Pat Morita, whose birth name was Noriyuki Morita, has gone to the Great Beyond, age 73.
An American actor who became famous for his Karate Kid movies and who also helped change perceptions of Japanese-Americans in Hollywood, Morita’s show business career began in the 1960s when he was 30 years old. As a stand-up comedian, Morita, the California-born son of Japanese immigrants, billed himself at first as the “Hip Nip.” He told a reporter in 1967: “‘Hip Nip’ just sounds groovy. A drummer laid it on me.”
Ralph Macchio, who played Daniel in the Karate Kid movies, said of Morita’s death: “Forever My Sensei.”
sayounara Morita San
*prayer*
Even I learnt how to rug windows from him.
My Miyagi was like a childhood hero to people my age X.X and now he is gone, who shall teach me to wax on and wax off? No one thats who
New York Times honored Pat Morita in editorial
NEW YORK — The New York Times on Tuesday devoted an editorial observer section tp the late Japanese-American actor Pat Morita, saying that he was “one of the last survivors of a generation of Asian-American actors who toiled within a system that was interested only in the stock Asian.”
In a commentary hedlined “Goodbye to Pat Morita, Best Supporting Asian,” Lawrence Downes of the New York Times said, “The movie and TV industry has never had many roles for Asian-American men, and it seemed for a while that they all went to Mr Morita.”
“Whenever a script called for a little Asian guy to drive a taxi, serve drinks or utter wise aphorisms in amusingly broken English, you could count on Mr Morita to be there,” Downes said.
“But it’s distressing to think that the life’s work of one of the best-known, hardest-working Asian-American actors is mostly a loose collection of servile supporting roles,” he said.
Downes said some Asian actors such as George Takei who played Mr Sulu in “Star Trek” and Jack Soo on “Barney Miller” broke out the stereotype but it “will be a long, long time before we erase the memory of the bucktoothed, jabbering Mickey Rooney in “Breakfast at Tiffany’s,” or Sidney Toler as Charlie Chan.”
Downes said Morita has a role as a Buddhist priest in an unreleased movie about Japanese-American soldiers of the famed 442nd Regimental Combat Team in World War II, and said his legacy “may soon take a posthumous turn for the better.”
The movie, “Only the Brave,” was written, directed, and produced by Lane Nishikawa, who was quoted as saying that the movie told its story from the Asian-American point of view, which was “an unusual perspective, by past or current standards,” Downes said.
“With its wide pool of Asian-American talent, including Mr Morita, Tamlyn Tomita and Jason Scott Lee, the film promises to be at least different from the other movie about the 442nd,” he said.
In Memoriam: Pat Morita
As noted on Japundit, Pat Morita has recently passed away. The news struck me terribly, just as I suspect it did for many in the Asian American community. For the younger generation, and I’m talking about people younger than 30, he’ll probably only be remembered as the endearing Mr. Miyagi from the Karate Kid. To an older generation, he was a comedian who had friends like Red Foxx, played Arnie in Happy Days, and appeared in MASH.
I did a little research to find out what else Pat had done with his life, and it turns out, he’s done a lot. First, let’s look at how things started: he got tuberculosis at two, and spent the next nine years in a hospital. A surgeon managed to do some kind of complicated surgery on his spine, allowing him to walk. Then the day came, at age 11, when he could walk out of the hospital. When he did, he was sent straight to the internment camp where the rest of his family was imprisoned. Clearly, the first chapters of the Pat Morita life story are pretty tragic.
Reading through his biography and filmography, it’s pretty clear that he managed to do a lot of stuff. He’s got over a hundred acting credits!
So rest in peace my friend, you will be missed.
He was 73??? Wow. He always seemed so youthful and vibrant. He will be missed.