Sessue Hayakawa– The First Hollywood Heartthrob

By Raymond Douglas Chong

Over a century ago, from 1914 to 1922, Sessue Kintaro Hayakawa, a Japanese actor, became a sensational heartthrob on Hollywood’s silver screen during the golden age of silent films.

Film critics praised Hayakawa for his role as Colonel Saito, the Japanese commander in The Bridge Over the River Kwai (1957), for which the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences nominated him for Best Supporting Actor.

At the height of his international stardom, Hayakawa was the first male Asian leading actor in Hollywood. He made history by sharing the first on-screen interracial kiss with actress Fannie Ward in The Cheat (1915), a groundbreaking moment during a time of miscegenation. Newspapers and magazines hailed him as the first matinee idol, even before Rudolph Valentino.

In 1918, he established Haworth Pictures Corporation, the first Asian-owned film studio.

In his memoir, Zen Showed Me the Way to Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility (1960), Hayakawa reflected on how Zen influenced his acting career.

Miyatake Toyo, the iconic photographer of Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo, noted: “Sessue Hayakawa. The greatest movie star in this century. When Sessue was getting out of his limousine in front of a theatre at a premiere showing, he grimaced a little because there was a puddle. Then, dozens of female fans surrounding his car fell over one another to spread their fur coats at his feet.”

Beginning

Kintaro Hayakawa was born on June 10, 1887, in Chiba Prefecture, Imperial Japan. His father was a wealthy fisherman It was expected that he would become a naval officer in the Imperial Japanese Navy. However, an injury prevented him from pursuing a naval career.

On July 10, 1907, Hayakawa arrived in the Port of Seattle aboard the S.S. Aki Maru as a student, with his final destination being San Francisco. By 1911, he was working odd jobs in Los Angeles, including as a dishwasher, waiter, and iceman.

In Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo, he participated in stage productions at the Japanese Theatre, adopting the stage name Sessue, which translates to “Snowy Continent.”

Hollywood Heartthrob

Thomas Harper Ince, the renowned filmmaker of the New York Motion Picture Company, discovered Sessue Hayakawa. He made his film debut in O Mimi San (1914) as Yorotomo, a prince, in a supporting role. Tsuru Aoki, who would become his future wife, also starred in O Mimi San as the lead actress.

Hayakawa became a box office sensation with his role as Tokorama, a Japanese diplomat, in The Typhoon (1914). In this film, he is involved in a passionate love affair with a chorus girl in Paris, France, which ends tragically when he strangles her. His brooding and handsome appearance captivated White American women. He quickly became a sex symbol across the country.

Later, Hayakawa signed on as a contract star with Famous Players-Lasky Films, a prominent Hollywood studio. In The Cheat (1915), directed by Oscar winner Cecil B. DeMille, he portrayed Hishuru Tori, a Japanese ivory merchant. In this film, Tori has a romantic relationship with a high-society woman who has embezzled money. During a heated struggle, he kisses her and then brands her shoulder, making it a notable moment in cinema history as it featured the first interracial kiss on screen.

The Los Angeles Times praised Hayakawa for his performances. “Sessue Hayakawa, the Japanese actor, who plays the role of the Oriental, does one of the best bits of acting seen on the screen. Through his general impassivity break ever as the story progresses, gleams of the natural passions, which smolders beneath the inscrutable exterior. Hayakawa gives you a glimpse principally through the glance of his eyes, but his mouth, too, especially in moments of triumph and of score and hate, is wonderfully expressive. Though impassive as a statue, he manages to give you the impression of inward passion that is titanic. “

Many White American women were enchanted by him, viewing him as a forbidden lover and an exotic figure. Fan magazines such as Photoplay, Harper’s, and The Saturday Evening Post feted Hayakawa, highlighting the intense sexual tension that existed amid societal views on miscegenation.

Finally, late in 1915, I was cast in The Cheat, a film since singled out by one motion picture historian, Lewis Jacobs, as one of the first of the domestic dramas of the well to-do in their own surroundings and with their own problems presented without moralizing and from their point of view. The Cheat was put into production and directed by Cecil De Mille, beginning October 20, 1915. With me in the cast were Fannie Ward, Jack Dean and James Neill, who was an actor as well as a director for the Lasky company.

The Cheat was Mr De Mille’ s nineteenth picture . In his autobiography, published in 1959, he recalls both it and me, writing “It was a rather daring theme for its time, the story of a society woman who gambled away Red Cross funds entrusted to her, borrowed $10,000 from a wealthy Japanese mAN ,consideration of a promise which was plainly if delicately hinted, then tried to repay her debt in cash instead of keeping her promise. At this point the Japanese branded her on the shoulder with the mark he used to identify all his possessions. The woman shot the Japanese and was saved from imprisonment only when she bared her branded shoulder in open court.

Sessue Hayakawa

from his memoir:

ZEN Showed Me the Way To Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility

Despite his success, Hayakawa became frustrated with some of the roles, feeling that the New York Motion Picture Company had typecasted him.

In his frustration, Hayakawa established his own Hollywood studio, the Haworth Picture Corporation. From 1918 to 1922, he acted, directed, produced, and wrote a total of 22 films. While he often portrayed the hero, many of these films featured stereotypical depictions of Japanese, Chinese, Mexican, and Indian characters. Tsuki Aoki co-starred with him in several of these productions.

Backed by $1 000,000, banked in my name as promised by the Connerys, my independent motion picture production company was organized and announced in March, 1918. I named it the Haworth Pictures Corporation. I was still engaged in making pictures for Famous Players-Lasky, and about to go on location in Hawaii to film Hidden Pearls. the first few months of my incorporation were given over to paperwork, the acquisition of a studio, employment of a staff and the hiring of a company of players. I purchased D W Griffiths old studio on Sunset Boulevard, close to where Paramount Studios are located today. I paid $300,000 for it, and invested another large amount in equipping its four stages with lights, cameras and the thousand and one other necessities of film making. Then I engaged William Worthington and James Young to direct. With them, I laid out an immediate production schedule of two pictures. His Birthright and The Temple Seeds Are Being Planted of Dusk, both of which we selected, according to a trade-paper report, “as being the most effective vehicle for [my] talents and containing dramatic elements that will appeal most strongly to the public taste at the present time.

Sessue Hayakawa

From his memoir:

ZEN Showed Me the Way To Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility

One of the films produced by Haworth Pictures Corporation was The Dragon Painter (1919), in which Hayakawa stars alongside Tsuru Aoki. Hayakawa plays the character Tatsu, a dragon painter who believes that his fiancée, Ume-ko, is a princess incarnated as a dragon.

The Los Angeles Times headlined “HAYAKAWA’S NEW FILM LIKE POEM.” “Either Sessue Hayakawa is the most exquisitely artistic producer of screen plays in the world today, or else the Japanese settings lend themselves so beautifully to dramatic production that we are lured into believing this is true. “

Exile

By 1922, Hayakawa was facing anti-Japanese sentiment in America and was frustrated with the racist stereotypes prevalent in Hollywood. His recent films performed poorly in the box office. He faced challenges running Haworth Pictures Corporation.

In search of renewal and stardom beyond Hollywood, he left Tinseltown to explore opportunities internationally as a vagabond.

Between 1922 and 1949, he acted in Broadway plays and vaudeville performances, as well as in French, British, and Japanese films. European audiences were captivated by his unique acting style and exotic appearance.

In the French film La Bataille (The Battle) (1923), Hayakawa starred as Le Marquis Yorisaka during the Russo-Japanese War, while also serving as the director and producer. The film became an international success for him.

When La Bataille was released, it erupted into an international success .The film played for two years in Paris alone . In the United States it was distributed under the title, The Danger Line. La Bataille. also was shown in Japan. There the great Admiral Togo, himself, went to see it. There is a scene in La Bataille in which, as Admiral Togo did following the Battle of Tsushima Bay, I stand fighting to control my emotions, and pay tribute to the gallant Japanese sailors who die in the battle. When I acted that scene, I tried to think as I felt he must have thought I spoke– as I believed he must have spoken— out of his heart. The admiral, taken back to that moment in May, 1905, and once again experiencing the emotion he felt then, cried.

Sessue Hayakawa

from his memoir:

ZEN Showed Me the Way To Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility

In a failed attempt to revive his Hollywood career, Hayakawa made his debut in his first American sound film, Daughter of the Dragon (1931), which is related to Fu Manchu. He co-starred with Anna May Wong, the pioneering Chinese American actress from Los Angeles.

In the film, Hayakawa portrayed an American Born Chinese detective, Ah Kee, working with Scotland Yard in London, while Anna May Wong played Princess Ling Moy, the daughter of Fu Manchu. This marked the first on-screen romance between an Asian couple in a sound film.

The picture was my first in sound. Daughter of the Dragon, a mystery I appeared in it with Anna May Wong and Warner Oland. He was not an Oriental— I believe he was of Swedish descent— but be performed Far Eastern character roles extremely well. He best remembered for his creation of the Chinese detective Charlie Chan on the screen.

My role in Daughter of the Dragon, as that of an American born Chinese, a police detective . I enjoyed it very much . For once I was not the VILLAIN. I have played the villain too many times .I think even though I did play romantic roles in my early films Sometime, just for once, I would like to play the hero.

 Sessue Hayakawa

from his memoir:

ZEN Showed Me the Way To Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility

Daughter of the Dragon (1931) eng sub 5

In 1932, he starred in his first Japanese film, Taiyo Wa Higashi Yori. (The Sun Rises from the East). He played the role of Kenji. Japanese film critics savaged his American style acting and filmmaking.

Resurrection

Humphrey Bogart, the Hollywood star, offered the supporting actor role in the noir crime film Tokyo Joe (1949) to Hayakawa. In the film, Hayakawa portrayed Baron Kimura in post-World War II Tokyo. The film resurrected his career in Hollywood.

The Los Angeles Evening Citizen News reported: “Sessue Hayakawa, one of early-day Hollywood’s colorful figures, returns to the Hollywood scene, after an absence of 17 years to portray the troublemaker in “Tokyo Joe,” adventure-thriller …”

Finally I was taken to the studio and introduced to Humphrey Bogart, whom I had never met. He was most kind. “I have admired you for years,” he said. “It’s going to be good working with you.” Humphrey Bogart and I got along very well together right from the start. It was a great compliment to me that, although there were any number of Japanese and Chinese actors in Hollywood, any one of whom might have been offered the role I was asked to play. he insisted on having me.

We completed filming Tokyo Joe in about eight weeks. Once more, I was the villain— an intransigent postwar Japanese, who refused to accept defeat. As usual, I died a violent death.

Sessue Hayakawa

from his memoir:

ZEN Showed Me the Way To Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility

Hayakawa received his greatest acclaim as a supporting actor in the Oscar winning film The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), directed by David Lean. He portrayed the character of Colonel Saito, the commander of a prison camp during 1943, with a compelling intensity. In the film, he orders British prisoners to construct a railway bridge over the River Kwai, which connects Thailand and Burma. This leads to a conflict with British Colonel Nicholson, played by Alec Guinness.

In 1958, Hayakawa was nominated for Best Supporting Actor at the 30th Academy Awards and also received a nomination from the Golden Globes. He won accolades from the National Board of Review for his performance.

To me, such a moment, at such a way station, came in Ceylon in 1957 when I was making the film, The Bridge on the River Kwai, one of the most notable motion picture successes of recent years. In it, my role is that of Colonel Saito, the stem commander of a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp deep in the jungle of Thailand, near the Burma border. Saito and his camp are there for one specific reason. He is duty-bound to see that a bridge is built across the Kwai for the railroad which will link the Bay of Bengal with Bangkok and Singapore and carry the Japanese Grand Army forward to forge still another link in the chain of victory it envisions as its destiny.

Sessue Hayakawa

from his memoir:

ZEN Showed Me the Way To Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXdycEK_38Y

Offscreen

On May 1, 1914, Sessue Hayakawa married Tsuru Aoki. He owned a Scottish Greystone castle at the corner of Franklin and Argyle in Hollywood until 1922. He entertained Hollywood powers and stars and Japanese notable figures from Japan with luncheons, buffet suppers, and sit-down dinners. He amply served bootleg liquor during the Prohibition era.

Hayakawa had two Cadillacs and a Ford. He also owned a gold-plated Pierce-Arrow car, which came with a liveried footman. He compulsively gambled.

Later, he had an affair with Ruth Noble, a fellow vaudeville performer who co-starred with him in The Bandit Prince. Out of wedlock, Noble gave birth to a son named Alexander Hayes in 1929. The controversy intensified when Noble named Hayakawa as the biological father. She claimed that Yukio was her son. Hayakawa eventually settled with Noble in her paternity lawsuit. Hayakawa and Aoki adopted the boy and changed his name to Yukio.

The revelation of a Japanese actor having an affair with a White American woman created a sensation. In The Los Angeles Times on December 14, 1931. Tsuru Aoki publicly supported her husband, stating, “MRS. HAYAKAWA TALKS; LOYAL TO ACTOR IN WOE.” She acknowledged her feelings regarding the affair, recognized the challenges posed by his fame, and defended Hayakawa.

Later, they adopted two daughters Yoshiko and Fujiko in Japan.

During World War II, from 1939 to 1945, Hayakawa was trapped in Paris, France. He survived by painting watercolors.

Tsuru Aoki died in Japan from acute peritonitis in 1961.

After retiring in 1967, Hayakawa became a Zen master in Tokyo, where he taught acting classes. On November 23, 1973, he died from a cerebral thrombosis complicated by pneumonia. He was buried in the Chokeiji Temple Cemetery in Toyama, Japan.

Legacy

 In 1960, Hayakawa published his intimate memoir Zen Showed Me the Way to Peace, Happiness, and Tranquility. He shared how Zen helped him recover from a suicide attempt, which ultimately led to a successful acting career.

In November 1960, Hayakawa was honored at the inaugural Hollywood Walk of Fame for his contributions to the motion picture industry. The ceremony also recognized pioneer Asian American actors Anna May Wong and Sabu. “Sessue Hayakawa was a Japanese and American Issei actor who starred in American, Japanese, French, German, and British films. Hayakawa was the first and one of the few Asian actors to find stardom in the United States as well as Europe. “

In the documentary The Slanted Screen (2006) by Jeff Adachi: NARRATOR: “Although a few Asian American males are cast in leading roles, one of Hollywood’s first stars was a Japanese American named Sessue Hayakawa. … Within a few years, Hayakawa become one of the highest paid and most respected stars on the silent screen. … Sessue Hayakawa played leading romantic roles and villains, and co-starred with the biggest female stars in Hollywood, most of whom are white.”

In the book Sessue Hayakawa: Silent Cinema and Transnational Stardom (2007), Dr. Daisuke Miyao critically examined his Hollywood stardom as a matinee idol during the Golden Age of Silent Films. He focused on his silent films in four parts.

• Introduction 
• Part One – Emperor, Buddhist, Spy, or Indian The Pre-Star Period of Sessue Hayakawa (1914–15) 
• Part Two – Villain, Friend, or Lover Sessue Hayakawa’s Stardom at Lasky-Paramount (1916–18) 
• Part Three – “Triple Consciousness” Sessue Hayakawa’s Stardom at Haworth Pictures Corporation (1918–22) 
• Part Four – Stardom and Japanese Modernity Sessue Hayakawa in Japan 
• Americanization and Nationalism: The Japanese Reception of Sessue Hayakawa
• Epilogue

PBS’s documentary Asian Americans (2020) covered Hayakawa’s life story. He finds great success in the United States yet still hitting the bamboo ceiling, when portraying sinister villains and negative stereotypes.

The American National Film Registry preserved three of his films for being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”: The Cheat in 1993, The Bridge over the River Kwai in 1997, and The Dragon Painter in 2014.

Special Screening of The Dragon Painter Film

On Saturday, March 1, 2025, 2:00 PM, Little Tokyo Historical Society, in partnership with Japanese American National Museum, will specially screen The Dragon Painter. The program will highlight the acting mastery of Sessue Hayakawa with Tsuru Aoki.

Bill Watanabe, Board Member of Little Tokyo Historical Society, wrote:

During the 1910s and 1920s, Japanese-born actor Sessue Hayakawa was one of the biggest silent screen stars in the world whose fame and income rivaled that of Charlie Chaplin and Douglas Fairbanks!  He became the screen heartthrob before Rudolph Valentino came onto the scene – and in light of these fairly unknown attributes of Sessue Hayakawa.

The Little Tokyo Historical Society (LTHS) will host a film screening, along with the Japanese American National Museum, of a film starring Hayakawa which he also produced and also features his wife Tsuru Aoki, herself a well-known actress of the time. The film will be shown on Saturday, March 1st from 2 to 4 pm at the Tateuchi Democracy Center and is free to the public although reservations are required.

In addition to the film showing, musician and composer Goh Nakamura will play an original musical background score he composed for this film. Prior to the film screening, Dr. Daisuke Miyao who wrote the book on Hayakawa will present his thoughts on Hayakawa’s amazing life and career.

In addition to the film screening event, the LTHS is also working to have a street sign marking the location of an historic theater in Little Tokyo which featured films by Japanese artists including Hayakawa, who was discovered acting on the stage in Little Tokyo before becoming a star in the silent movies. Hayakawa was also an Oscar nominee for his role in the movie “The Bridge on the River Kwai.” 

Everyone is welcome to attend this event to commemorate this amazing story.

Close

Sessue Kintaro Hayakawa was the first Hollywood heartthrob during the Golden Age of Silent Films. He paved the way for Asians in the motion picture industry across America and Europe from 1914 to 1967.

Throughout his five-decade career, Hayakawa achieved several notable milestones:

• He was the first Hollywood Heartthrob during the Golden Age of Silent Films.
• He was the first Asian leading actor in Hollywood, starting in 1914, playing interracial relationships.
• In 1915, he participated in the first interracial kiss during an era of strict miscegenation in The Cheat.
• He established the first Asian-owned Hollywood studio, Haworth Pictures Corporation, in 1918.
• He starred as leading actor in all Asian romance in a sound film alongside Anna May Wong in 1931 in Daughter of the Dragon.
• He was nominated for the Oscar as Best Supporting Actor in 1958 for The Bridge on the River Kwai.
• He was recognized as a pioneer Asian actor in the inaugural Hollywood Hall of Fame in 1960.
• He appeared in 109 films.
• He directed six films.
• He produced two films.

Despite his significant achievements in cinema and business, Hayakawa expressed regret over not being cast in heroic roles, as he was often typecast as an exotic figure or a sinister villain. He bitterly endured the systematic racism of the Hollywood studio system.

My one ambition is to play a hero. In all the years I have been on the screen, I always play the bad man.

Sessue Hayakawa