How many of these actors served in WWII?
This was 1957, not that far away from WWII.
shareI took these from Wikipedia:
William Holden - a 2nd Lt in the Army, but he made training films and did not see combat
Alec Guinness - Served in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve in World War II, serving first as a seaman in 1941 and being commissioned the following year. He commanded a landing craft taking part in the invasion of Sicily and Elba and later ferried supplies to the Yugoslav partisans.
Jack Hawkins - a Colonel in an entertainment unit
James Donald - no apparent service, he made war films
Sessue Hayakawa - In 1937, Hayakawa went to France to perform in Yoshiwara and later found himself trapped and separated from his family, when the German occupation of France began in 1940. Hayakawa made few movies during these years, but supported himself by selling watercolors. He joined the French Resistance and helped Allied flyers during the war.
That bit about Hayakawa sounds as if it'd make a great movie in itself.
"I'm not reckless . . . I'm skillful!"
I'd imagine that after December 1941 Hayakawa would have experienced severe racial prejudice in Europe and found life most difficult.
shareHe probably would have experienced severe racial prejudice in Europe either way.
The people, and the people alone, are the motive force in the making of history.
-Mao Zedong
I do not know his particular details, but while the Nazis obviously made life extremely difficult for nearly everyone in the nations they occupied, a Japanese man of his stature might not have had to deal with serious racial prejudice in France. For one thing, Parisians were notably friendlier to various ethnic minorities, with some black Americans finding refuge there before the war. Also, the Germans and Japan were allies during the war, so he would have had that in his favor.
I have seen enough to know I have seen too much. -- ALOTOshare
I've known several businessmen who did business in Japan during the 1970's. Their comments to me and others were that the Japanese were the most severly racially prejudiced people they'd ever encountered (racially segregated hotels, comments, etc.). Race prejudice is an international problem -- and always has been.
shareYou don't say where or when those businessmen said they had faced discrimination. The bias against Asians in the US is well documented, from laws long before WWII, regulating immigration quotas, including not allowing men to bring their wives. When he was making silent movies, and later talkies, (again, long before the Pearl Harbor attack) Mr Hayakawa was not allowed to portray any sort of romantic scene with a non-Asian. And we all know, or should, about the US concentration camps set up after Pearl Harbor, but Mr Hayakawa was in France by then.
Now, since WWII, which the Japanese militarists launched in the early 1930s, there has been a lot of residual animosity in Asia against the Japanese, and one can easily understand why. Unlike the Germans, the Japanese government has always limited its admissions of blame for countless atrocities, and they do a poor job of fully educating their children about the war. This leaves many Japanese puzzled as to why they face animosity on the mainland when they visit, and many falsely conclude that the Koreans or Chinese, etc., are simply mean-spirited bigots.
A side note: In that war, things were often more complicated that we might now think. Years after the Nazis invaded and decimated much of Poland, they were the ones who uncovered the Katyn Forest massacre of Polish officers done by the Russians.
And there was the amazing case of Japanese diplomat Chiune Sugihara, who saved thousands of European Jews by tirelessly issuing visas even as he was being forced to leave Lithuania.
I have seen enough to know I have seen too much. -- ALOTOshare
I don't rememeber where these men experienced the prejudicial treatment. These were different men working for different companies and in Japan at different times, btw.
I do appreciate that the balance of your post supports my final thought -- that racial discrimination/prejudice is, and always has been, an international problem.
Best