films? These movies were great! I cannot believe just how thin skinned people can be.

[trebb]

We are losing the country to the commies. When they take off Charlie Chan and when an 18 year old's parents sue a school because the teacher read offensive comments from a Mark twain novel, and these things are treated as legitimate gripes, there is a huge problem with the sanity of the nation.

[Clint N. Suhks]

"one of the most offensive Asian caricatures of America's cinematic past."

Hope they don't ban stupid "white boy" Jerry Lewis movies too.

[AppyPappy]

Was the actor who played Charlie Chan Chinese?

It's ironic that the black actors who played in Amos and Andy have been denied income because of the boycott of the show.

[Clint N. Suhks]

Numba wun son, hypocrisy!

[mtbopfuyn]

The poll is showing 0.9% who think Fox was right in cancelling CC. Yep, that's about right; 99% of us have to bow down to the 1% who are so sensitive they get offended about every little thing.