THE DEVIL'S CLAIM (1920) Sessue Hayakawa & Rhea Mitchell Hindu Novelist Drama

Description

Vintage original 11x14 in. US lobby card
from the silent film drama,
THE DEVIL'S CLAIM
, released in 1920 by Robertson-Cole Distributing Corporation and
directed by Charles Swickard
and written by J. Grubb Alexander. Set in New York's Greenwich Village area, Sessue Hayakawa stars as a Hindu novelist who becomes involved with a band of devil worshippers.
The image features an interior medium shot of Akbar Khan (
Sessue Hayakawa
) as she shakes hands with social worker Virginia Crosby (
Rhea Mitchell
), who appears to be somewhat dazed
Printed for the film's original 1920 US theatrical release, this vintage original lobby card is unrestored in very fine- condition with a light 1 in. diagonal crease on the bottom left corner and a tiny amount of wear on the tip of the other corners. There are no pinholes, tears, stains, or other flaws.
Plot-line
: Akbar Khan (Sessue Hayakawa), a Hindu novelist living in Greenwich Village, uses his love affairs as inspiration for his books. When he exhausts all the story material from his affair with Indora (Colleen Moore), a young Persian girl, he deserts her. Virginia Crosby (Rhea Mitchell), a social worker, takes pity on Indora, who has failed in an attempt to kill Khan, and offers to win him back for her. Virginia pretends to fall in love with Khan and inspires him with tales of the devil's trademark, the emblem of a band of devil worshipers whose hero is named Hassa. In these tales, Hassa and a beautiful Hindu woman lead a series of adventures based upon the motif of devil worship. When Virginia jilts Khan before the last installment of the serial is written, she sends Indora to take her place and Khan finally discovers his love for her.
Kintaro Hayakawa
(June 10, 1889 – November 23, 1973), known professionally as Sessue Hayakawa, was a Japanese actor. He was one of the biggest stars in Hollywood during the silent era of the 1910’s and 1920’s. Hayakawa was the first actor of Asian descent to achieve stardom as a leading man in the United States and Europe. His "broodingly handsome" good looks and typecasting as a sexually dominant villain made him a heartthrob among American women during a time of racial discrimination, and he became one of the first male sex symbols of Hollywood.
After being expelled from the Japanese naval academy and surviving a suicide attempt at 18, Hayakawa attended the University of Chicago, where he studied political economics and quarterbacked the school's football team. Upon graduating, he traveled to Los Angeles in order to board a scheduled boat back to Japan, but decided to try out acting in Little Tokyo. There, Hayakawa impressed Hollywood figures and was signed on to star in
The Typhoon
(1914). He made his breakthrough in Cecil B. DeMille's
The Cheat
(1915), and thereafter became famous for his roles as a forbidden lover. Hayakawa was one of the highest paid stars of his time, earning ,000 per week in 1915, and million per year through his own production company from 1918 to 1921.
Hayakawa's popularity and sex appeal ("his most rabid fan base was white women") unsettled many segments of American society which were filled with feelings of the Yellow Peril. With multiple World Wars taking place throughout his career, and rising anti-Asian sentiment in the United States, the types of roles that he usually played were gradually "taken over by other actors who were not as threatening as Hayakawa in terms of race and sex". Hayakawa left Hollywood in 1922 and worked in Japanese and European cinema for many years before making his Hollywood comeback in
Tokyo Joe
(1949).
Of his talkies, Hayakawa is probably best known for his role as Colonel Saito in
The Bridge on the River Kwai
(1957), for which he earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Hayakawa starred in over 80 feature films, and two of his films (
The Cheat
and
The Bridge on the River Kwai
) stand in the United States National Film Registry.