| The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Mystery |
| Starring | Anna May Wong |
| Country of origin | United States |
| No. of seasons | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 10 |
| Production | |
| Running time | 30 minutes |
| Original release | |
| Network | DuMont |
| Release | August 27 – November 21, 1951 |
The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong is an American television series which aired on the now defunct DuMont Television Network. It starred Chinese American silent film and talkie star Anna May Wong (birth name Wong Liu-tsong) who played a detective in a role written specifically for her. The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong was the first U.S. television series starring an Asian-American series lead. [1]
Wong's character was a dealer in Chinese art whose career involved her in detective work and international intrigue. [2] The ten half-hour episodes aired during prime time, on Wednesdays at 9:00p.m. ET. [3] Though there were plans for a second season, DuMont canceled the show in 1952. No copies of the show or its scripts are known to exist. [4]
Like most DuMont programs, no known episodes of The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong exist today, the majority of the network's footage having been dumped into the Hudson River upon closure. Although a few kinescope episodes of various DuMont series survive at Chicago's Museum of Broadcast Communications, New York's Paley Center for Media, and the UCLA Film and Television Archive, there are no copies of Madame Liu-Tsong in these archives. [5]
In 1996, early television actress Edie Adams testified at a hearing in front of a panel of the Library of Congress on the preservation of American television and video. Adams stated that, by the 1970s, little value was given to the DuMont film archive, and that all the remaining kinescopes of DuMont series were loaded into three trucks and dumped into Upper New York Bay. [6]
| # | Title [7] | Aired |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "The Egyptian Idol" | August 27, 1951 |
| 2. | "The Golden Women" | September 3, 1951 |
| 3. | "Spreading Oak" | September 10, 1951 |
| 4. | "The Man with a Thousand Eyes" | September 17, 1951 |
| 5. | "Burning Sands" | September 24, 1951 |
| 6. | "Shadow of the Sun God" | October 1, 1951 |
| 7. | "Golden Caravan" | October 8, 1951 |
| 8. | "Message from Beyond" | October 15, 1951 |
| 9. | "The Prodigal Stepson" | October 22, 1951 |
| 10. | "Tinder Box" | October 31, 1951 |
| 11. | "The House of Quiet Dignity" | November 7, 1951 |
| 12. | "Boomerang" | November 14, 1951 |
| 13. | "The Face of Evil" | November 21, 1951 |
The DuMont Television Network was one of America's pioneer commercial television networks, rivaling NBC and CBS for the distinction of being first overall in the United States. It was owned by Allen B. DuMont Laboratories, a television equipment and television set manufacturer, and began operation on April 13, 1940.
Kinescope, shortened to kine, also known as telerecording in Britain, is a recording of a television program on motion picture film, directly through a lens focused on the screen of a video monitor. The process was pioneered during the 1940s for the preservation, re-broadcasting and sale of television programs before the introduction of quadruplex videotape, which from 1956 eventually superseded the use of kinescopes for all of these purposes. Kinescopes were the only practical way to preserve live television broadcasts prior to videotape.
Mary Kay and Johnny is an American sitcom starring real-life married couple Mary Kay and Johnny Stearns. It was the first sitcom broadcast on a television network in the United States. Mary Kay and Johnny initially aired live on the DuMont Television Network before moving to CBS and then NBC.
Wong Liu Tsong, known professionally as Anna May Wong, was an American actress, considered the first Chinese American film star in Hollywood, as well as the first Chinese American actress to gain international recognition. Her varied career spanned silent film, sound film, television, stage, and radio.
Captain Video and His Video Rangers is an American science fiction television series that aired on the DuMont Television Network and was the first series of its genre on American television.
Rocky King Detective is an American action/crime drama series that was broadcast live on the DuMont Television Network on Sundays at 9pm ET for most of its run. The series ran for six seasons, from January 7, 1950, to December 26, 1954. From January 7, 1950, to July 22, 1950, the series was broadcast on Saturdays at 8:30pm ET, and from September 8, 1950, to March 9, 1951, it was broadcast on Fridays at 9:30pm ET, until moving to Sundays.
Admiral Broadway Revue is an American live television variety show that ran from January 28 to June 3, 1949. The show was notable for being "television's first full scale Broadway type musical revue."
The 1948–49 network television schedule for the four major English language commercial broadcast networks in the United States. The schedule covers primetime hours from September 1948 through March 1949. The schedule is followed by a list per network of returning series, new series, and series cancelled after the 1947–48 season. This was the first season in which all four networks then in operation in the United States offered nightly prime time schedules Monday through Friday.
Daughter of Shanghai is a 1937 American crime film directed by Robert Florey and starring Anna May Wong, Charles Bickford and Buster Crabbe. Unusually for the time, East Asian American actors played the lead roles. It was also one of the first films in which Anthony Quinn appeared. In 2006, Daughter of Shanghai was included in the annual selection of 25 motion pictures to be added to the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress.
Boxing from St. Nicholas Arena was an American sports program originally broadcast on NBC from 1946 to 1948, and later on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network from 1954 to 1956.
Newsweek Views the News is an American television program broadcast Mondays at 8pm ET on the DuMont Television Network. The series ran from 1948 to 1950.
Anna May Wong was an American actress of Chinese heritage, who grew up in a culturally diverse neighborhood adjacent to Chinatown, Los Angeles. Her father believed in exposing his family to the creative arts, and often took them to see traditional Chinese stage productions. Young Anna, however, was fascinated by the emerging film industry in the area, and would fantasize herself as a movie actress like Pearl White or Mary Pickford. Her daydreams began to look like an achievable goal when local Baptist minister James Wang, who often worked with the film productions, recommended her as an extra in the Alla Nazimova silent production of The Red Lantern. Wong was only 14 years old, and eventually left school before graduating. While still a teenager, she was cast in the lead role of Lotus Flower in The Toll of the Sea.
The Johns Hopkins Science Review is a US television series about science that was produced at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland from 1948-1955. Starting in 1950, the series aired on the DuMont Television Network until the network's demise in 1955. The series' creator was Lynn Poole, who wrote or co-wrote most of its episodes and acted as the on-camera host.
Front Page Detective is an American crime drama series which aired on the DuMont Television Network on Fridays at 9:30 p.m. ET from July 6, 1951, to September 19, 1952, and in October and November 1953. The program was then in broadcast syndication for several years thereafter.
Miss U.S. Television was a series of contests held by the DuMont Television Network and its affiliates during 1950. The contest searched for the woman "with the most outstanding talent and beauty".
Concert Tonight is an American music television series which aired on the now-defunct DuMont Television Network.
Once Upon a Tune is a weekly half-hour American television series that aired on the DuMont Television Network, premiering on March 6, 1951, and running to May 15, 1951.
Highway to the Stars was an early American live television soap opera, which was broadcast on New York City station WABD, flagship station of the DuMont Television Network, from August to October 1947, at which point it was replaced with Look Upon a Star, itself eventually replaced with Camera Headlines in January 1948.
Amanda is an American music television program starring Amanda Randolph that debuted on the DuMont Television Network on November 1, 1948. The ending date for the show is unclear, but it still appears in a TV schedule from October 1949.
