--Organization of Chinese Americans

By Marc Morano
Cybercast News Service
July 2, 2003

Coming soon to a TV near you?

The Fox Movie Channel, apparently torn between the sensitivities of Asian Americans and the desires of its viewers, has amended an earlier decision to cancel a Charlie Chan film festival.

Fox had announced the cancellation of the broadcasts last week after complaints from Asian American groups about the fictional Chinese detective the groups said was portrayed as a racially offensive stereotype.

However, the Fox Movie Channel, which serves about 20 million households through either cable or satellite service, added a sentence late Tuesday to its website statement indicating a possible shift in the network's decision to cancel the Chan film festival.

The sentence added to the Fox website reads as follows:

"Fox Movie Channel will schedule Charlie Chan films based on the feedback of its subscribers."

The cable channel's apparent softening of its position is firing up Asian groups who had protested the airing of the Chan films in the first place.

"This is really the second time [Fox Movie Channel has] caved to public pressure. I would imagine that the movies are probably going to run now," Andrew Rice, spokesman for the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium (NAPALC), told CNSNews.com.

The NAPALC, along with the National Asian American Telecommunications Association (NAATA), have been among the leaders of the campaign to remove Chan films from the airwaves. The NAATA called Chan "one of the most offensive Asian caricatures of America's cinematic past." More than 40 films were produced featuring the crime-solving character Charlie Chan, beginning in the silent era of the 1920s and continuing into the late 1940s.

Rice predicted supporters of the Chan films would dominate the "feedback" that Fox will receive.

"It's disappointing. Anytime you're dealing with a minority group, you are not going to be the majority," Rice said.

Tim Lucas, editor and co-publisher of the monthly magazine Video Watchdog, one of the leaders of the effort by Chan fans to persuade Fox to reverse its cancellation, sees the new website "feedback" statement as a hopeful sign.

"It shows me that [the Fox Movie Channel is] beginning to give some credence to the [Chan supporters'] viewpoints, who never had a chance to make their opinion known prior to the decision to cancel," Lucas told CNSNews.com.

Lucas welcomes a decision based on viewer feedback because he believes Chan fans have the facts on their side.

"The people who are objecting to the [Charlie Chan] ban are explaining why in well-reasoned terms, and the [Asian] organizations that have asked for the films to be withdrawn have been falling back on misinformation," Lucas explained.

"I have received nothing but support from Asian-Americans' correspondence," he added.

Rice's group, the NAPALC, earlier on Tuesday had praised Fox for its decision to cancel the Chan broadcasts. In a press release, the group praised the movie channel as "a responsible corporate citizen because they understand that in 2003 we need to move beyond stereotypes."

Rice said a Fox Movie Channel executive told him the network cancelled the Chan films because they were "getting a lot of negative feedback, and [the Fox executive] felt like it was the right thing to do - to pull the movies because they were so offensive to the Asian community."

But Rice now believes that if Fox allows the films to be broadcast as the result of popularity or "feedback" from viewers, the network will have forfeited its ethical concern for racial sensitivity.

Novelist Earl Derr Biggers created the fictional Chan character, and the Chan movie 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 in the 1930s. The movies also featured Asian 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.

Lucas said he has a growing suspicion that the Fox Movie Channel is milking the controversy for publicity and ratings.

"I don't want to jinx anything, but the addition of that little caveat to Fox's statement - which is making Chan fans hopeful - makes me start to wonder if this whole controversy might not be someone's brilliant plan to bring more attention to the Chan festival," Lucas said, noting that Fox affiliates were still running ads on Tuesday of this week for the Chan film festival on the Fox Movie Channel.

"I'd like to believe that my feelings haven't been deliberately manipulated, but if it gets the movies back on TV in the long run - manipulate away," he added.

Several phone calls to the Fox Movie Channel seeking comment were not returned.

Fox channel now says future of Charlie Chan up to subscribers

Banned less than a week ago, Charlie Chan might already be on his way to a comeback.

The Fox Movie Channel announced last week it was going to stop carrying Chan films after Asian-American groups complained that the movies, made in the 1930s and 1940s, fuel racist stereotypes about Asians.

But the cable channel indicated Thursday it again might show movies about the resourceful detective after all. The network put a statement on its Web site that read: "Fox Movie Channel will schedule Charlie Chan films based on the feedback of its subscribers."

Calls Thursday to Fox Movie Channel spokesman Thomas Ruffner seeking further explanation were not returned.

The character Charlie Chan--a Chinese detective, though never played by an Asian actor--would speak in a fake Chinese accent and spout inscrutable, fortune-cookie-type wisdom while occasionally complaining about his "honorable No. 1 son."

The Chan movies had largely disappeared from the airwaves and cable networks. But Fox Movie Channel was involved in restoring about two dozen of the old movies and was in the middle of showing them as part of a weekly "film festival" when it said it had been made aware of complaints of ethnic stereotyping.

News of its ban brought the network hundreds of e-mails and letters urging it to reconsider and bring back Chan.

But a spokesman for an Asian-American group said Thursday he hopes Fox Movie Channel won't do that.

"We are not looking for censorship, but, when you look at the four major networks, there is not one single character represented by an Asian male," said Andrew Rice, a spokesman for the National Asian Pacific American Legal Consortium. "Instead, you have this, which is such a lightning rod in the Asian community."

Contact the Fox Movie Channel here.

Action Alert: Charlie Chan Movie Festival

---ACTION ALERT -- PLEASE REDISTRIBUTE WIDELY---

SNEAKY AS A FOX

A few weeks ago, various national Asian American organizations, including OCA, NAATA, MANAA and NAPALC, became aware that the FOX Movie Channel cable network was planning to air a "Charlie Chan Movie Festival." As the Organization of Chinese Americans has explained:

"Charlie Chan is a painful reminder of Hollywood's racist refusal to hire minorities to play roles that were designated for them and a further reminder of the miscegenation laws that prevented interracial interaction even on screen. Asian Pacific Americans and many other minorities were not able to portray themselves on screen. Instead, they were inaccurately depicted by Caucasian actors, who wore face paint to act out stereotypical images of Asians as slanted eye, buck toothed, subservient, and non-English speaking. To recast Charlie Chan at this time and age would be completely inappropriate."

On July 1, FOX Movie Channel announced that it was canceling the festival. However, on July 2, the FOX Movie Channel Web site quietly changed this position to say that "Fox Movie Channel will schedule Charlie Chan films based on the feedback of its subscribers."

In other words, FOX is preparing to bow to pressure from its viewers who want the movie festival to go ahead.

Asian Americans must act NOW.

Tell FOX that its deception has not gone unnoticed, and that if the movie festival goes ahead, Asian Americans will long remember this affront to our community. You can contact the FOX Movie Channel at:

http://www.foxmoviechannel.com/contact.asp

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

View an animated cartoon entitled "FOX in sheepish clothing" on the Web at:

http://modelminority.com/images/postcards/fox.gif

Read about the latest developments at: